**TLDR - Boris Johnson and his cabinet announced and encouraged the 'Clap for Tom Moore' in an attempt to drive a narrative akin to "Heroes doing their national duty and raising money for the NHS' as opposed to the narrative of the conservatives consistently under funding the service to the point that it needed donations in the first place.** Tom Moore was undoubtedly someone who deserves to be recognised. His goal of raising £1000 for NHS Charities Together (by walking over 100 lengths of his garden at 100 years old) ended in a staggering £32.7 million raised. This is no small feat, and clearly for our nation, Tom Moore represented a determination and spirit that we hope is evident in the British peoples. And yet, when Boris announced a clap for Tom Moore on a Thursday at 6pm, I couldn't help but be left with a sour taste in my mouth. Here was a man whose party have been responsible for a decade of under funding the NHS **[1]**, who announced a £16.5 billion increase in the defense budget during a pandemic when said under funded NHS is in dire need of money **[2]**, encouraging us to clap for a situation that has only been necessitated by the conservative's greed. This was no (perhaps misguided) social movement like the 'Clap for our Carers' **[3]**, begun by the people without the power to currently help the NHS. This was a deliberate attempt from the prime minister, to make a martyr out of a situation that should never have needed a martyrdom in the first place. It's the equivalent of someone setting a house on fire and applauding the firemen who died trying to douse its flames. **REFERENCES** **[1]** https://nhsfunding.info/nhs-crisis-making/#:~:text=The%20NHS%20has%20experienced%20a,since%20the%20NHS%20was%20established. **[2]** https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2020/11/19/uk-to-boost-defense-budget-by-219-billion-heres-who-benefits-and-loses-out/ **[3]** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clap_for_Our_Carers

**TL;DR 'Clap for Tom Moore' was not meant to intentionally distract the public from the mismanagement and underfunding of the NHS. If anything, the clap brought these issues into the forefront of many people's minds as they remembered all the money that he raised for the NHS service.** I don't believe that the 'Clap for Tom Moore' was meant to intentionally distract us from the government's failings to the NHS. The national clap was to simply pay tribute to the man who in some ways has come to define the coronavirus pandemic in the UK, as well as to the NHS staff. Johnson told the Commons that the purpose of the clap was to 'show our appreciation for (Captain Sir Tom) and all that he stood for and believed in' and I don't believe that there is any sinister plot behind the clap to distract the public from the mismanaged and underfunded NHS. [1] The NHS’s underfunding has rarely been forgotten throughout this pandemic. The British public are fully aware of the NHS's situation, this is the reason why Captain Sir Tom Moore set out to raise money in the first place. If anything, the clap may have even emphasised the lack of NHS funding as the public remembers all that money he raised for the company. As this pandemic continues to rage on throughout the UK, there is no event big enough that could truly distract the public from the NHS's mismanagement. [1] ‘Boris Johnson to lead national clap for Captain Sir Tom Moore after death’, (https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/boris-johnson-national-clap-captain-sir-tom-moore-death-today-b918475.html)

Clapping for Tom Moore or the NHS was only ever about scoring virtue points in our very warped modern status marketplace. So I don't think it was a distraction from the true predicament of the NHS but also don't think it was anything to do with Sir Tom or any NHS 'heroes'.