Only on 3 May did the stay-at-home restrictions promulgated by the British government on 23 and 26 March, rules enforcing the most draconian restrictions in British history, come before the Commons for retrospective endorsement with just two hours debate and no division. Steve Baker writes in The Telegraph that “We have lived under house arrest for weeks by ministerial decree – a statutory instrument that parliament had no foresight of and no opportunity to scrutinize or approve before it changed life in this country as we know it. The situation is appalling.” He argues that governments do have to take decisive action to protect public health, “But this suspension of freedom comes with a cost too. Millions of people in our country have been plunged into idleness at public expense and unemployment, facing financial and psychological hardship on a scale never seen before.” He emphasizes: “These extraordinary measures require not only legal authority but democratic consent. There is a real possibility that they have had neither,” adding: “The world just changed but British values have not.”