Covid-19 Diaries: is democracy in danger from wartime-style crisis powers?

Ian Evans and I have been friends since we met on holiday in Peru as long ago as Sunderland AFC were in the Premier League and Peter Reid was the manager. He lives in Ipswich and tries his best to support his local club*.

Just before lockdown, he and his wife joined another couple for a meal followed by a concert at the Ipswich Regal Theatre, part of a farewell tour, now curtailed, by the Irish band Clannad. Both friends were later found to be suffering from the wretched Covid-19 though they appear to have recovered and Ian and Jude have suffered no similar symptoms.

If that illustrates the random nature of the virus, Ian - a lawyer who served the judicial system for many years before retirement - has identified a potentially alarming if political side-effect ....  I thought about it yesterday when taking a short walk in the park at the end of our street and one of two men in uniform, somewhat closer together than social distancing guidance regards as advisable, told my wife: "A maximum of 20 minutes, madame, because there are two of you...."  While it was no great hardship to comply, the request did slightly unnerve me ...