Is Boris feeling lucky?

The political and economic new year is all about surging Covid and a surging cost of living. The list of what families in particular will contend with in the coming weeks is enough to induce tears of exasperation.

Take schools for starters.

Staff absences, largely caused by coronavirus, were 8 per cent at the end of last term. On the Department for Education’s own projections, the Omicron surge means these absences will rise to between 9 per cent and 13 per cent at the beginning of this term, and it is not inconceivable the upward path in absences will peak at between 20 per cent and 25 per cent.

The Education Secretary, Nadhim Zahawi, is determined schools should remain open. Head teachers are with him in the ambition but are understandably anxious about the challenge — which will be trebly hard for remoter schools located far from supply teachers.

Damage to education is inevitable, as Zahawi has admitted, in the permissions he’s granted for classes to be merged and for assistants to fill in as teachers.