Hopefully voters in North Shropshire will bring Johnson's premiership to a deserved end in 8 days' time.
We can only hope that the voters in that most respectable of constituencies realise the power they have in their hands to rid our country of this endless embarrassment.
Hopefully voters in North Shropshire will bring Johnson's premiership to a deserved end in 8 days' time.
They won't even on Redfield poll tonight Labour would still be short of a majority and LDs frequently win by elections the Tories regain at the general
For all those supporting BoJo - what success has he delivered over the last 2 years?
I am not supporting him, but he got us out of the EU, got a trade deal that protected our sovereignty more than anyone said was possible, and got us a vaccine program earlier than anyone else in Europe
The one that ended the United Kingdom as a trading block and forces GB and NI companies to have export licences to sell things to each other?
If that's protecting the sovereignty of the UK I'd hate to see what not ptotecting it looks like.
Theresa May's backstop.
Infinitely worse.
Perhaps, but isn't relevant to the argument @Aslan was promoting. He said that the current trade deal - which dissolved the UK trading area - "protected our sovereignty". I now need an export license to sell products in my own country. How has that protected our sovereignty to do things like not need an export license to trade inside our own country...
I don't need you to come back in with alternative takes on external sovereignty - you have one perspective on that, I have another. But the ending of the UK as a trading nation is indisputable - we are now split in two with GB as one trading zone and NI as another trading zone. Usually deals that protect a country's sovereignty doesn't split a chunk off it.
It did protect our sovereignty because we had Article 16 so could override it. The ending is not indisputable, we'll see what the situation is post-Article 16.
There are plenty of countries that have had chunks split off, where its convenient to do so, its far from unprecedented.
On that logic while in the EU our sovereignty was protected because we could always leave.
Either in the EU we were sovereign because we could leave and there is no compromise of sovereignty over NI because we can invoke A16; or in the EU we were not sovereign and we are not sovereign now because there is no free movement of goods between GB and NI.
You are a logical debater. Which is it; it can't be both.
We were always technically sovereign, we could only exercise that sovereignty by invoking Article 50 so we rightly did when people wanted to exercise that sovereignty.
Same deal with Article 16 - and I think it should be invoked too.
So as it stands we are not sovereign because we haven't exercised it. Is that right?
If memory serves, you've been trying variants (so to speak) of this line for a couple of years now, and I'm sorry, but I think it's a stupid argument. If we our sovereignty within the EU is only present because we have the option to leave it, then we clearly aren't sovereign while we're in it, and the fact that we assented (implicitly) to that reality is irrelevant.
He who [has to] break[s] a thing to find out what it is, has left the path of wisdom.
Apology accepted. Although your point is wrong. We were always sovereign whether we decided to exercise it or not. Of course we made compromises but did so as a sovereign nation.
But that is not the point. If we were not sovereign within the EU because we hadn't "proved" it by leaving, then the NI deal means we are not sovereign because as of this moment we haven't exercised A16. It can't be both.
If you think we weren't sovereign while in the EU and aren't sovereign now because the NI deal means that there is no free movement of goods between GB and NI that is fair enough. But you can't argue for one and not the other.
We were always sovereign for both. The question is if you wanted to exercise your sovereignty or not.
The English and Welsh voted to exercise their sovereignty, hence invoking Article 50. The NI did not, hence the special arrangements.
Now if the NI wish to exercise theirs, then A16 is the right answer for them, just as it was for the UK as a whole. For the same reasons. Using the same logic.
No inconsistencies.
Excellent. So we were sovereign while in the EU: tick. And we are sovereign with this NI deal: tick.
So why all the fuss about leaving the EU to reclaim our sovereignty.
Because we wanted to exercise our sovereignty.
Not just have it in abeyance.
Philip
I remember you telling me that the main benefit of leaving the EU was to get our sovereignty back.
Now you are telling me that we had it all the time!
So why leave?
So we could exercise it.
If you only have sovereignty so long as you can't exercise it, and you want to exercise it but can't, then do you have it.
So we only have something if we use it? Obviously we "could" exercise it, we did. So obviously we had it.
