February 24, 2021 - 11:52am
One of the main features of the UK lockdowns has been the near-uniform consensus around them. As each one has gone by, cross-party support for lockdowns has only strengthened while fewer voices have been willing to offer anything in the way of dissent. There have been exceptions on both sides of the aisle: Lord (David) Blunkett, a famous figure of the New Labour era and former Home Secretary, and Sir Charles Walker, a prominent Conservative Party backbencher and vice chairman of the 1922 Committee, the all-important backbencher group.
Coming from two very different political backgrounds, these unlikely bedfellows have joined forces to draw attention to the pitfalls of the UK’s ongoing lockdown policy:
- They agree that a different solution could have been found, with a greater emphasis on personal agency
- They are particularly worried about the impact on mental health and the economy
- They would like a faster timetable out of lockdown
- They call for a public enquiry, and for people to be held to account
- They share strong messages for each of their party leaders
I’m very strongly in favour of both free speech and defending the newspapers when it was unpopular, including the fact that they’d been extremely unpleasant to me 15 years ago. And in favour of free thought and free expression. But I’m not a libertarian. In other words, I’m not someone I’m not a hedonist. I don’t believe that anything goes so I’m a bit of a contradiction in small C, conservative social attitudes, but a very strong commitment to a democracy being participative. Not taking the word from the top down. And I think that when we get out of this in the summer… we’ll need to reset the the political dialogue, because otherwise we’ll become used to being told what to do from above. That’s bad for all of us, but it’s particularly bad for democracy.
- Lord Blunkett, LockdownTV
People are frightened. The political class and the media and the scientists on stage have been very, very good at frightening people. We’ve had these amazing television campaigns, which basically say, you’re going to kill people if you leave your home because the government wanted to keep infection rates down and it wanted to keep deaths down. I’m afraid the legacy of that, as I said in Parliament yesterday, is going to be a very long tale of mental health problems… We’ve got people who were so terrified, they won’t leave their homes. We’ve got children who won’t go outside because they’re frightened, if they catch something and bring it back they’ll kill their parents, we’ve got adolescents self harming. We have just done in my view, a terrible, terrible thing, and we will regret it for a long time to come.
- Sir Charles Walker, LockdownTV
On returning to normality:
Readjusting to any kind of normality is going to be a massive challenge, it will have an impact on productivity on our life and wellbeing for some time to come. There should be a recovery programme geared to that the psychology. In terms of those daily press conferences, they should be turned into something positive, if we’re going to recover, not just economically in terms of restoring growth, and getting people into meaningful jobs. But also getting back the kind of life that we want to lead and the way in which people can get up in the morning and get themselves to work.
- Lord Blunkett, LockdownTV
On SAGE:
I think you can be a SAGE scientist and advise the government, or you can be a scientist that goes on the airwaves, TV and radio, but it has been so damaging to have these various scientists from SAGE beating each other up on the airwaves, creating huge concern. It is pretty disgraceful when they’re introduced as X, Y and Z, and Professor X, Y and Z is a SAGE scientist, but is here in his or her own capacity. They’re not there in their own capacity. They are there as a SAGE scientist, and of course, they’ve never been more in demand. They’ve never been more intellectually engaged. But having these various scientists on our airwaves and in our newspapers day after day after day after day, beating each other up IS scaring constituents. Some of my constituents have just been debilitated. Again, I’m sorry, if I sound emotional but this has been utterly disgraceful. I hope there’s a public inquiry and I help hope people are held to account I’ll be held to account at the ballot box.
- Sir Charles Walker, LockdownTV
On China:
I went to China first in 1983. I wouldn’t want to live in China, I wouldn’t like to live under that particular regime, and particularly the one that’s in place at the moment. And I wouldn’t want anybody to actually have to transfer that particular command and control both socially and economically, to this country. I would fight very hard against that. So the answer is that the Chinese have developed an understanding of the way in which they comply, not just the communist era from 1949, but long, long before that. We wouldn’t want to put up with it for one moment. We should be very wary of everything we do. On the economic front, we should be extremely robust, not just as a nation, but internationally with the Chinese. But they are the second largest economy now in the world. And we need to learn how to deal with them. And dealing with them needs a bit of good statecraft and clever political operation, and not just a head in the wall.
