lockdown
Covid could paralyse the new German coalition
An iron curtain has descended on Europe, and once again, it goes right through the middle of Germany. The average…
When push comes to shove
One thing that surprised every-one during lockdown was how many people derived unexpected pleasure from living under imposed restrictions. Can…
Why lockdown sceptics lost the argument
I’m optimistic that the government won’t implement ‘Plan B’, let alone impose another lockdown — but not because sceptics like…
Why did we decide that Covid was over?
Look, I don’t know much epidemiology. Can’t pretend to. So what follows is, necessarily, a personal finger to the wind.…
Can booster shots help Britain avoid another lockdown?
For weeks now, ministers have been getting increasingly frustrated by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s failure (JCVI) to back…
Emergency exit
For 18 months, the government has held power over us as never before in peacetime. The emergency powers granted by…
Covid pingdemic takes its toll on Britain’s economic bounce-back
The arrival of ‘freedom day’ on 19 July enabled people to return to concerts, festivals, and ditch social distancing, but…
Gove has got his groove back
I was pleased to see pictures of Michael Gove at a nightclub in Aberdeen last weekend. According to press reports,…
Zero-Covid is wishful thinking if Australia wants to rejoin the world
As former Australian foreign minister and High Commissioner to the UK Alexander Downer wrote in last week’s magazine, almost all…
Homeric levels of misery
The National Theatre has given Sophocles’s Philoctetes a makeover and a new title, Paradise. This must be ironic because the…
The blind spot in the SNP’s ‘war on drink’
Scotland’s grim reputation for abnormally high drug fatalities has become embedded in the public consciousness over the past year. The…
Will Covid turn into the common cold?
Many experts and modellers thought that the 19 July reopening would be a disaster. So far, that has not been…
The new insularity
There is something bizarre about a sporting event designed to bring people and nations together but from which spectators have…
How Australia was caught in lockdown limbo
Sajid Javid’s deleted weekend tweet about Britain ‘learning to live with, rather than cower from Covid’ upset just about everyone…
Diary
You always remember when a prime minister calls you to ask you to take on a new role, and you…
Now what?
The government’s Covid optimism is fading fast
Get ready for the Boring Twenties
Earlier this year, I noted the suggestion (made by an American academic and run with by a swathe of the…
When will Boris get serious about balancing the budget?
Should we be pleased that net government borrowing for June came in below expectations, at £22.8 billion – £5.5 billion…
Boris Johnson’s sombre ‘freedom day’ press conference
On the day that nearly all legal Covid restrictions go, one could be forgiven for presuming ministers would be in the…
The depressing spectacle of ‘freedom day’
It was billed as ‘freedom day’. Yet few people, it seems, either want to enjoy their new-found freedom or are…
How ‘freedom day’ became ‘chaos day’
Welcome to ‘freedom day’, or more properly ‘chaos day’ – with businesses warning they can’t operate because too many employees…
Has Boris got cold feet over ‘freedom day’?
A very strange ‘freedom day’ greets us on Monday. Legally, almost all restrictions will be lifted. But practically, ministers are…
Best behaviour
The Prime Minister is urging citizens not to throw caution to the winds when lockdown ends on 19 July but…
Whitty’s lockdown warning will trouble Boris
In a Science Museum webinar yesterday, Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer, warned about the increasing number of people in…
Johnson urges caution ahead of final easing
How different will life be after 19 July? Not very, if the Prime Minister’s press conference this evening was anything…