Is this some weird version of "having your cake and eating it?" ....or because we don't use a nuclear weapon we don't have it?
No its the polar opposite.
If you're not bothered about using your sovereignty then its OK to keep it in abeyance in something like the EU or NI Protocol, so long as you have an exit mechanism like A50 or A16.
If you are bothered about using it then you need to invoke the relevant Article first before you can.
How is that not clear?
But I am not bothered about using it. There are more important things to worry about, like Covid, the NHS, paying back borrowed monies, trying to keep our trade figures up to where they were, you know, and of course not dying (even though I am old and I will die sooner or later...)
That's fine, you're not bothered. So vote Remain then. That's entirely valid. I had no philosophical objection to Remain.
But that wasn't the nations choice. You were a minority and lost the vote. A majority were bothered so that's the decision made.
To say masks do nothing is obviously completely wrong and verging on anti-vax-like conspiracy theories.
A full and correct deployment of the Horse Battery
Hope you are well.
Ah, you know, ups, downs, sideways bits. I'm having a new bathtub installed - in my small world this is excitement of a sort
I don't think I ever did get to the bottom of the CHB moniker. It's a quiet eveing, no PMs in trouble, no end to the world! Surely a (do dramatise) story of a famous PB moniker will draw an audience of ... er lots!
To say masks do nothing is obviously completely wrong and verging on anti-vax-like conspiracy theories.
A full and correct deployment of the Horse Battery
Hope you are well.
Ah, you know, ups, downs, sideways bits. I'm having a new bathtub installed - in my small world this is excitement of a sort
I don't think I ever did get to the bottom of the CHB moniker. It's a quiet eveing, no PMs in trouble, no end to the world! Surely a (do dramatise) story of a famous PB moniker will draw an audience of ... er lots!
Sensible and moderate proposals by the PM tonight. Vaccine passports for nightclubs and large venues and facemasks for cinemas and theatres given Omicron but crucially no new lockdown
These measures are pretty much what we have in Scotland already. HYUFD in "SNP are sensible and moderate" shocker.
And which appear have had zero effect on either the case or vaccination rate in Scotland. The reality is this won't make any difference to the outcomes, it just means more miserable people, ruined business, and a "papers please" society.
Restrictions have always been the wrong answer to this pandemic, but at least last time round there was a point "we're waiting for the vaccines" / "we're rolling out the vaccines". There is no point now - we have vaccines, we've double jabbed almost everyone at any real risk, and triple jabbed the most vulnerable.
Polling on this is massively skewed because - most people want to WFH for reasons unrelated to the pandemic, and those least in favour of restrictions are least likely to be polled because they will be out living their lives rather than cowering at home being rung by opinion pollsters.
On topic, the worst thing from this polling is this.
Three in ten say they are less likely to follow Covid rules as a result (29%).
This rises to a third of Labour voters (33%) and those aged 18-34 (33%) who say the same.
Over half say they are just as likely to follow the rules (54%)
Whatever Boris Johnson announces tonight will be ignored by large parts of the country making us less secure.
He needs to go and be replaced by someone with the credibility and authority to launch you new Covid-19 measures.
Except it wouldn't matter if Jesus were to descend from heaven to promote any new Covid measures. First of all, the country, or a large enough fraction of it at any rate, has had enough of Covid measures and will happily ignore them if they think they can get away with it. And secondly, there's probably nothing short of a full lockdown that will do anything to seriously impede the latest version of this bloody virus, it's questionable as to whether or not even that will work, and neither the economy nor wider society can sustain an annual cycle of hokey cokey house arrest for the next thousand years.
The Government can plausibly get away with yet more masks (useless) and WFH (not useful enough,) and after that it is out of options. Reinstating large scale business support and putting about five or six million people back on furlough until various roadmap steps between April and July, let alone shutting all the schools again for the Winter, is a non-starter. And if declining to go to those lengths means, to put it bluntly, tent hospitals and doctors having to decide which Covid patient gets a ventilator and which one gets a big shot of morphine, then that's what's going to end up happening. After all, selectively abandoning non-Covid patients to perish through lack of care capacity is already a reality in the NHS. Why should selectively abandoning Covid patients to perish as well seem so unimaginable?
