1/ The Tories excuse for being late to lockdown in 2020 is that they worried the public wouldn't want that sort of restriction or be able to handle it, so they had to delay it for as long as possible.
Rubbish.
This Thread with evidence from the time why that claim is nonsense.
Rubbish.
This Thread with evidence from the time why that claim is nonsense.
2/ The Tories didn't lockdown until March 23rd but this poll from a month earlier (28th Feb) shows that public already had a desire for stronger restrictions..
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1233426167488708610?s=20
3/ Many organisations didn't wait for the Tories to act. On March 13th (ten days before lockdown), the main football bodies decided themselves to suspend all games.(NB what I'm calling social distancing here means lockdown, we weren't using that word then)
https://twitter.com/D_Raval/status/1238425171675033601?s=20
4/ We didn't need polls to confirm what the public were thinking. This clip from March 15th shows that public had already understood the emergency. We had organically without government instruction done our own version of lockdown.
https://twitter.com/D_Raval/status/1239120905214672896?s=20
5/ The public's desire for strong restriction grew as the pandemic grew worse. This from mid March (19th) with 52% supporting the cancellation major sporting events.
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1240649919557521414?s=20
6/ Despite continued mixed messaging and confusion from the government, a large chunk had already implemented their own version of lockdown. There were exceptions fuelled by the Tories confusing messages. This clip shows why lockdown was inevitable.
https://twitter.com/D_Raval/status/1240567688478384129?s=20
7/ When the government did start to take some action before the lockdown, ie closing schools, the public were significantly in favour (67%).
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1240696370685562880?s=20
8/ In the run up to lockdown announcement, the public were already significantly in favour (64%)
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1240697936356323331?s=20
9/ Summary:
- It was clear that public wanted stronger restrictions as both polling and their actions well before the lockdown announcement show
- The public's own organic lockdown before the official one prevented the spread being worse in March
- No excuses for late lockdown
- It was clear that public wanted stronger restrictions as both polling and their actions well before the lockdown announcement show
- The public's own organic lockdown before the official one prevented the spread being worse in March
- No excuses for late lockdown
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