Now what? The government’s Covid optimism is fading fast

When the news broke on Sunday morning that Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak planned to skip self-isolation — availing themselves of a loophole — the reaction was as much disbelief as fury. Could the Prime Minister and Chancellor, even for a second, think it right to excuse themselves from the Test and Trace regime that they have imposed on millions? They changed their minds (after just a few hours) but it raised wider concerns in the party: what on earth were they thinking? And is this typical of the quality of decision-making we can expect ahead of a tricky few weeks?

Of course they both had other plans in mind for so-called ‘freedom day’. By this point in the roadmap, the hope was the virus would be in retreat and the UK heading towards a ‘great British summer’. Ministers were counting down to their holidays while Johnson had spent the past few weeks focused on returning to his post-Covid domestic agenda with an underwhelming ‘levelling up’ speech, along with plans for a social care announcement to mark his two-year anniversary as PM.