Basically, if we are fortunate and this latest wave of the disease is moderate then we can all breathe a sigh of relief, and if we aren't and it's bad then there are no workable strategies left for avoiding a massacre. Draconian restrictions are over. Finished.
I'm not sure it's as "mild" as we all hope
Benedict Barclay @BarclayBenedict · 2m Replying to @BarclayBenedict The total number of people in hospital with Covid is 4,252, which is very sharply up on 2,550 last week.
Gauteng has fallen from 72% of cases to 59%, which shows that cases are now rising faster in other provinces.
The report from a couple of days ago was that 76% of the admissions testing positive with Covid were incidental infections i.e. the patient was not being admitted with Covid.
I believe that turned out to be wishful thinking bolleaux
Really? Source?
I found it last night down some 3am rabbit hole, I fear I can't find it again. Feel free to ignore, or not
Anyway, I just don't believe South African hospitals are taking in loads more people with broken limbs who just "happen" to have Covid as well
From yesterday
"South Africa's Covid Hospital Admissions More Than Double In A Day
"South Africa Covid Cases: According to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases 383 people have been admitted to hospital with the disease in the last 24 hours compared with 175 in the preceding period."
"Worst day yet for hospital admissions in South Africa. #Omicron Cases and Daily Admissions are 3x what we saw with Delta. But the silver lining is that ICU is still 72% below the most applicable Delta comparison period. How many will end up in ICU is the question. #COVID19"
Given the test positivity rate in South Africa is more than 20%, why does it surprise you that people with other ailments (cancer, eye surgery, gunshot wounds, kidney disease, etc.) might have Covid?
Enough people are now going through the whole grisly, inevitable process - infection, admission, then on to ventilation and ICU - for us to know the surge in Gauteng is real and it is Covid
There are also reports of the first deaths circling Twitter, and that statistical leap in excess deaths to consider (which might of course be random, or not, or Delta, who the F knows?)
OK time to watch Boris scratch the blackboard
So: time to nail your colours to the mast: So you think we should be strengthening measures against Covid (moving towards Lockdown), or continuing with current measures?
I said earlier that I think we should stick with what we have, and instead focus on surging the booster drive, and prepping the NHS for a big wave of new cases between now and late Jan
I fear a grim and foolish logic is, however, leading us to Plan B, and then Lockdown
And some on here are still saying Oh that will be fine, you stay home and eat chocolates.
Jesus F Christ. For many many people the last winter lockdown was pretty much unbearable
It will not be fine. But neither is having a very high rate of hospitalisation and deaths.
You fuck people and their businesses over too much, you run out of money, the health service collapses, you get the deaths anyway.
The odd thing is: we have been at war; in many ways a much worse situation, and your scenario did not come to pass.
When the country was at war the Government didn't respond by telling everybody to sit at home all the bloody time.
They did, when it was needed. 'Stay put if the invader comes.' 'Holiday at home' to prevent 'unnecessary travel'. 'Coughs and sneezes spread diseases'. .
I’m old enough to remember having been told to hide under the kitchen table in the event of the four minute warning.
Whatever happened to kitchen tables?
I'm typing this drivel on my family's old kitchen table, formica top, metal legs, which I use as my desk.
Don't know what your lot did with yours'.
I do recall a kitchen table when I was young. It had fold out flaps and the steel mechanisms that sprung them into place were like Normandy beach defenses.
We had pews as seat for out kitchen table. Dad demolished an old chapel in the 60's, and rescued some of the old pews. My brother still uses one as seats for side of his table, and my sister has the other somewhere.
I miss them; many of my childhood memories revolve around mealtimes and those pews. But I've got the clock that hung above the table.
What's also really odd is that this is being justified by "1m infections between now and the end of December" which is basically our current run rate, so the scientists don't expect a major explosion in the virus, Delta or Omicron. The modelling wouldn't support it either because there's such high levels of population immunity and Delta or Omicron will run into sub-standard hosts far too often to really break out.
