Only two weeks ago, the Health Secretary, Sajid Javid, was doing his best to calm business fears, confident that last year’s nightmare before Christmas would not repeat itself.
“We know now,” he told Sky News, that harsh Covid restrictions “carry a very heavy price, both economically, socially, in terms of non-Covid health outcomes such as the impact on mental health”.
The Government wouldn’t usher in such restrictions again, he insisted, without serious and thoughtful consideration. “If one was to make decisions like that, they would have to be done very, very carefully. We’re not there yet. We’re nowhere near that.”
Yet ten days later, the Prime Minister announced Plan B. “It came out of nowhere,” says one source close to government, “and it has completely and utterly thrown a spanner into the works of the economic recovery”.
There are plenty of theories doing the rounds about why new mask mandates, working from home directives and vaccine passports were ushered in so quickly. But regardless of the reasons behind it, Javid’s promise of careful…
