What shocks me most about Matt Hancock’s WhatsApp messages is the flippancy surrounding decisions to scare, manipulate and control the British public. We were told, repeatedly, that government ministers were ‘following the science’. But thanks to Isabel Oakeshott we now know that schools were closed, children masked, families and friends separated, visitors kept out of care homes and quarantine periods prolonged, less because of ‘science’ and more, it seems, for political convenience.
So where is the outrage? People lost lives and livelihoods. Children missed out on education and exercise. Physical and mental health suffered. Lengthy NHS waiting lists and economic problems will be with us for many years to come. Yet, incredibly, the response to this scandal of unimaginable, incalculable scale, from most news outlets, is oddly subdued. Non-existent, even.
Far from leading every major television and radio news bulletin, the Daily Telegraph‘s lockdown files revelations are pushed down to item three or four.
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