All of this is being done to cover up Boris and his dodgy parties.
To say masks do nothing is obviously completely wrong and verging on anti-vax-like conspiracy theories.
A full and correct deployment of the Horse Battery
Hope you are well.
Ah, you know, ups, downs, sideways bits. I'm having a new bathtub installed - in my small world this is excitement of a sort
I don't think I ever did get to the bottom of the CHB moniker. It's a quiet eveing, no PMs in trouble, no end to the world! Surely a (do dramatise) story of a famous PB moniker will draw an audience of ... er lots!
What's also really odd is that this is being justified by "1m infections between now and the end of December" which is basically our current run rate, so the scientists don't expect a major explosion in the virus, Delta or Omicron. The modelling wouldn't support it either because there's such high levels of population immunity and Delta or Omicron will run into sub-standard hosts far too often to really break out.
All of this is being done to cover up Boris and his dodgy parties.
Whitty's charts were quite startling
Also this is 1m Omicron plus however many Delta can take before it disappears?
So it could be 2m, about 100,000 a day. Which is a fuck of a lot, to be fair
To say masks do nothing is obviously completely wrong and verging on anti-vax-like conspiracy theories.
A full and correct deployment of the Horse Battery
Hope you are well.
Ah, you know, ups, downs, sideways bits. I'm having a new bathtub installed - in my small world this is excitement of a sort
I don't think I ever did get to the bottom of the CHB moniker. It's a quiet eveing, no PMs in trouble, no end to the world! Surely a (do dramatise) story of a famous PB moniker will draw an audience of ... er lots!
I thought it was telling he said these measures signed off by the cabinet.....I think he wanted to go a lot further.
He knows the pressure the NHS is under right now with an Omicron wave is on its way. We are in for a tremendously difficult winter
And we have allowed massive pressure and a massive backlog to build in the NHS by month after month after month of 40k+ new cases per day. The laughably dubbed "exit wave".
France, with their vaccine passports and permanent plan b measures have got 12k in hospital with COVID right now, today. The UK has got 7k in hospital with COVID. The Netherland, another one who dodge the exit wave, have got more people in hospital with COVID than they did in their first wave. Germany, another one to dodge the exit wave, have got more people in the ICU than in either of the previous waves. Switzerland (my soon to be home), dodged the exit wave, have got more people in the ICU than ever before.
What exit wave? We have not had an exit wave. Your LSHTM study did not claim we have had an exit wave. The reason why the NHS is so fragile is the relentless wall of patients - part Covid, part everything else that gets swept aside by Covid. Other countries haven't suffered that because they didn't follow your advice and lift all restrictions.
You keep saying this because you want it to be true. But it isn't true. Its like listening to HYUFD click his jackboots together three times saying he still believes in fairies.
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband in 2012 and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
On topic, the worst thing from this polling is this.
Three in ten say they are less likely to follow Covid rules as a result (29%).
This rises to a third of Labour voters (33%) and those aged 18-34 (33%) who say the same.
Over half say they are just as likely to follow the rules (54%)
Whatever Boris Johnson announces tonight will be ignored by large parts of the country making us less secure.
He needs to go and be replaced by someone with the credibility and authority to launch you new Covid-19 measures.
Except it wouldn't matter if Jesus were to descend from heaven to promote any new Covid measures. First of all, the country, or a large enough fraction of it at any rate, has had enough of Covid measures and will happily ignore them if they think they can get away with it. And secondly, there's probably nothing short of a full lockdown that will do anything to seriously impede the latest version of this bloody virus, it's questionable as to whether or not even that will work, and neither the economy nor wider society can sustain an annual cycle of hokey cokey house arrest for the next thousand years.
The Government can plausibly get away with yet more masks (useless) and WFH (not useful enough,) and after that it is out of options. Reinstating large scale business support and putting about five or six million people back on furlough until various roadmap steps between April and July, let alone shutting all the schools again for the Winter, is a non-starter. And if declining to go to those lengths means, to put it bluntly, tent hospitals and doctors having to decide which Covid patient gets a ventilator and which one gets a big shot of morphine, then that's what's going to end up happening. After all, selectively abandoning non-Covid patients to perish through lack of care capacity is already a reality in the NHS. Why should selectively abandoning Covid patients to perish as well seem so unimaginable?
