Over the weekend I went out on my bike for my exercise and cycled around the borough, went through all of our main town centres and also visited some of our parks as well. And I have to say I was impressed by what I saw. The vast majority of people were all following the social distancing rules, and there were really just a couple of isolated incidents where people weren’t following the rules.

And, also, it was clear that the majority of you were actually staying at home and, obviously, that is going to help us as we try to come out of this crisis, and help ensure that there isn’t a second wave of coronavirus.

So, we’ve opened up our golf courses and our tennis courts and you can use them with members of your own household and you can also use them with one other person not of your own household and you have to maintain the two-metre social distancing rules.

You can also meet people from another household, one person in our parks and green spaces or in the street. Again, if you maintain that two-metre social distance.

You will have noticed that we’ve opened or re-opened our household waste and recycling centres at Greenford and Acton. Unfortunately, we’ve had some very very long queues and people waiting for over four hours so I’d plead with you to just hold back a little bit and wait until it settles down; keep your rubbish and things that you have been storing for a little bit longer and, hopefully, the queues will go and everyone can use the recycling centres as and when they need to, going forward.

Also, I wanted to just say that this week is Mental Health Awareness Week and, obviously, loneliness is difficult at the best of times but in this COVID crisis I think it is even worse.

So, if you know of a friend who’s elderly, isolating on their own or you have a neighbour who’s elderly and vulnerable and on their own, give them a call on the telephone or make contact virtually through Skype, or whatever virtual means of communications that you’ve got, and that they understand. The old telephone is probably the best way to do it.

We can only come through this crisis if we work and stay together, so please reach out to others and help them – especially those who are on their own – and support each other. And let’s continue to follow the advice to stay at home as much as possible and, by doing that, we are definitely going to save lives.