Lord Frost: Covid lockdowns were a serious mistake – the Government needs to do ‘stuff that works’ | The Telegraph - Tony Diver:
January 13, 2022 - "Lord Frost has accused the Government of 'Covid theatre', as he called on Boris Johnson to scrap mask mandates and warned that the country will look back on lockdowns as a 'serious public policy mistake'.
"Instead of pursuing 'stuff that works' such as antiviral drugs and effective ventilation, Mr Johnson has locked down the country and restricted freedoms unnecessarily, the peer argued, as he called on ministers to rule out any prospect of a new lockdown and to consider a more diverse range of advice when making public health decisions.
"Speaking to this week’s episode of The Telegraph’s Planet Normal podcast, which you can listen to [below - gd] ... Frost also said that the Government’s controversial net zero agenda had been 'rushed', and that technology receiving taxpayers’ money 'may not be the best way forward' but is 'increasing costs on individuals'. His opposition to many of the most significant policy decisions of the Prime Minister’s premiership will buoy Conservative backbenchers who have recently rebelled against the front bench on Covid measures and environmental policy.
"Lord Frost, who rose to prominence as an adviser to Mr Johnson in the Foreign Office before being handed a peerage for his leadership of the UK’s Brexit negotiating team, resigned dramatically days before Christmas over concerns about the Government’s 'direction of travel'. He told The Telegraph that coronavirus policy was the main reason for his departure from the Cabinet. 'That was the reason I resigned. That’s what took me out of the Government in December,' he said. 'I didn’t agree with the Plan B measures, masks, vaccine passports – that’s what forced me out.'
"The peer said that, when the pandemic is viewed in hindsight, the UK has 'come out relatively positively' but that lockdowns will be revealed to be an error. 'I think, honestly, people are going to look back at the last couple of years globally and see lockdown as a pretty serious public policy mistake,' he said.
“I would like to see the Government ruling out lockdowns for the future; repealing the legislation; ending them. We can’t afford it [and] it doesn’t work. Stop doing Covid theatre – vaccine passports, masks, stuff that doesn’t work – and focus on stuff that does work so that we’re ready if the next one is worse. Stuff like ventilation, antivirals, proper hospital capacity, managing it properly – that’s what we need to be focusing on going forward....
"'I’ve seen a fair bit of the material and I do think that there hasn’t been enough internal debate. There haven’t been enough voices challenging the epidemiologists. There hasn’t been enough of a voice of the economy in this, [or] an attempt to get to grips with the trade-offs. I have seen the Prime Minister kind of groping for that information and it not being there, and I think he’s not necessarily being well-served by everybody around him.'"
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