CHANGE: Plan B Covid restrictions to end in England, Boris Johnson announces.

“Having looked at the data carefully, the Cabinet concluded that once regulations lapse the Government will no longer mandate the wearing of face masks anywhere,” the prime minister told MPs on Wednesday.

“From tomorrow, we will no longer require face masks in classrooms and the Department for Education will shortly remove national guidance on their use in communal areas.

“In the country at large we will continue to suggest the use of face coverings in enclosed or crowded spaces, particularly when you come into contact with people you don’t normally meet – but we will trust the judgment of the British people and no longer criminalise anyone who chooses not to wear one.”

Amazing how facing an existential threat to one’s career focuses the mind: Is it over for Boris Johnson? “His excuse for attending a drinks party in the garden of No. 10 Downing Street after passing such restrictive lockdown laws is that he ‘believed implicitly that this was a work event’ — even though his private secretary had convened the event via a mass email asking staff to ‘bring your own booze.’ The No. 10 garden, Johnson said, is an extension of the office, so it was all work. As he spoke at Prime Minister’s Questions, Tory Members of Parliament sat silently behind him — glad for once to be wearing their masks.”