For two months France has had its local lockdown system set up, with clear definitions of what would happen, under what conditions. It has published all the data that would set those conditions since then. I do not think this should be that hard. https://twitter.com/thomasforth/status/1265334057963061248

Is it this particular elected government that is incapable of such basic competence?
Or is the lack of such basic competence a feature of the UK civil service?
Or some mix of the two?
We should ask the French civil service to do the inquiry that tried to find out.

The scale and duration of the UK government's complete failure on Covid-19 makes me wonder if it's salvageable. I read an interesting thread this morning that this might have to be our 5th Republic moment. A complete rethinking of the whole purpose and functioning of the state.

This is deep dysfunction.