When An Essential Is Not Just An Essential, It’s A Necessity. Welcome To The Mad Mad World Of 2020 Britain

It’s a question none of us had really had to face up to until just three long weeks ago. What exactly is an essential item? When push comes to shove, just what is a necessity and what is a frivolous waste of money?

The government has attempted to clarify this, but without going as far as to draw up a list of all essential items (good luck with that one) it is open to interpretation. A lot. According to their own legislation, no person may leave the place where they are living without reasonable excuse. Food, exercise, giving blood, and so forth being categorised as such.

Further that, a reasonable excuse includes the need, “to obtain basic necessities, including food and medical supplies for those in the same household (including any pets or animals in the household) or for vulnerable persons and supplies for the essential upkeep, maintenance and functioning of the household, or the household of a vulnerable person, or to obtain money”.

Well, for some, it appears that such as a trampoline or a new BBQ come under the heading of keeping the household functioning. For others it might mean a pair of hair-clippers or a new plant or a new set of saucepans.

And all of them would be completely right. Because surely, at a time like this, more than any other, our own personal sense of well-being is one of the most important things we must maintain. For some it could be reading, for others knitting and for others planting. Who is to say that they should be denied these simple pleasures provided they follow the rules?

And for all of us quarantined for weeks on end, where for whom knitting might not be the first thing on our minds, online adult toy and lingerie retailer Lovehoney, report an uplift in sales and customers who are grateful that they have decided to remain open for business. The link between sexual well-being and mental well-being has never been more relevant than now.

Because what is essential varies from one person to another. A new smoke alarm might not be on your personal list of essentials, but if yours suddenly decides to break down, all of a sudden a new smoke alarm is an extremely essential item.

Stories abound of shoppers being denied paying for items at the checkout as the store staff deemed them not to be essential items. Lipstick, mascara, four cans of beer (you’re obviously having a party sir) spring to mind.

And, limitations owing to stockpiling (which thankfully now appears to be abating) notwithstanding, what should be deemed essential and non-essential when it comes to grocery shopping?

Milk, eggs, bread and so forth, it’s doubtful anyone would object to any of those, but what about sneaking an avocado in your basket. Essential? Or how about a mango or two. Essential?

Because surely, at a time like this, more than any other, our own personal sense of well-being is one of the most important things we must maintain

In addition to the definition above, the government has also published a list of the retail outlets deemed exceptions and therefore allowed to remain open during the coronavirus outbreak.

Taking them both together would seem to provide a perfectly plausible definition. In other words, for those retail outlets on the exceptions list, then shouldn’t people be allowed to shop those stores for whichever items they like, provided they follow the appropriate social distancing guidelines, without being branded as pariahs?

Two police forces, however, seemed to think differently as we entered the Easter weekend, stating that they would be patrolling the aisles to check the contents of our trolleys for non-essential items.

Just go back and read that last sentence again. Frankly, it beggars belief. Both have since retracted their statements hence are not named here. But even so, to have been thinking along those lines is possibly the most terrifying aspect of this crisis.

This however is the reality of the U.K. in April 2020. But the really scary thing is that it could so easily be April 1984 where the Thought Police are watching our every move.