Ruth Wishart: 'Our supplies of trust during Covid are beginning to wear thin'

His antipathy to vaccines is well documented and his behaviour after allegedly contracting Covid in mid December fell some way short of isolating.

His forms to guarantee entry to Australia seemed to have a few administrative errors too, like stating he was a travel free zone when he was dotting about Serbia and Spain.

But, being an important sort of chap, these minor details were apparently seen to by a minion.

Back on court one, the Prime Minister, whose relationship with the truth has been called somewhat tenuous. Or so claimed one ex Conservative MP in his column last week. I won’t repeat what else he said, since he can afford much better lawyers.

Anyway, Boris Johnson’s principal private secretary has seemingly been a mite unwise on two counts.

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Firstly he thought it acceptable to invite 100 or so folk to a drinks party when the rest of the UK world was firmly locked down, and secondly, he was cavalier enough to couch this invitation on an actual email.(You know, the sort of thing recipients can print off or forward if so minded.)

I try not to be overly cynical about such things, but I’m seriously pushed to remember when I last invited people to an illegal event on any boss’s behalf, and in his or her back garden. Which suggests that the actual host may have been Mr J himself.

But, since this column in this particular space does not do politics, I’ll leave it, as the dear leader suggests, to the mandarin charged with investigating such matters to determine who invited whom to what.

I can only suggest that it’s all got a bit them and us, has it not?

On one thing most of us can agree and that is that vaccine take up and the like is a matter of trust. The government has to trust the scientists, and the public has to trust the government. It is currently a commodity in short supply.