- Lord Blunkett, LockdownTV
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SubscribeCharles Walker has been excellent over recent months. If only more politicians had articulated his fully justified anger. His words on the demented and demonic government scientists are particularly welcome. I hope he is, somehow, able to hold them to account.
Here, Here. Sir Charles, along with Desmond Swayne have been all to rare a thing in Westminster, Beacons of sanity in a pea-souper of derangement.
I’ll second that, and a shout out for David Blunkett too, on this issue at least.
I totally agree with the views expressed. The benefits of lockdown are in the minds of the modellers – we know it ‘works’ at one level, the Chinese demonstrated that. But, it isn’t the only strategy for dealing with the virus – the British people, in my view, respond much better to principles than to rules. A clear articulation of the principles of how best to deal with a highly contagious virus would have brought compliance without the huge collateral costs. Taking away individual agency in a democracy is an affront, this isn’t war and it isn’t an existential threat – it could have been dealt with in a far better way. So rather than lead the way we followed by adopting command and control.
I remember hearing the first reports of lockdown in China and, as Ferguson said, thinking that would never happen in Europe and then it did. Unbelievable.
I too never believed that a Chinese style lockdown could EVER happen here and was dumbfounded when it did . I thought the people of UK were real progressives and the government an outlier/leader but lo & behold we have surpassed China and infact are a laughing stock. Like a flag in the wind.
It also begs the question of Where have all the fans of dystopians films and novels gone to? When I sit in a dystopian film, I am not cheering authority, I am cheering La Résistance!
I always thought the others in the theatres and reading that book genre where also on the resistance side. WTF happened! Where are all the resisters! Where are all the Orwell and Asimov fans?!
China played the West. My friend in Taiwan said the dropping down dead in the streets was pure theatre. Then ask yourself this. The virus is supposed to be well nigh unstoppable once it gets into a population yet Beijing and Shanghai let alone the other cities did not see ( apparently ) the cases we saw all over the West. Funny that.
Adam Kucharski on Twitter just now, presumably responding to criticism of modellers:
I agree with Kurcharski. I’m not sure I agree with you. If you want to avoid collateral costs, what voluntary advice would you give to people?
So what is your reading of what happened just before Christmas and New Year ?
9 months in to this experience and the government’s message is: “think carefully about what you are going to do over the holidays”. Well apparently lots of people didn’t think and didn’t act in a respectful and responsible manner because 2 weeks later the cases in the UK peaked at around 68,000.
Combating respiratory viruses, on a personal front is not rocket science – don’t mix with other people for extended periods of time in an enclosed, unventilated space.
All previous “pandemic” frenzies in the past half century had post-mortems of “never again” after vast fear campaigns, yet, we continue to repeat the same fear-mongering.
It’s as if it was a built-in characteristic of electoralism. People don’t want truth, they want fear and tribal faith.
‘we know it ‘works’ at one level, the Chinese demonstrated that.’ We know NOTHING from the Chinese lockdown as it was impossible to be true. Even New Zeland with its 100% closed Island did not stop all covid, the Chinese one did with a billion+ people milling about and inernational travel numbering millions?
The Chinese are 100% playing the West. CHINA DEATHS PER MILLION 4, UK DEATHS PER MILLION 1803!!!!!!! from worldometers
Charles Walker‘s articulation of his anger was so helpful to me, echoing some of the feelings that I have experienced in recent months.
It is an emollient.
I think it is testimony to the power of fear that many people are in favour of Lockdowns and seem to want to ignore any evidence to suggest a different approach may have been more effective overall. it is like getting turkeys to vote for Christmas.
Surely we should want to find alternative ways and pull out all the stops in order to find alternative strategies rather than be subjected to these damaging restrictions?
