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 deeply worried by the surge of the Indian variant and the rise of hospitalisations to around 600 a day — a figure that will probably double according to the Bristol University PCCF project (which we at The Spectator find to be the most reliable). Hence this massive fudge: the government abolishing the mask mandate but saying it ‘expects’ people to wear them in shops and crowded spaces nonetheless. The NHS will continue to mandate them in hospitals. Then perhaps the biggest surprise: the vaccine passport U-turn whereby companies are told it’s their social duty to ask people for proof of immunity or a negative test.

What’s happened? From my inquiries, it seems that Boris Johnson has got cold feet but it was too late: he had boxed himself into a corner with all his promises of 19 July going ahead, being irrevocable etc.