There is little doubt that several serious mistakes were made by the government when the coronavirus first arrived on the shores of the United Kingdom. It faced an unprecedented challenge and none of the options before it were without risk. The ship of state was eventually steadied – or steadied itself – and an immediate catastrophe in the National Health Service was averted (though not in the care-home sector). Yet Britain is still on course to have the highest death toll in Europe, and it is not much consolation to know that the outcome could have been even worse.

The question now, which the next few weeks will answer, is whether the government has made another strategic error in its handling of the route out of the crisis. Having locked down the country for seven weeks and reduced the economy to a shadow of itself, Boris Johnson’s hope is that the situation can be slowly eased back to something nearer to normality. But his policy came close to derailment last weekend, through confusing and conflicting messaging.