Lockdown confusion isn’t helping

The government is still refusing to give any details of whether, when and how the current coronavirus lockdown might lift. At this afternoon’s lobby briefing with journalists, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman repeated the line we have heard over the past few days that the government needs to be ‘focused relentlessly’ on ensuring that people abide by the current restrictions, saying: ‘We need to focus in our public message in order to save lives.’

There is clearly anxiety that people will relax their approach to social distancing and staying at home over the Easter weekend, with the weather forecast promising warm temperatures and sunshine. No. 10 is accordingly rebuffing the endless questions from journalists about the lockdown. But this is out of sync with the devolved administrations of the UK: both First Ministers of Wales and Scotland have said the lockdown will not lift any time soon. Nicola Sturgeon said today that the COBRA meeting this afternoon is highly unlikely to conclude anything else.