Basically, if we are fortunate and this latest wave of the disease is moderate then we can all breathe a sigh of relief, and if we aren't and it's bad then there are no workable strategies left for avoiding a massacre. Draconian restrictions are over. Finished.
I'm not sure it's as "mild" as we all hope
Benedict Barclay @BarclayBenedict · 2m Replying to @BarclayBenedict The total number of people in hospital with Covid is 4,252, which is very sharply up on 2,550 last week.
Gauteng has fallen from 72% of cases to 59%, which shows that cases are now rising faster in other provinces.
The report from a couple of days ago was that 76% of the admissions testing positive with Covid were incidental infections i.e. the patient was not being admitted with Covid.
I believe that turned out to be wishful thinking bolleaux
Really? Source?
I found it last night down some 3am rabbit hole, I fear I can't find it again. Feel free to ignore, or not
Anyway, I just don't believe South African hospitals are taking in loads more people with broken limbs who just "happen" to have Covid as well
From yesterday
"South Africa's Covid Hospital Admissions More Than Double In A Day
"South Africa Covid Cases: According to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases 383 people have been admitted to hospital with the disease in the last 24 hours compared with 175 in the preceding period."
"Worst day yet for hospital admissions in South Africa. #Omicron Cases and Daily Admissions are 3x what we saw with Delta. But the silver lining is that ICU is still 72% below the most applicable Delta comparison period. How many will end up in ICU is the question. #COVID19"
Given the test positivity rate in South Africa is more than 20%, why does it surprise you that people with other ailments (cancer, eye surgery, gunshot wounds, kidney disease, etc.) might have Covid?
Enough people are now going through the whole grisly, inevitable process - infection, admission, then on to ventilation and ICU - for us to know the surge in Gauteng is real and it is Covid
There are also reports of the first deaths circling Twitter, and that statistical leap in excess deaths to consider (which might of course be random, or not, or Delta, who the F knows?)
OK time to watch Boris scratch the blackboard
So: time to nail your colours to the mast: So you think we should be strengthening measures against Covid (moving towards Lockdown), or continuing with current measures?
I said earlier that I think we should stick with what we have, and instead focus on surging the booster drive, and prepping the NHS for a big wave of new cases between now and late Jan
I fear a grim and foolish logic is, however, leading us to Plan B, and then Lockdown
And some on here are still saying Oh that will be fine, you stay home and eat chocolates.
Jesus F Christ. For many many people the last winter lockdown was pretty much unbearable
It will not be fine. But neither is having a very high rate of hospitalisation and deaths.
You fuck people and their businesses over too much, you run out of money, the health service collapses, you get the deaths anyway.
The odd thing is: we have been at war; in many ways a much worse situation, and your scenario did not come to pass.
When the country was at war the Government didn't respond by telling everybody to sit at home all the bloody time.
They did, when it was needed. 'Stay put if the invader comes.' 'Holiday at home' to prevent 'unnecessary travel'. 'Coughs and sneezes spread diseases'. .
I’m old enough to remember having been told to hide under the kitchen table in the event of the four minute warning.
Whatever happened to kitchen tables?
I'm typing this drivel on my family's old kitchen table, formica top, metal legs, which I use as my desk.
Don't know what your lot did with yours'.
I do recall a kitchen table when I was young. It had fold out flaps and the steel mechanisms that sprung them into place were like Normandy beach defenses.
We had pews as seat for out kitchen table. Dad demolished an old chapel in the 60's, and rescued some of the old pews. My brother still uses one as seats for side of his table, and my sister has the other somewhere.
I miss them; many of my childhood memories revolve around mealtimes and those pews. But I've got the clock that hung above the table.
Devon friend of mine has them in his (former hall-) house's kitchen. Same provenance. Very flexible for different numbers, lovely old wood.
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
Have you considered updating your avatar to Sir Mortimer Chris?
