ARE they just incompetent or actively malicious? That’s the question I keep asking myself. When it comes to the UK government it is, at times, difficult to know. Some kind of conjoined clustershambles of both perhaps.

The Home Office’s shabby, dilatory, deceitful, heartless, frankly monstrous response to Ukrainian refugees certainly suggests as much. A more potent cocktail of uselessness and viciousness is hard to imagine as people flee a war only to be confronted with closed offices, conflicting instructions, pointless journeys and a ton of paperwork before joining – or more likely not – their families in the UK. So far, less than 1,000 have managed to do so. But this is quite normal for Boris Johnson’s government. Another week, another catalogue of errors and performative nastiness. The Home Secretary Priti Patel, it must be said, has always excelled at the latter. Why change now, I suppose, even in the face of a humanitarian crisis. Some of the errors are minor and may even be quite funny. Liz Truss (or her social media handler) tweeted about her meeting with the Greek Foreign Secretary Nikos Dendias. Unfortunately, she got him mixed up with the Greek singer Nikos Vertis. At least it suggests someone in this government has some interest in culture. Whether the Greek Foreign Secretary was impressed may be another matter.
Still, we can all make mistakes. Like the purchase of inadequate personal protection equipment for the NHS at the beginning of the pandemic. Somewhere in the region of £8.7 billion’s worth. PPE equipment bought under so-called “fast track” lanes where companies, often with links to Tory ministers, were handed contracts after limited checks.
The Department of Health admitted this week they are going to have to dispose of unusable medical equipment by burning it. How much are they going to burn? Somewhere in the region of 500 plus lorryloads a month. All in a bid to get rid of the 5.5 billion pieces of useless PPE. Yes, 5.5bn. That’s a staggering figure, isn’t it? 
The government can say – and they have – that they were in a hurry to purchase protection in the middle of a global health crisis. Even so, that’s ineptitude on an epic scale
When it comes to checking the bona fides of Ukrainian refugees, the government claims that it is being dutiful and diligent – and let’s give them the benefit of the doubt for a moment – because of safety concerns. 
It’s just a pity that they weren’t quite so diligent two years ago when it came to providing adequate protection for the NHS. 
But then this is a government stuck in a Brexit mindset when the world has moved on. 
The British people are horrified by what is happening in Ukraine and want to help. The government at times seems to be merely paying lip service to the idea of compassion. As in so many things, it likes to talk the talk but don’t seem very interested – or maybe the word should be capable – of walking the walk. 
But then why walk when you can take the government plane?