MIKE HILL: Please remember that the silent killer is still out there

Already non-essential shops have opened, live football is back on our TV screens and, on Saturday, pubs and restaurants will re-open for the first time in months.

With the summer holidays coming up, it’s a truly liberating moment for many folk who are sick of the lockdown.

Government Ministers, supposedly “guided by the science”, have magnanimously taken a step back and withdrawn from their daily TV briefings; leaving us with benevolent promises of jam tomorrow, air bridges to foreign climes so we can holiday once more sometime soon, safe schools for our kids, safe workplaces to return to, major infrastructure projects to give us jobs and, of course, the liberty and freedom we all deserve as the Coronavirus slowly recedes.

The truth is that in places like Leicester, Barrow-in-Furness and nearby Middlesbrough the threat of the virus remains high and, here in the North East in general, the statistics show that we are only just coming out of our peak.

The danger is still out there, and the Government know it.

Those who stood by and allowed COVID patients to be released from hospitals into care homes, causing, in my opinion, untold deaths, are now in the business of opening the gates and letting the population loose in the hope, no doubt, that herd immunity will follow.

It’s a massive gamble on their part and I really hope, after all of the efforts put in by Hartlepudlians to battle this pandemic, that American Independence Day - which, of course, falls on Saturday July 4, doesn’t mark a change in direction for us.

Recklessness has never been the norm here; that has been the irresponsible attitude of the minority.

As a member of the Treasury Select Committee, I will be the first to admit that we are probably heading for the worst recession within living memory and re-stimulating the economy is vital, but not at the expense of lives or our vital public services.

So, come Saturday, please remember the killer is still out there, it might be nice to be able to go out for a pint but please act responsibly and observe the social distancing rules.