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The Guardian view on governing after lockdown: Boris Johnson’s grip is weak

<span>Photograph: Barcroft Media/Getty Images</span>
Photograph: Barcroft Media/Getty Images

There is no such thing as a total truce in Westminster, and a partial one rarely lasts long. The period when Labour felt obliged by a sense of duty in a national emergency to provide “constructive” opposition to the government is over. In parliament on Wednesday, Sir Keir Starmer accused Boris Johnson of failing to get to grips with the situation and the prime minister responded with affected resentment at the lack of “cooperation” from his counterpart across the dispatch box.

But it was Mr Johnson’s decision to support Dominic Cummings over alleged lockdown breaches that incinerated any prospect of political consensus on coronavirus policy. By failing to chastise his maverick aide, the Tory leader committed two grave mistakes. First, he effectively diluted the mandatory element of the regulations, creating an unwritten “Cummings clause” for anyone minded to interpret the rules leniently for themselves. Second, he politicised the whole lockdown issue by making it clear that science and evidence are subordinate to the whim of a single Downing Street adviser.

That has consequences for the implementation of future regulations. Already, a Conservative rebellion is brewing over plans to impose a fortnight of quarantine on people arriving in the UK, with fines of up to £1,000 for those who roam without permission. There are doubts about the viability and purpose of the proposal. Sceptics ask why such a system was not in operation months ago, when the threat of people importing the coronavirus was higher. Enforcement will be piecemeal, with only a fraction of those in quarantine receiving follow-up calls to verify obedience. Workers in a number of sectors will be exempt.

The stated reason for the quarantine regime now is to avoid a resurgence of the virus, while the stated reason for not enforcing one earlier is that it would not have made a substantial difference to the trajectory of the epidemic. There is a contradiction there. While infection from overseas is a hazard worth managing, not much about the government’s handling of the disease so far gives confidence that clinical rigour is paramount.

But the plan scores well in opinion polls, as tends to be the case with anything involving tighter border control. Going with the grain of public opinion is a large part of the policy’s appeal in Downing Street, especially since the Cummings affair took a toll on Mr Johnson’s personal ratings.

As evidence mounts that Britain’s handling of Covid-19 is among the worst in the world, the government goes to ever greater lengths to demonstrate vigour in its response, with the performance of action taking precedence over achievement. A test, track and trace scheme for monitoring infections after lockdown was said by Mr Johnson to be “world-beating” – a silly phrase because it is not a competition – yet many of those tasked with delivering the service warn that it is being launched prematurely, and full national cover will not be reached for weeks.

Claims to have met targets for the numbers of tests being administered have subsequently proved highly misleading, with the figures inflated by double-counting. The UK Statistics Authority earlier this week rebuked Matt Hancock, the health secretary, for providing inadequate data on testing, noting that a lack of transparency breeds public mistrust.

At the start of the outbreak, Mr Johnson had a large store of public trust at his disposal. There was a sense of collective duty in facing a national threat. That resource has been shamefully squandered and the prime minister’s own lack of competence and focus is the reason. For any policy to be effective, the public needs to have confidence in the motive for its deployment and that it will work. People need to know that measures are implemented properly and for the right reasons. Mr Johnson is failing both tests.