sticking plaster

plural sticking plasters · alternative UK stick plaster

1. New ZealandUKAn adhesive bandage used in dressing wounds.

   As I live, these covered parts of him were checkered with the same squares as his face; his back, too, was all over the same dark squares; he seemed to have been in a Thirty Years’ War, and just escaped from it with a sticking-plaster shirt.

   1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chapter 3

   Synonyms: adhesive bandage, band-aid, Elastoplast

2. idiomaticinformalAn inadequate solution to a serious problem.

   In a statement, Khan called the deal a sticking plaster and said: "The Government is, in effect, making ordinary Londoners pay the cost for doing the right thing on COVID-19.

   2020 June 3, “Network News: Khan agrees £1.6bn "sticking plaster" for TfL”, in Rail, page 16