Patrick Christys: There’ll always be an excuse to extend the Coronavirus Act

Are we heading towards a dictatorship by stealth? The government wants to extend the draconian Coronavirus Act for another six months, despite the fact that around 65.1% of the population is fully vaccinated and pretty much every adult has received at least one dose.

We’re being told that cases are rising, hospitalisations are going up, winter is coming, flu season is just around the corner, the kids are going back to school, and we haven’t even spoken about a new variant yet…there’ll always be an excuse.

There’ll always be a reason to extend the Coronavirus Act. We may never be out of it. They want to extend their powers just in case we have an October lockdown. I won’t comply with it. It’s only if we start saying no in big numbers that things will change.

Lockdown to protect the summer, lockdown to protect the autumn, lockdown to protect Christmas, lockdown to protect the spring - can you see a theme here?

Under the Coronavirus Act, police can disperse any gathering – which literally means any group of more than one person, we all remember the two ladies who got done for having coffee together in the park – they can detain you if you’re suspected of having Covid, boot you out of any premises it likes, order you to remain in any premises. Failure to comply can see you fined or taken to court.

As if that wasn’t unpalatable enough, an official review published in May found that every single prosecution brought using controversial powers has been wrongful. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said that all 270 charges under the Coronavirus Act had been withdrawn in court, or overturned after innocent people were convicted in England and Wales.

As well as the Coronavirus Act there’s the Health Protection Regulations. The CPS said it's ongoing review also found that 279 charges under the Health Protection Regulations had also been unlawful between March 2020 and March 2021 – 18 per cent of the total. Overall, 549 incorrect charges were identified out of 1,821 prosecutions using all coronavirus laws, meaning around a third were wrongful.

The main reason given for the mistakes? That police officers misunderstood the law.

So we have ultra-draconian laws being incorrectly enforced in a way that could massively impact our civil liberties. That’s a dictatorship.

And then we add into the mix that the government is willing to go against expert advice and start jabbing kids, Boris, reportedly being led around by the nose by her indoors, implementing a green agenda that nobody voted for, we’re staring down the barrel of tax hikes that break a manifesto promise…

We’re living in scary times - when I heard that there might be an October lockdown I had to check my calendar, just to make sure I wasn’t living in the year 1984.