I do hope a truly independent and objective enquiry (if there is such a thing ) is held. If the idea holds that they ‘worked’ then we can be in for a very uncertain future.
Heartening to see an MP bold enough to call it out for what it is – barbaric.
I completely agree with what you have said here. A number of people should be held to account for the way this has been handled over the past tear!
“…the way this has been handled over the past tear!”
Freudian typo? I’ve certainly found myself on the edge of tears and despair too many times since last February. In some ways I don’t recognize myself anymore–whence the unflappable optimist?
Terrific interview. So good to see a bit of cross party agreement against the lockdowns for once; and I have great admiration for Charles Walker’s compassion.
Lets hope these two gentlemen’s colleagues start to take more notice of what they have said here, and recognise the wisdom of their words.
The only pklace in the world I know of which NEVER had lockdown of any kind, no mask mandate, and now are through it so can be used in studies is the one no one mentions – South Dekota USA!
Christi Noem (SD Govenor) at the CPAC does a wonderful talk on it on youtube, watch it. The California/Florida issue is well mentioned, but the two best, South Dekota and Belarus are never mentioned. The whole debate is rigged to justify the criminally insane lockdowns.
The second worst thing about authoritarians – is that they’re not even effective at anything except stamping out political opposition.
The worst their performance and the more damage they cause the more authoritarian they become.
Excellent! I’m a socialist, but my rage is equal to that of Walker’s. I wish there were more Plunketts speaking out, even if moderately. Sadly, leftist are all hiding behind their new religion.
Excellent interview. I wish I were in Charles Walker’s constituency!
Obviously, UnHerd doesn’t pay much attention to such things, but Sir Charles Walker was wrong in saying that China has the world’s second largest economy. The IMF forecast for GDP on a purchasing power parity (PPP) basis for 2021 shows China with the world’s largest economy, almost 22% larger than its American counterpart. Its economy is also 3.7 times larger than the combined economies of Brazil, the UK and South Africa. This is one reason why everyone speaks of the UK, South African and Brazilian variants of the coronavirus rather than using their formal scientific names, but anyone who speaks of the China virus, the ChiComm virus or the Wuhan virus is attacked as a vicious racist hatemonger. Brazil, the UK and South Africa are the world’s 8th, 9th and 33rd largest economies respectively.
IMF would make the most corrupt politician seem honest. Everything, like WHO and all their ilk, they say is to push their globalist agenda. IMF does not deal in truth, it deals in manipulation.
Excellent interview, many thanks.
I have been so sick of seeing so much blame to the “far right” or the “soft liberals” in all this so it’s very refreshing to see a true representation of the fact that this isn’t a Right/Left thing at all, people feel like this on both sides and the politics just seem to be pushed by media to cause a distraction so that people argue about that rather than what is quite frankly, a humanity issue. If more humans pulled together over this instead of arguing or being to scared to “let down their political side” then we might not have got here!
Thank you so much for doing this interview and to Charles Walker and David Blunkett for being so brave to speak out in a te when speaking out leaves you open to ridicule or hate!
I watched this with great interest and was pleasantly surprised. Thank goodness Charles Walker is speaking out! I was slightly disappointed that there was no reference to a few issues and questions I have, such as the effect of seasonal flu figures on the general population and ‘covid’ statistics, (where indeed has the flu actually gone), the highly controversial vaccine passports that have obviously been planned for quite a long time, (despite many outright lies being spoken by various politicians that they are not on the cards), and of the potential serious health (mental and physical) implications of children being coerced into wearing face masks at school. Not to mention the real theft of liberty, freedom of speech as all the main social media ‘platforms’ are now being savagely censored, and of course the right to work without discrimination of having had or not had ‘the vaccination’, which I still believe should be based on personal choice with informed consent. Maybe another discussion in the future I hope. I feel it is essential for alternative news reporting, opinion and discussion. Thank you for providing a small amount of that in these extremely troubling times.
Once more, politics lives downstream of culture. It has become more fashionable to question the wisdom of lockdowns over time, and so, the political class responds.