A back from the brink Boris Johnson stood at a lectern outside the front door of 10 Downing Street, on Monday morning and channelled Winston Churchill as he told the British people that while the lockdown would continue for the time being, “we are now beginning to turn the tide”.

“Preparations are under way and have been for weeks to allow us to win phase two of this fight as I believe we are now on track to prevail in phase one,” the British Prime Minister said.

All this reminded old timers of Churchill’s famous Mansion House speech in London in 1942 after the British had routed Rommel’s forces at Alamein and drove the German out of Egypt: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”

One old timer Boris mentioned is former Captain Tom Moore, who has raised more than £28 million for the NHS by walking round and round his garden at his home in Bedfordshire with the help of a walking frame. He is due to receive a personalised telegram when he turns 100 on Thursday, 30, April.

Also all Royal Mail post is currently being stamped: “Happy 100th Birthday Captain Thomas Moore NHS fundraising hero 30th April 2020.”

Boris urged the country to show “the same spirit of unity and determination” as Captain Moore.

It was not only what Boris had to say that attracted attention but the very fact he was there in person, looking perhaps a little pale, his tousled hair a little longer, but otherwise restored, following his stay at the ICU at St Thomas’ Hospital in London.

His cabinet colleagues are clearly relieved the skipper is back. “Great to see the boss back and on top form,” tweeted health secretary Matt Hancock, while foreign office minister, James Cleverly, posted, “Good to have you back boss” and even Sajid Javid, who was replaced as chancellor by his deputy, Rishi Sunak, said, “Back at the helm.”

Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner was less gushing: “The NHS has done tremendously but the government didn’t lockdown early enough, didn’t provide the PPE and didn’t test and trace. This cost us lives as we have one of the worst death rates worldwide. It’s vital our government doesn’t make any more mistakes and is transparent with the public.”

So what did Boris say?

He began with an apology: “I am sorry I have been away from my desk for much longer than I would have liked.”

He said: “If this virus were a physical assailant, an unexpected and invisible mugger, which I can tell you from personal experience it is, then this is the moment when we have begun together to wrestle it to the floor.

“This is the moment when we can press home our advantage. It is also the moment of maximum risk because I know that there will be many people looking now at our apparent success and beginning to wonder whether now is the time to go easy on those social distancing measures.”

He stressed that “we must also recognise the risk of a second spike, the risk of losing control of that virus, and letting the reproduction rate go back over one, because that would mean not only a new wave of death and disease but also an economic disaster.”

Despite calls from many influential Tories to allow some economic activity to resume, he was categoric on the fundamental point: “I refuse to throw away all the effort and the sacrifice of the British people and to risk a second major outbreak and huge loss of life and the overwhelming of the NHS.”

He urged the British people to “contain your impatience”.

“We collectively flattened the peak,” he said. “So when we are sure that this first phase is over, and that we are meeting our five tests — deaths falling, NHS protected, rate of infection down, really sorting out the challenges of testing and PPE, avoiding a second peak — then that will be the time to move on to the second phase in which we continue to suppress the disease and keep the reproduction rate down, but begin gradually to refine the economic and social restrictions and one by one to fire up the engines of this vast UK economy.

“In that process difficult judgments will be made. And we simply cannot spell out now how fast or slow or even when those changes will be made though clearly the government will be saying much more about this in the coming days.

And I want to serve notice now that these decisions will be taken with the maximum possible transparency. And I want to share all our working and our thinking, my thinking, with you the British people.”