Fifth of Britons following lockdown rules less strictly, poll indicates

A fifth of Britons are following the lockdown rules less strictly than before – with a third of those citing Dominic Cummings’ actions as a factor, a survey has indicated.

The YouGov poll suggested that the vast majority – some 73% – followed the lockdown rules last week as strictly as they had in the previous week.

But of the 21% who said they followed the rules less strictly, 32% mentioned Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s senior adviser as one of the reasons for their breaches.

The Prime Minister has stood by his aide, who travelled from London to Durham during the lockdown because of concerns over who would look after his son if both he and his wife were incapacitated by coronavirus.

Durham Police concluded he may have committed a “minor breach” of the regulations by taking a trip to Barnard Castle but took no further action.

The YouGov poll suggested that in total 7% of Britons may have used Mr Cummings’ actions as their justification for their own breaches of lockdown rules.

The survey of 2,043 British adults on May 28-29 found that younger Britons were the most likely to have adhered less strictly to the rules than in the previous week.

Some 29% of those aged 18 to 24 and 25% of those aged 25 to 49 said their adherence to the rules had declined.

The survey also found 76% felt the coronavirus situation was getting better, up from 58% two weeks ago.

More than a third – 36% – said restrictions should be more severe, but this is down from 42% two weeks ago, while the proportion of those thinking the lockdown measures were about right increased from 42% to 47%.

Against a backdrop of political and business pressure to ease the two-metre social distancing rule, a separate survey found 49% opposed reducing the distance to 1.5 metres, with 37% in favour.

Those findings came from a snap poll of 1,565 British adults on June 2.