The response looks well organised to me.
How!?!?
Did whatever happened with that email knock us back to any great degree?
Probably. To assess, ask questions like: do we have more or less new ventilators per capita than participants?
As Gove said in one of the briefings, we've been buying ventilators all over the place, including from the EU.
Can we buy more or less quickly if we do all the negotiation ourselves?
There's been some problems with protective clothing, but if the demand for anything spikes significantly there will be shortages.
Have we requisitioned any factories yet? Our neighbours have.
Our manufacturing companies have proved themselves adept at turning their hand to making stuff they don't usually make.
Really? What was it, 30 ventilators this weekend? Contrary to this government repeatedly thanking its friends like JCB and Dyson, the overwhelming majority of ventilator production is being done by existing suppliers running their capacity at 110% or more of its normal maximum, running shifts 24 hours and taking extraordinary steps to reduce stoppages with some increased costs and a lot of worker goodwill because this is literally a life-or-death effort - but most of them get fark all thanks from government and scepticism from certain people that they're actually working on ventilator parts.
Examining the alternatives is not whataboutery, it's a valid part of assessing performance and what could be expected.
Chuck Johnson and Hancock in the Thames if you like, but there's no point in doing that unless there is or was something better to put in their place.
"Other people would have done worse" still does not mean that this group are doing well!
The chancellor should also get an honourable mention.
Brilliant job by him and his staff to come up with two huge rescue plans in such short order.
Less great that it's failed to launch in a prompt manner, especially the stuff for self-employed, and that loads of people have been laid off. Also, government agency closures/restructurings planned for 1 April went ahead as planned, leaving loads more people without a job and no immediate prospect of being able to find another one, instead of delaying the closures and furloughing the workers.
