COVID-19 Thursday 23rd April 2020

So, with the lack of movement recently not helped by the Easter weekend, I thought it was time as we moved into week 4 to make this a weekly update rather than a daily one.

However, today there feels like a big question to be asked...are we about to get moving again?

I was always nervous about the ‘second period’ of lock-down as I thought people would (and in the main did) observe the initial 3-week lock-down but I do feel much of that was due to Boris (love him or loathe him) and a TV address watched by well over 20 million people insisting we followed the advice. The advice to continue was made in a daily briefing and has been given nowhere near the same coverage…to the extend that some people may not even know they should be continuing to follow such strict advice.

As someone with a son who is reasonably high risk due to severe asthma, I only leave the house once a day but on my daily exercise walks I’m noticing far more people out and about than 2 weeks ago. It is still quiet, don’t get me wrong, but it is not as quiet.

Now I’m not altogether surprised as I’ve always felt that you can only ask for strict observance for so long (unless you enforce it) and peoples’ mental health will be a factor as is a desire to return to some sort of normality. Don’t get me wrong, I feel it, even though I’m well equipped to work from home and we have what we need, but given the chance I would like to see family and friends, and yes travel to work!

I can’t therefore see anything but a partial removal of restrictions after this next 3-week period as it is clear to me that another period of lock-down at this level would be unsustainable. Also, there is this overwhelming feeling of getting the economy moving again to a degree, and ultimately everyone is going to want that as long as it is not going to unnecessarily risk life!

I’m not one, and have no desire to get into the science of it all, and don’t want to comment on how long I think it will take to get a vaccine (I have no idea) or how long we will have to social distance for or whether I will be working at home for the better part of a year because I can….

 But what I am sensing is this feeling that we are (or about to) get moving again.

In construction a good number of sites have remained open and I’ve spoken to people who are and have been as busy as ever, but what we are now seeing is more and more contractors and developers opening up sites again and going back to work…

Is this right, is it too soon? This is possibly the debate to be had, but for me (selfishly) I hope it is the right time and can be done safely and business will start to flow again. Most people who have contacted me over the last 4 weeks have also said that front end teams have been busy, demand and inquiries are still coming in so we can only hope that construction will be one of those industries that gets Britain moving again.

What did Churchill say? ‘It is not the end…’ clearly it is not, but possibly, just possibly it is the beginning of the end (or maybe it is just the end of the beginning)