NO ONE at the Oxford Mail relishes being a killjoy: the idea of telling any family that, after months of misery and hardship, they aren’t even allowed to enjoy a single day of snow, build a snowman or go sledding, is deeply uncomfortable.

However as your local newspaper, it is a fundamental part of what we do to carry a message of public responsibility, especially when times are difficult.

We do not tell anyone that they cannot have fun in their own garden, and we do not tell anyone that they cannot leave their house to go for a run or just a walk and enjoy the snow, but when we see images like the one on today’s front page of large numbers of people congregating in a public place clearly for recreational purposes, while the vast majority are still hunkered down inside, we feel duty-bound to remind people that the Government’s stay-at-home order has not changed.

We will accept that there is room for debate over how best to control a pandemic, and of course it is possible to go sledding in the park and not spread the virus, however such arguments quite simply ignore the basic point that there is a temporary order which is likely to remain in place for a few more weeks yet, and for some people to just blatantly ignore it and act as if the rules don’t apply to them is not only potentially dangerous, it’s also just an insult to the rest of us who are still obeying the rules of this lockdown.

It's also an insult to all of those who have died from this virus, all of those who have contracted it and suffered through it, all of their families and the NHS workers who have risked their lives.

This is not a question of the best way to control a contagious virus – this is a matter of basic human decency: none of us like this lockdown, but the vast majority of us are patiently sticking to the rules.

It's not because we are scientists and we understand the risks inside and out, and it's not because we support everything this Government says – it's because, at a time of crisis, we stick together because it is the right thing to do.