There is only one way we can ‘exit’ full lockdown and that is when we have a vaccine.

Whatever you think of Nadine Dorries – I think she is an idiot – the fact is that she is a health minister in Boris Johnson’s government. I begin this blog by showing a tweet she made tonight. There is no other way of interpreting what she is saying here: Britain will remain in lockdown for the next 18 months to two years. Two Christmases will pass until some kind of normality is resumed. Here’s why.

Scientists are hard at work to try and develop a vaccine for Covid-19. We can be encouraged by progress in some of the studies but despite some of the more optimistic newspaper headlines, it is unlikely that, assuming a safe and effective vaccine is discovered, it will be available until, at the very earliest, late 2021. The new normal will be an endless lockdown.

The prime minister must have thought a lot of Ms Dorries to appoint her as a minister in his government. And presumably, he must have been impressed with her knowledge of the health sector to which he appointed her. Her tweet represents a dramatic change to the way the country is seeing Covid-19. Some of us were hoping that things might return to some degree of normality by the autumn. Dorries states clearly that this is not the case. What are we to make of her comments?

Presumably, this must be the view of government, since Ms Dorries is an integral part of government. Her departmental boss, Matt Hancock, who has consistently been the government’s best performer, gave no inkling of how the future was likely to pan out at today’s press conference. I’m no Tory, but praise where praise is due and Hancock was outstanding today, in terms of honesty and sincerity. So, why did Ms Dorries come out soon after to make such a startling announcement?

It could be that she is a loose cannon and was merely giving her opinion and not that of the department for which she is currently a minister. But things don’t usually work like that. When a minister disagrees with government policy, then she or he resigns. We do not know whether Ms Dorries does disagree with government policy, whether she was making things up as she went along or she was announcing government policy earlier than it was supposed to be announced. I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she was being honest.

So, let’s be clear. A government health minister has said this: “There is only one way we can ‘exit’ full lockdown and that is when we have a vaccine.” This means we will be in ‘full lockdown’ well into next year and and possibly well into 2022. She adds: “We need to find ways we can adapt society and strike a balance between the health of the nation and our economy.” Boris Johnson will now need to explain to us how society can be adapted. More than that, he will have to explain precisely what Ms Dorries means about ‘(striking) a balance between the health of the nation and our economy.” Actually, with regards to the latter, he won’t. We know.

Ms Dorries is saying, quiet explicitly, and I praise her for her honesty, is that the choice for government will be quite simple. What’s the number of deaths the government thinks will be acceptable in order to keep the economy going? Her words cannot be interpreted in any other way.

66% of the electorate approve of the job Boris Johnson is doing as prime minister. I am in the 34% who either don’t have a view, think he is not doing a particularly good job or think he is doing a terrible job. I’m in the small minority that think he is doing a terrible job, the same with his government.

The new Labour leader Keir Starmer was attacked by some on the right of politics for asking the government to publish its ‘exit strategy’ from the Covid-19 semi-lockdown. It appears that the health minister Nadine Dorries has now given the government position. It’s time for the government to level with us. And if the reason it is ducking and diving from publishing its exit strategy is because they expect us to still be in lockdown until 2022, we should be told the facts, no matter how grim they are.

PS The twitter link isn’t always working properly., Sorry about that.