Bad law?

There's a chap I encountered a few years ago on Twitter called David Allen Green, who styles himself as a "commentator on law and policy". He's a smart and interesting chap who also writes for the FT - my coronavirus 'safe space' - and sends out newsletters every so often. 

He's particularly scathing about the manner in which this government has used the various interments of legislation during the pandemic, although I also agree with what I infer to be a confidence that they are not malign, as such, but simply too shambolic to understand what they're really doing. 

I'm going to stray (I think) from the legal definition of bad law here and say why I think some of the current rules that have been imposed upon us are bad. For a start, the entire proposition has been undermined by Johnson's support for Cummings' assertion that he used his judgment in breaching the government's guidelines. So we can all do that with good reason, right? Or do we have to be as smart as Cummings thinks he is?

And then there are the various inconsistencies such as the fact that from July the fourth, I can go in a room with a bunch of strangers in a bar or restaurant but I'll still be limited on the number of people (and households) that I can have in my house. And don't get me started on the sensible queuing to get into Booths and the rigour around the tills, compared with the free for all of the actual shopping experience!

But the most annoying thing for me - and maybe it is an entirely personal phenomenon - is where I simultaneously get irritated by people breaking the rules whilst not believing in them, anyway. Like today, when Dan and I took our walk, there were loads of people down at the beach by the Lune. There was an evident lack of social distancing by most people and yet, out there in the open, everything I've read suggests there was very little risk to them at all. (Far more risk to the people jumping off Devil's Bridge!)

I'm no scientist and I prefer to err on the side of caution, so I am obeying the 'rules' such as they are, but I can't really find it in my heart to be angry or even particularly critical of these people out enjoying themselves in this unprecedented sunny spell. And I suspect that we had better guidance and a more competent government, then they'd either be permitted to do this or it would be clearer to them while they shouldn't.

PS I am not using this argument to support the simply lunatic amount of people who packed themselves onto the beaches on the south coast!

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-12.2 kgs
Reading: About to pick up 'Circe', which Dom kindly sent me after listening to me grumble about 'Underland'.