Where was the fear?

 I’ve read the whole of the Sue Gray report now and I can thoroughly recommend it. It’s well written, clear and easy to read. I didn’t have to look up any words or refer to Ancient Greek myths. Considering that this report is written by a government civil servant it is as impartial as possible. Depending on your original viewpoint, you could get to the end, completely horrified or thinking, ‘What’s all the fuss about. None of this was the Prime Minister’s fault. They were right, he was only ambushed by cake.”

I fell somewhere between the two camps, which is the story of my life. I was expecting to be more cross. I’d seen the salacious highlights of vomiting and karaoke that the press had already drawn out and I had heard people say that there is nothing new here, move on, Boris is vindicated, so maybe the punchline had been spoiled. 

As I started to read, I was furious. If there had only been one event it might have had more impact but with each new gathering (I’m not sure it’s fair to call them parties) you get numbed to it. The report clearly states what rules were in place for each event and you are left in no doubt that Sue Gray believes that the people there (especially Martin) flouted every single one of them but she didn’t go as far as to say that this ‘wine time Friday’ culture was anything to do with the Prime Minister. 

What struck me, though, was that none of these people had any fear. 

We were terrified for two years.

Frightened of catching the illness, spreading the virus, accidentally killing our granny, using public transport, causing whole class self isolation, closing a shop you’d been in, being stopped by the police, being fined for sitting on a park bench, wrecking the economy if we didn’t eat out to help out, loosing jobs, working from home, zoom, leaving the house, having the neighbours report you if you interpreted the rules differently. 

I doubt that’s an exhaustive list but my point is we were petrified and they weren’t.

Maybe they had all had Covid and thought they couldn’t get it again or transfer it to anyone else. Maybe they didn’t love anyone they wouldn’t want to kill. Maybe they didn’t care if the whole of the government machinery that couldn’t do its job via Zoom was forced to self isolate. Maybe there was nothing to fear and they were just keeping us in our place. Or maybe they just didn’t understand the threat they were in charge of and that is the most worrying thing.

Isn’t there anyone else who would like to have a crack at Prime Minister? 

Anyone?