The Herald:

IN my list of lockdown villains cyclists and supermarket operators would once have been in the top five.

The roads around my neighbourhood curl gently around the Campsies and glisten all year with the lather of panting cyclists. Either this place holds the world record for numbers of pedal-pushers per square mile or hundreds of them were slaughtering those early travel restrictions as they hauled their sweaty limbs along these routes.

Elsewhere, the concept of social distancing in those early Covid days was ignored by supermarket managers who showed callous disregard for the health of their employees. Their lofty community values didn’t seem to extend to frontline workers made to stack shelves within inches of shoppers.

Food retail chains profited greatly from lockdown. Yet, rather than pay staff overtime to replenish supplies outside normal hours, they chose instead to imperil their health. Never was there a better argument for seeking the protection of a trade union.

Such transgressions though are footling when compared with the insidious profiteering of government during the pandemic. In England, the Boris Johnson administration has used Covid as a get-rich-quick scheme for friends and family.

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