Simon Jones: Cummings and goings

It’s fitting that the intended theme for this column, disruption in optics, has been forced to take a back seat following the revelation that Downing Street special adviser Dominic Cummings admitted to driving 30 miles to a tourist attraction with his partner and child during lockdown to assess whether his vision was good enough to drive.

Like many, I watched the extraordinary press conference on bank holiday Monday in disbelief – and that was before the, quite frankly, insane rationale for the journey to Barnard Castle in the North East. Up until that point, I could almost appreciate his reasoning for making the 260-mile trip to fully isolate on a family farm in Durham. Almost.