I have never known such a sombre mood in the UK as that which prevails today. As if 2020 has not been bad enough, the weekend news that the government has cancelled the planned five day relaxation of social distancing restrictions over Christmas in response to rising infection rates has thrown the plans of millions into chaos. This was done with the best of intentions in the face of a new variant of SARS-Cov-2 which appears to be more infectious than previous strains. But in response more than 40 countries have, at the time of writing, placed bans on travellers arriving from the UK to limit the spread of the new variant. The most serious of these is the French decision to impose a 48-hour ban on passengers and freight entering from the UK which will severely disrupt cross-border trade.
The first reaction of many people was to direct their anger at the government. After all they were promised just three days earlier by Boris Johnson that it would be “inhuman” to ban Christmas as he defended plans to allow households to socialise over the festive period (the fact that local lockdowns in late July were announced hours before the start of the Eid festival did not go unremarked on social media). That said, we should cut the government some slack regarding the decision to impose new restrictions in the face of the most serious health crisis in a century. Many people may disagree, but the experience of the first lockdown was that it did result in a significant reduction in the spread of the disease, albeit at a very high economic cost. Those arguing that the UK should have followed the Swedish model are less vociferous in the face of mounting acceptance in Sweden that the government’s strategy was a mistake, with even the King suggesting that the policy has “failed”.
... but how it was done
A far bigger problem has been the government’s communications strategy. The decision on Saturday afternoon to add a fourth tier of restrictions to the 3-tier system with just a few hours’ notice seemed very rushed. Worse, it flew in the face of the message given just three days earlier. Since the government has known about the new Covid variant for some time, it calls last week’s comments defending previous Christmas plans into question. However, this is in keeping with the pattern which Johnson has followed throughout the year. He was late in implementing the first lockdown in March; he resisted the scientists’ calls for a national lockdown in September, instead opting for a series of badly implemented regional lockdowns, before being forced to bow to the inevitable and implementing a second lockdown in November and now the latest U-turn.
Preparing for border disorder
But it is the restrictions on the flow of goods and people across borders which are the most sobering aspect of the whole issue. Even before the events of recent days queues were mounting on both sides of the Channel as firms attempted to build up stocks ahead of disruption in the event of a no-deal Brexit. One of the consequences has been that the cost of transporting a container of goods has significantly increased, with reports that a container of goods from China to Felixstowe now costs $10,000 per load – four times the usual rate. The French border closure has made the problem significantly worse because hauliers have no incentive to enter the UK for fear of being stuck on this side of the Channel. None of this should come as any real surprise. I did point out two years ago that problems at the ports would quickly lead to large queues.
It may be that the border closure is partly motivated by the desire of the French government to fire a warning shot at Downing Street to indicate what could happen in the event of a no-deal Brexit. Contrary to what the diehards have maintained over the last four years, the UK really does not hold all the cards – it is questionable how many it holds at all. In the absence of either a Brexit deal or an extension of the transition period, this could be just a foretaste of what is to come. Latest reports from within government suggest that the UK has ruled out any Brexit extension. Given Johnson’s record on U-turns, we should not necessarily take this at face value. But if this really is the government’s position, it should brace itself for the mother of all political backlashes in 2021. It is extremely difficult to believe that voters will stand idly by whilst restrictions on cross-border traffic cause such inconvenience, resulting in higher prices and a reduction in the range of goods available for purchase.
Interestingly, a recent IMF working paper looked at pandemics across a range of countries over the period 2001 to 2018 to assess whether they lead to higher inequality and increased social unrest. It concluded that “the results from local projections show that social unrest increases about 14 months after pandemics on average. The direct effect peaks in about 24 months post-pandemic.” Add in the self-inflicted pain of a senselessly hard Brexit and I would not want to be in Johnson’s shoes in 2021.
It's nothing personal - I just oppose incompetence
I was recently accused of peddling Anti-Tory propaganda. Since the respondent was anonymous I am sure they will not remind me repeating their response to one of my blog posts: “From the very first words of this article, it's glaringly obvious that the writer is a remoaner. The colouring of the language clearly lays a foundation for the rest of the article to be another Brexit/Tory-bashing tiresome monologue. So, it puts me off. It didn't start as balanced, so I (and I'm guessing many others) didn't read through, because they already knew the theme and conclusion of the story. Shame. There may be many salient points buried within these 1489 words, but I won't go in search for them. I have better things to do with my time.”
Whoever they are, they have missed the point of everything I have written over recent years. My criticisms are not party political (they should read what I wrote about Jeremy Corbyn). They are a response to government incompetence. It is not my intention to take pot shots at the government for the sake of it – I leave that job to the professional columnists with this article by The Observer’s Andrew Rawnsley neatly summarising Johnson’s unsuitability for leadership at a time when more than flowery rhetoric is required. As Rawnsley put it, if there is light at the end of the tunnel it “will have to be exceedingly bright to wipe away all the memories of how long and dark, stumbling and flailing has been the nation’s journey through the tunnel.”
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