Among the victims of the lockdown are all those stuck in the marooned justice system.
Like Paul Embery, who sat on the executive of the Fire Brigade’s Union until being dismissed, he says, for the heinous crime of speaking at a rally in favour of Britain leaving the European Union.
Mr Embery is claiming unfair dismissal and his employment tribunal was due to be heard last month but has now been put back to next February.
He believes that he was sacked because the union leadership was in favour of remaining in the EU and would not tolerate any dissent, even though he spoke at the rally in a personal capacity and in his own time.
This was questioned by the union’s general secretary, Matt Wrack, who stated in a letter to the Mirror that those who studied the evidence “concluded this was not the case”.
Mr Embery is furious at the suggestion that he attended the rally when he should have been at work.
“I gave the speech after 5pm on a Friday, outside of my FBU working hours, and there were thousands of witnesses to testify to this fact,” he says.
“I wrote to Matt Wrack and demanded a retraction. He didn’t reply. I wrote again. Again, he didn’t reply.
“So I wrote a third time. Again, he ignored me.”
Mr Embery says that he was also ignored by the union president Ian Murray, until threatening to go public with Mr Wrack’s “blatantly untrue” letter.
At which point the union employed solicitors Thompsons to threaten him with legal action, telling him: "You do not have the consent of the FBU to publish private correspondence."
The letter is hardly that private, it was sent to the Mirror and extracts have already been published.
He says: “It is appalling that the union leadership is prepared to use members’ money in an effort to gag former officials.”
The FBU responded through national officer Mark Rowe who said that Mr Embery’s letters were not answered because he was not following correct procedure for making a complaint, and stood by Mr Wrack’s suggestion that he attended the rally in union time.
At least I think he did, the response wasn't exactly clear. He referred to an earlier article of mine on this scandal in which I quoted Mr Embery explaining the context of his speech at the Leave rally: "I did not even say it in my capacity as an FBU spokesman but on behalf of Trade Unionists Against The EU and in my own time on a Friday evening."
Mr Rowe said that the disputed letter from the general secretary "simply corrected that error in the article".
The error being, I can only assume, the claim by Mr Embery that he made the speech in his own time.
"Those who actually studied the evidence and who know the fire service and the union concluded that this was not the case," claimed Mr Wrack in his letter.
Back to Mr Embery: “Can the FBU provide proof to substantiate the general secretary's claim that those who sat in judgment on my case collectively drew the conclusion that I did not attend the rally in my own time?
"They will not be able to do so, no such evident exists. When they are unable to provide the evidence, it will prove that the general secretary's statement was a falsehood.”
The sooner an employment tribunal can decide the case, the better I sense for all concerned, not least because it is the FBU's members who are paying its legal bill.
Not only has it employed Thompsons, I'm told it is also hiring Oliver Segal QC, and I don't imagine he comes cheap.
