Make the most of your time in lockdown with a daily dose of celebrity news and guides to the best shows. Sign up to the entertainment newsletter.
Phillip Schofield has gone in on Boris Johnson and the government over their “lack of clarity” regarding changes to the lockdown restrictions.
On Monday, the This Morning presenter criticised the prime minister and foreign secretary Dominic Raab over mixed messaging about whether people could meet up with more than one family member in a public park.
Phillip said he was starting the show “in a state of utter confusion” after the PM’s TV address on Sunday night, claiming: “His speech created more questions than answers.”
His co-host Holly Willoughby added: “And the answers seem to change every half hour.”
Phillip continued: “We now lack clarity, I understood until last night at 7 o’clock, I understood where we were going, I understood what was happening.
“Now I don’t understand, I don’t know what’s happening.”
The pair discussed Raab’s statements on BBC Breakfast and Radio 4′s Today programme, where he said people could meet more than one family member in a park, if they maintained social distancing.
The government has since clarified this was not correct, insisting people will only be allowed to meet one other person in a park while obeying distancing guidelines.
Phillip said: “You literally couldn’t write this, if this was in a farce on the telly I would go ‘That is a bit far-fetched, no government would arse it up that much’.
“It’s utterly astonishing. We have been really level on here, we have been really sensible on here, but this has just tipped us over the edge today.
“Until maybe somebody, maybe, would come on the show and explain actually what it is you want us to do?
“What are we allowed to do? Are you genuinely saying we can only meet one parent? Can you meet one parent in the morning and another parent in the afternoon? Can you go round to their house or does it have to be outside? What do you mean?”
Holly added: “I think we’re just about holding on we’ve all done so well. We’ve all done exactly as we’ve been told.
“We were doing so well to keep our spirits up, to keep going, to keep going, to keep going, but when there is this level of confusion, it knocks you back.
“When you feel you are just getting to grips with it, you’re just keeping afloat, it just knocks you back again.”
The PM’s address has been criticised by a number of other high-profile media figures, including fellow ITV daytime presenter Piers Morgan.
The Good Morning Britain host tore into Johnson’s “disingenuous” speech, which he said was full of “his usual flim-flam, his bluster, his bellicose, fist-pumping rhetoric”.
Little Britain star Matt Lucas has also filmed a searing parody of the speech, which he shared on Twitter.
This Morning airs weekdays at 10am on ITV.
