Alexander has finally bestirred himself to announce a public inquiry on the causes and course of the pandemic. The terms of reference, however, remain extremely unclear. And, apparently, we can afford to wait until spring next year for it to commence. There are more than merely electoral calculations behind such a delay, although these undoubtedly play a part, as this would report well after the next election.
There is a tension in official strategy between the undoubted trend of government policy, on the one hand, which is to get everything back to 'normal', so that the machine of capitalism can function without the 'incubus' and 'diincentive' of increased welfare benefits, and the rhetoric, on the other, of learning the 'lessons' of the pandemic, honouring the dead, and paying proper attention to those who, in many ways, have lost so much. There is a tension, in short, between the government's real priority and the things which it feels that it has to say and do for decency's sake. For even vice, as personified by Alexander, feels the need to pay tribute to virtue. And, despite everything, that inquiry could well yield some very uncomfortable truths. Alexander would dearly like us to 'forget' the pandemic, but forgetting is the mind's way of dealing with uncomfortable memories. However much something is 'forgotten', something uneasy and disquieting still remains.