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
This is the start. Tories are headed for the 20s at this rate
This is going to destroy so much hospitality. A tragedy unfolds
Hold on there for a bit, though. We're not at December 2020 yet.
Yes we are. Use your brain. Even tho many places will try and stay open, people will voluntarily stay away. And there won't be any office workers to do impromptu drinks (huge at this time of year)
How many will go to a theatre or a panto? To sit in a mask for 3 hours? Cinemas ditto
Everything will slowly shutter, as business evaporates, a chain reaction of minor calamity adding up to a big catastrophe
There is nothing to be cheerful about, I'm afraid. Nothing at all
Why are we messing around with distractions (such as what circle of hell requires a vaxport, and which only a facemask) when the message should be very clearly to vaccinate early and often?
The vaccine strategy is being completely undermined by the government's own actions and messages.
It's reached the stage where it needs more than a message. In requires the Government to make life really difficult for the minority who refuse to do the right thing, so that they finally do get vaccinated.
As I said earlier, increase personal tax rates for people who are unvaxxed. For a while, whilst they are unvaxxed. After a period, increase them for life.
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband in 2012 and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
Once again you make the mistake of drawing judgement from snap polls on the day.
While we’ve been poring over every twist and turn, very many people are yet to get back from work.
Are you incapable of learning from your past mistakes?
What's also really odd is that this is being justified by "1m infections between now and the end of December" which is basically our current run rate, so the scientists don't expect a major explosion in the virus, Delta or Omicron. The modelling wouldn't support it either because there's such high levels of population immunity and Delta or Omicron will run into sub-standard hosts far too often to really break out.
All of this is being done to cover up Boris and his dodgy parties.
Whitty's charts were quite startling
Also this is 1m Omicron plus however many Delta can take before it disappears?
So it could be 2m, about 100,000 a day. Which is a fuck of a lot, to be fair
Omicron will displace Delta rather than complement it, they both compete in the same pool for hosts because the immunity funnel is compatible. Even at 100k per day with Omicron that might only be something like 700-1000 hospitalisations per day which is not different to the current rate. A lot of Omicron will be reinfections (low severity) and among the double but not triple jabbed (also low severity). The most at risk will be the AZ/AZ people who haven't had their third doses, if anything we should have had a programme knocking on doors with Pfizer injections asking them to do their booster doses. That, more than anything else, will help the NHS.
As with the firebreak, and tiered restrictions last year, I'm yet to understand what the government is trying to achieve with plan b. If they said "look we think Omicron is really bad and to stop it completely overwhelming the NHS we're going into a full lockdown, it sucks but we have evidence that it presents severe symptoms in the double jabbed 25m who haven't had third doses and we will reopen in January when we've got all 46m double jabbed people a third dose" I would have respected the honesty of it, though disagreed with the content. There is logic in that kind of action. This is simply a "lets be seen to be doing something" kind of measure which will achieve little and change nothing.
To say masks do nothing is obviously completely wrong and verging on anti-vax-like conspiracy theories.
A full and correct deployment of the Horse Battery
Hope you are well.
Ah, you know, ups, downs, sideways bits. I'm having a new bathtub installed - in my small world this is excitement of a sort
I don't think I ever did get to the bottom of the CHB moniker. It's a quiet eveing, no PMs in trouble, no end to the world! Surely a (do dramatise) story of a famous PB moniker will draw an audience of ... er lots!
From the other side of the compass than me, do you imagine there's any way that Labour can mess up this lead in the next couple of years?
Realistically Boris needs to be almost perfect AND needs Labour to mess up in order to win a majority.
Yes, re-admitting Corbyn would be a good way to do that.
Apart from that, the left has decided to marginalise itself and the polls are showing that by not being Corbyn and not being Johnson, Labour is capable of polling 40%.
In 1997 they managed 43%, with a bit more effort they could legitimately beat that.
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband in 2012 and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
Tories will probably recover to 38-40% at the GE under any leader (even Johnson) but its still not a great poll for the Tories as its the beginning of a sustained pincer movement.
On topic, the worst thing from this polling is this.
