Are you 100 per cent sure you’re ready for lockdown easing today? As pandemic restrictions ease a little furthur, will you notice all the ways the wider world has changed? 12 April 2021 • 5:00am And here we are, then: the Glorious 12th. Today’s Great Return will bring – if not total freedom – then shops, outdoor pubs and food, hairdressers, nail bars, gyms, self-contained staycations, theme parks, zoos, and weddings of up to 15. After months of torpor, hiring activity is at its fastest rate for almost six years. For many, this week will also mark a return to some sort of office existence, or as our Chancellor described it with David Brent-style evangelism back in March: “The spontaneity, the team building, the culture that you create in… an organisation from people… riffing off each other.” On Friday, Grant Schapps announced that he was no longer telling people not to book foreign holidays.