James O’Brien has said the government has successfully shifted the blame for its coronavirus response onto the people after a new poll found six in ten people would blame the public for a second wave.
Echoing comments published in The London Economic in mid-May as the government changed its slogan from ‘Stay Home’ to ‘Stay Alert’, the LBC presenter passionately exclaimed:
“The only way the government get away with this is by making it our fault”.
According to a poll of 2,000 people by JL Partners for ITV’s Peston three quarters of people polled believe there will be a second coronavirus lockdown in 2020.
Of those polled almost half (48 per cent) said they expected a second spike in the virus to hit in winter, leading to another nationwide lockdown, with 87 per cent believing there will be serious damage to the economy – while six in ten people thought there would be further disorder on Britain’s streets in the next six months.
And despite pubs and restaurants in England being allowed to open from Saturday, 70 per cent of those polled think they will have to close again later in the year.
Fifty-nine per cent of Brits say they would would blame a second wave on the public while just 33 per cent would blame the government.
As TLE contributor Kevin O’Hara concluded in May:
“But be sure of this, when there is a second peak, as there surely will be, it will be down to us, because we were told to Stay Alert and Control the Virus.”
Related: 331 coronavirus deaths in UK in last 48 hours as pubs gear up to reopen