Three in ten say they are less likely to follow Covid rules as a result (29%).
This rises to a third of Labour voters (33%) and those aged 18-34 (33%) who say the same.
Over half say they are just as likely to follow the rules (54%)
Whatever Boris Johnson announces tonight will be ignored by large parts of the country making us less secure.
He needs to go and be replaced by someone with the credibility and authority to launch you new Covid-19 measures.
Except it wouldn't matter if Jesus were to descend from heaven to promote any new Covid measures. First of all, the country, or a large enough fraction of it at any rate, has had enough of Covid measures and will happily ignore them if they think they can get away with it. And secondly, there's probably nothing short of a full lockdown that will do anything to seriously impede the latest version of this bloody virus, it's questionable as to whether or not even that will work, and neither the economy nor wider society can sustain an annual cycle of hokey cokey house arrest for the next thousand years.
The Government can plausibly get away with yet more masks (useless) and WFH (not useful enough,) and after that it is out of options. Reinstating large scale business support and putting about five or six million people back on furlough until various roadmap steps between April and July, let alone shutting all the schools again for the Winter, is a non-starter. And if declining to go to those lengths means, to put it bluntly, tent hospitals and doctors having to decide which Covid patient gets a ventilator and which one gets a big shot of morphine, then that's what's going to end up happening. After all, selectively abandoning non-Covid patients to perish through lack of care capacity is already a reality in the NHS. Why should selectively abandoning Covid patients to perish as well seem so unimaginable?
Basically, if we are fortunate and this latest wave of the disease is moderate then we can all breathe a sigh of relief, and if we aren't and it's bad then there are no workable strategies left for avoiding a massacre. Draconian restrictions are over. Finished.
I'm not sure it's as "mild" as we all hope
Benedict Barclay @BarclayBenedict · 2m Replying to @BarclayBenedict The total number of people in hospital with Covid is 4,252, which is very sharply up on 2,550 last week.
Gauteng has fallen from 72% of cases to 59%, which shows that cases are now rising faster in other provinces.
The report from a couple of days ago was that 76% of the admissions testing positive with Covid were incidental infections i.e. the patient was not being admitted with Covid.
I believe that turned out to be wishful thinking bolleaux
Really? Source?
I found it last night down some 3am rabbit hole, I fear I can't find it again. Feel free to ignore, or not
Anyway, I just don't believe South African hospitals are taking in loads more people with broken limbs who just "happen" to have Covid as well
From yesterday
"South Africa's Covid Hospital Admissions More Than Double In A Day
"South Africa Covid Cases: According to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases 383 people have been admitted to hospital with the disease in the last 24 hours compared with 175 in the preceding period."
"Worst day yet for hospital admissions in South Africa. #Omicron Cases and Daily Admissions are 3x what we saw with Delta. But the silver lining is that ICU is still 72% below the most applicable Delta comparison period. How many will end up in ICU is the question. #COVID19"
Given the test positivity rate in South Africa is more than 20%, why does it surprise you that people with other ailments (cancer, eye surgery, gunshot wounds, kidney disease, etc.) might have Covid?
Enough people are now going through the whole grisly, inevitable process - infection, admission, then on to ventilation and ICU - for us to know the surge in Gauteng is real and it is Covid
There are also reports of the first deaths circling Twitter, and that statistical leap in excess deaths to consider (which might of course be random, or not, or Delta, who the F knows?)
OK time to watch Boris scratch the blackboard
So: time to nail your colours to the mast: So you think we should be strengthening measures against Covid (moving towards Lockdown), or continuing with current measures?
I said earlier that I think we should stick with what we have, and instead focus on surging the booster drive, and prepping the NHS for a big wave of new cases between now and late Jan
I fear a grim and foolish logic is, however, leading us to Plan B, and then Lockdown
And some on here are still saying Oh that will be fine, you stay home and eat chocolates.
Jesus F Christ. For many many people the last winter lockdown was pretty much unbearable
It will not be fine. But neither is having a very high rate of hospitalisation and deaths.
You fuck people and their businesses over too much, you run out of money, the health service collapses, you get the deaths anyway.
