Sammy Wilson: Northern Ireland cannot afford to follow those voices who want to diverge from London on lockdown

Those in positions of authority whether it be politicians or those who advise them have an unenviable task at present.

At various times they have been told that up to 500,000 people in the UK could lose their lives if the government does not get a grip on infection rates then the same advisors downgrade that to 15,000.

At the same time economists are telling ministers that the measures they are taking are going to collapse the economy and it will take years to restore the economic health of the country.

Relax the lockdown too quickly and they will be accused to sacrificing the vulnerable.

Relax it too slowly and they will be accused of condemning millions to years of economic hardship.

Meanwhile those with no responsibility for making the decisions sit back and complain about what was done wrong and cynically use cases of hardship and heartache as a weapon to make their point.

The most despicable are those who have used this crisis to score party political points something which Sinn Fein have unashamedly done even to the point of claiming that this health crisis proves their case for a united Ireland.

At the same time their counterparts in Scotland the SNP bluntly tell the government at Westminster to keep their recovery plan to themselves, Scotland will do its own thing.

Unfortunately in Northern Ireland Sinn Fein and some of their allies in the NI Assembly have adopted the same approach. Given the requirements that any lifting of the lockdown restrictions and future recovery plan must have cross community support it has proven almost impossible to get the initial guidance on the lockdown changed.

Look at the wrangle over the reopening of recycling centres. Even when it was obvious that their closure was resulting in widespread fly tipping by couldn’t care less citizens, there was weeks of resistance to the reopening of the centres by Sinn Fein and the Alliance Party and some Sinn Fein dominated councils still refuse to open them.

We have had the same frustration over the opening of garden centres despite all the medical advice that the danger of infection is very low in open spaces.

The unwillingness of some executive parties to agree this relaxation defies logic when one considers that the public can go to most large supermarkets and buy compost, seeds and plants in enclosed spaces but can’t go to an open air garden centre and do the same.

While the health minister appears on a daily basis telling us about the need to concentrate only on coronavirus and the need to reserve facilities which have not ever been used to deal with Covid -19 cases, there are thousands of cancer patients, people with heart problems, people who are losing their eyesight having their treatment deferred and in some cases losing their lives.

It is not unreasonable to ask how many people are being denied treatment for life threatening health problems at present, and whether there is not a case for releasing some beds to deal with them and is the current cautious approach by the health minister preventing the health service carrying out the normal service which vulnerable and desperate people expect.

I spoke in a debate in Westminster this week and listened to Scots and Welsh nationalists boasting that their countries would do their own thing. Sinn Fein or the Alliance didn’t participate but it is clear that their message is the same.

The truth of the matter is that it doesn’t make sense to declare UDI (Unilateral Declaration of Independence) in our response to this health crisis nor is there a case for imitating the decisions made in the Irish Republic.

It is significant that while nationalist parties in NI claim that we should work in tandem with the Republic, the government in the Republic never saw fit to consult or even inform the NI Executive when it introduced its own lockdown or relaxed some of its controls.

The blunt truth is that we in NI cannot afford to deviate substantially from the decisions about lockdown or speed and nature of recovery made at Westminster.

There are huge costs in closing down businesses. There will be huge costs in getting the economy moving again.

We do not have the resources to finance these measures so therefore cannot deviate from UK decisions about return to work or the length of time businesses will be supported because the Westminster government will quite rightly question why it should finance contrary decisions by Stormont.

Also the integrated nature of our economy with the GB economy means that decisions cannot be totally independent of the bigger UK picture.

I was highly amused this week to see Leo Varadker giving a rather cowed Mary Lou McDonald a lecture on the importance of British money to finance the corona virus measures NI.

Whether it is playing party politics, playing safe, or being genuinely scared of causing unnecessary deaths, the fact remains that we are being stuck with a policy which is frustrating business, is being questioned by increasing members of the public and is hurting hundreds of thousands of individuals.

The real fear is that political inertia will result in increasing numbers of the public deciding that they are going to ignore the guidance on how they should lead their lives.

That is why it is so important to lay out a clear path which balances the health, economic and social needs of the country.

• Sammy Wilson is DUP MP for East Antrim