I think the government thought release lockdown and the normality will return - sadly not. Towns are still empty people have got used to shopping on line and they don't want the commute either. Plus if the schools don't go back their parents cant go to work - what happens if the schools haven't gone back by the end of furlough?

If it hasn't sunk in yet, we're not going back to how it was in 2019. As desperate as our great leaders are to get back to the good old days, it just isn't going to happen. People's priorities have changed. No longer will they want to waste money on retail trinkets and sit for hours on trains and buses, in cars for hours on their way to jobs which they can just so easily do at home, and save themselves a massive percentage of their earnings while doing it.

and what do you know about work? freeloading and shirking all your life? all you care about is the supply of werthers originals.

Please read your PM.

I completely agree with you - the world has moved on - this has significant implications as commercial property underpins much in the finance of this country - if that sector had a crash things could get very interesting.

We already see the reduction of demand for retail space will we see the same for commercial and office space?

The potential threat of commercial and office spaces being empty is driving the return to the office, in my opinion. If that market collapses it will be carnage. But I just can't see companies carrying on paying for tens of thousands of square metres of office space when they can just rent a small 'hub' office, and have employees come and go as they please while doing the majority of their work from home. A mate of mine has already terminated the contract of his office in favour of paying an hourly rate for meeting rooms, as and when required, for his staff who are now working from home. It'll save him a fortune.

On a personal level, I haven't been in my work office since late March. I may only get in in single figures for the remainder of the year. There is nothing of any note I haven't been able to do from home. Even my biggest yearly projects have been completed and ordered while sat at my kitchen table. My home and work Macs are almost identically specced and fully synched up. It's the same working interface whether I'm at home or in the office.

I suppose the big test will come in the Winter when people working from home are having to heat and light their own houses for the majority of the working day. If companies downsize their offices, saving them fortunes, will they subsidise home workers' utility bills in the Winter?

My thoughts exactly - my wife has been at home since February - it hasn't impacted her ability to deliver on her role - in fact quite the opposite.

https://hms.harvard.edu/news/silent-spreaders

FROM Harvard university


Also evidence that babies carry large amounts of Covid in their faeces .

You can all make your mind up on the potential implications when 3 million children go back to school in two weeks time .