Coronavirus: Britain's revised pandemic strategy criticised as confusing

LONDON - The British government has published extensive guidance on how the nation could return to work after seven consecutive weeks of home confinement to reduce coronavirus infection rates.

But although Prime Minister Boris Johnson hailed the newly-issued guidance which comes into effect from Wednesday (May 13)as a tentative step to "reopening society", his initiative came under immediate fire from both opposition leaders and the media for its alleged lack of clarity.

Under emergency legislation adopted in March, the British government must renew or revoke its "stay at home" orders on a rolling basis, every three weeks. One extension has already been implemented, and the question was whether another one should be ordered on Wednesday.

Mr Johnson came under considerable pressure from backbenchers within his ruling Conservative party to relax the restrictions on industry and businesses and allow people to return to work as evidence mounted about the magnitude of the damage to the economy.

Last week's report by the Bank of England, the country's central bank, suggesting that Britain could face its worst recession in over three centuries clearly unsettled lawmakers. And so did a warning by Mr Andrew Bailey, the bank's governor, that "not all economic activity" will be revived, even if lockdown restrictions were lifted.

But at the same time, the British government remains nervous about the wholesale lifting of movement restrictions, partly because of news from other European countries such as Germany where infection rates have gone up after people were allowed to resume normal activity, but also because ministers in London are acutely aware of the lack of information about the true state of the pandemic.

Britain's health authorities have set themselves the target of performing 100,000 coronavirus tests daily, but that has seldom been met, so an assessment about the true level of infection rates is difficult to make.

And although the latest statistics indicate that daily mortality figures are diminishing, the number of those recorded as dead each day because of coronavirus-related complications still runs into the hundreds.

So, Mr Johnson has tried to straddle the median line between keeping all the restrictions or lifting them by urging people to "go to work if you can't work from home", a variation of the previous ban which encouraged everyone to stay at home.

People will also be allowed to spend an unlimited amount of time exercising outdoors; the current rules allow only 30-minute stints of outdoor exercise. And they can meet one other single person from outside their household, provided all stay 2m apart.

Mr Johnson also laid out a three-month plan to reopen primary schools, shops and outdoor cafés and restart sports activities, although every move remains conditional on containing virus transmission rates, and most of the measures won't be kicking in before July.

Yet all Mr Johnson seems to have achieved in announcing a gradual transition is to confuse just about everyone. Trade union leaders complain that workers are left at the mercy of employers, who may be able to require their employees to return to work. The teachers' union attacked Mr Johnson's plans as "nothing short of reckless".

Meanwhile, employers complain that they have little guidance on what they should do; businesses needed their "practical questions answered so that they can plan to restart", the British Chambers of Commerce said.

To further confuse matters, the autonomous administrations in Scotland and Wales, with powers to operate their own health services, complain that they have not been consulted, and have refused to apply the new measures.

Detailed written guidance extending to over 50 pages and published on Monday does provide some clarity as to which industry sectors are expected to resume work and on what conditions.

Still, opposition parties criticise the entire approach as confused and ineffective. "The nation was looking for clarity and consensus," claimed Mr Keir Starmer, who leads Labour, Britain's biggest opposition party; instead, what it got is a new policy which "raises more questions than it answers", he added.

Confusion also surrounds plans to introduce a 14-day quarantine rule for travellers to the UK. For months, the British have refused to introduce quarantine requirements and ministers are struggling to explain why these measures may be necessary now, just as other European countries are discussing lifting border controls.

Besides, France has already negotiated an exemption from future quarantine requirements, so any traveller to the UK can easily bypass restrictions by simply arriving via France.

Unsurprisingly, ordinary Britons are evenly divided about the merits of Mr Johnson's announcement. Latest opinion polls indicate that some 44 per cent of people in Britain support the changes, while 43 per cent oppose them.

And less than a third of the public claims to understand what their government now expects from them.