The infection rate in Sunderland has shot up [...] Not sure why we are doing so badly, but I suppose I'd better continue to keep my head down.
Plenty of suggestions in other posts, like:
People are meeting up in larger groups than allowed already. [...] too many 'cant' wear a mask.
but I guess you're right, we're not sure. I also feel there is a lack of urgency from government for finding out why because it would probably suggest continuing restrictions or imposing new ones and that doesn't fit Boris's irreversible narrative towards surrender.
Restrictions then - I used to work with pubs in the past and know that many need the table service restriction to end in order to be viable, the longer this carry on the more pubs will close, jobs lost etc...
I was at one place last week which was taking orders at a till by the garden entry, then you either took your drink(s) on the way to your table if the order was ready in the time it took to take payment (they were pretty fast) or it was brought over by waiting staff. If you wanted another, you actually went out the exit and back in again. I'm not sure if that was strictly legal under current restrictions, but it should be!
To be blunt, if carrying a few drinks to tables (collecting empties on the way back, although I bet that's more often than usual) is enough to send a pub under, then it probably wasn't going to survive next winter anyway. Should we really cause a lot more infections and a few more deaths to give such businesses a few more months trading?
People are meeting up in larger groups than allowed already.
If it's outdoors, 1m+ and groups aren't mixing, I would have relaxed the group size restriction further already, but I would make it that if one of such a group tests positive, they should all quarantine until two negative tests a few days apart, so that risk might motivate smaller groups.
The mask thing is a mistake, although they should be mandatory with no exceptions as too many 'cant' wear a mask. So in that respect its pretty much optional already!
I wouldn't say "no exceptions" but I would be in favour of proof to be carried and shown to public health officers on request.
The problem with lifting this particular restriction is that there are people who post (here and elsewhere) that they are currently covering their face when legally required but will bin their masks when the law is repealed, and decreasing use will increase transmission, so this change especially seems a pretty needless risk to take. Are enough people to make a difference to business survival really not going to the pub or whatever because they have to wear a mask to go to the bog? I suspect more are going to be deterred by the increase in unmasked nobbers in pubs, so this change will actually hurt them, even if there is no business-destroying surge in deaths.
We have seen repeatedly during this that there is a significant "me-me-me" group who won't do the right things voluntarily but will if they risk fines or even peer pressure, and the government maybe knows that there's enough of them to cause a bigger third wave. The most likely conclusion seems to be that they are trying the "herd immunity" gambit again, hoping that it won't flood the NHS this time (mainly due to vaccination), hoping it will be over before schools go back and sacrificing the smaller number of deaths and greater number of long-covid sufferers!
