I don't know if you noticed, but 2020 was bobbins. 2021, as young and full of promise as it is, has hinted that it could well be more of the same, but let's at least hope for an improvement on last year. After all, the bar is set pretty damn low right now. Most of us, business owners, self employed and employees alike have suffered enforced closures, job uncertainties, slashed profits, mounting bills, reduced income, not to mention the added mental health burden caused by childcare difficulties and vastly reduced social interaction. So I hope we can all draw a line under all of this soon enough, and begin to rebuild and get back to normal.
If you are one of the tiny number of people who actually reads this blog, then you may have noticed a hint of scepticism towards all of this. Given the inertia of public opinion, that's been a risky position to take for a blog on a company website, but to explain, I would like to think that disingenuous cut and paste statements from companies at times like these are as thin and translucent to the eye of the customer as they are in reality.
Remember back in April when your email accounts lit up with personal messages from company CEO's? It started with one, then within the week every Tom, Dick and Harry was letting you know how important you were to them and how safe you would be buying their sausages/combine harvesters/wardrobes/toilet brushes. Did you feel reassured? Or did you ignore it and wonder how they got your email address? I know I did the latter. It's in the interests of every company not to put their customers or staff at risk from anything, so the pearl clutching emails just came off as a bit weird.
So anyway, here is what I would like to see from 2021 in no particular order but all as soon as humanly possible:
1. Schools open fully. Children are not very susceptible to Covid and treating them as vectors of disease is not healthy for anybody. They also represent the group with the most to lose and the least to gain from all this.
2. Businesses open again. Vast government aid packages will have done nothing but defer the problem of businesses going under unless they are able to trade. Many already have failed. Many more are destined to. Many represent lifelines for people, vulnerable in many more ways than just one respiratory disease, and spread or no spread, surely it is up to the individual to decide whether they want to frequent these places? Just because it's open, it doesn't mean you have to go there.
3. Pubs open again. Pubs surely ought to be able to reopen now that the definition of a substantial meal has been clearly established as one, all, or none of the following:
A Scotch egg, Michael Gove and Matt Hancock
A cup of coffee, Debyshire Police
2 Scotch eggs, Michael Gove
A plated meal eaten with a knife and fork, Boris Johnson
A meal costing more than nine Euro's, Leo Varadkar
Not a Cornish pasty on it's own but perhaps with chips. But not just chips on their own, Robert Jenrick
Not just one Scotch egg. Unless it's quite a big Scotch egg, Michael Gove
4. An all encompassing final entry this one. The ability to see whomever you want to and go wherever you please.
I couldn't have imagined writing this blog post twelve months ago. Anyway, have fun, and Stay Sa....no sorry, I just can't say it.