The odd thing is: we have been at war; in many ways a much worse situation, and your scenario did not come to pass.
When the country was at war the Government didn't respond by telling everybody to sit at home all the bloody time.
They did, when it was needed. 'Stay put if the invader comes.' 'Holiday at home' to prevent 'unnecessary travel'. 'Coughs and sneezes spread diseases'. .
I’m old enough to remember having been told to hide under the kitchen table in the event of the four minute warning.
Whatever happened to kitchen tables?
I'm typing this drivel on my family's old kitchen table, formica top, metal legs, which I use as my desk.
Don't know what your lot did with yours'.
I do recall a kitchen table when I was young. It had fold out flaps and the steel mechanisms that sprung them into place were like Normandy beach defenses.
We had pews as seat for out kitchen table. Dad demolished an old chapel in the 60's, and rescued some of the old pews. My brother still uses one as seats for side of his table, and my sister has the other somewhere.
I miss them; many of my childhood memories revolve around mealtimes and those pews. But I've got the clock that hung above the table.
Devon friend of mine has them in his (former hall-) house's kitchen. Same provenance. Very flexible for different numbers, lovely old wood.
I haven't been able to get one, but the sort of schooldesks kids used when I were knee-high to a grasshopper (*) are apparently very good for kids to work from. A friend of ours says theirs is brilliant.
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband in 2012 and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
I think you may find that those numbers will be eclipsed as Johnson´s government faces a wave of rage and contempt. The pathetic attempt to use the Plan B announcement as a distraction from Partygate is so transparent that it is more likely to reduce support than boost it. It is a cowardly and contemptible way to behave, and that is a trope that the British voters are getting quite familiar with. They are also getting quite sick of it.
This is going to destroy so much hospitality. A tragedy unfolds
Hold on there for a bit, though. We're not at December 2020 yet.
Yes we are. Use your brain. Even tho many places will try and stay open, people will voluntarily stay away. And there won't be any office workers to do impromptu drinks (huge at this time of year)
How many will go to a theatre or a panto? To sit in a mask for 3 hours? Cinemas ditto
Everything will slowly shutter, as business evaporates, a chain reaction of minor calamity adding up to a big catastrophe
There is nothing to be cheerful about, I'm afraid. Nothing at all
Lockdowns are quite different for the economy, and also for social life, from restrictions. There's always something to be cheerful about.
What's also really odd is that this is being justified by "1m infections between now and the end of December" which is basically our current run rate, so the scientists don't expect a major explosion in the virus, Delta or Omicron. The modelling wouldn't support it either because there's such high levels of population immunity and Delta or Omicron will run into sub-standard hosts far too often to really break out.
All of this is being done to cover up Boris and his dodgy parties.
A million infections by Omicron by the end of the month would be - on average over the next 3 weeks - nearly 50 TIMES the current estimate of the infection rate (1000 a day).
On topic, the worst thing from this polling is this.
Three in ten say they are less likely to follow Covid rules as a result (29%).
This rises to a third of Labour voters (33%) and those aged 18-34 (33%) who say the same.
Over half say they are just as likely to follow the rules (54%)
Whatever Boris Johnson announces tonight will be ignored by large parts of the country making us less secure.
He needs to go and be replaced by someone with the credibility and authority to launch you new Covid-19 measures.
Except it wouldn't matter if Jesus were to descend from heaven to promote any new Covid measures. First of all, the country, or a large enough fraction of it at any rate, has had enough of Covid measures and will happily ignore them if they think they can get away with it. And secondly, there's probably nothing short of a full lockdown that will do anything to seriously impede the latest version of this bloody virus, it's questionable as to whether or not even that will work, and neither the economy nor wider society can sustain an annual cycle of hokey cokey house arrest for the next thousand years.
The Government can plausibly get away with yet more masks (useless) and WFH (not useful enough,) and after that it is out of options. Reinstating large scale business support and putting about five or six million people back on furlough until various roadmap steps between April and July, let alone shutting all the schools again for the Winter, is a non-starter. And if declining to go to those lengths means, to put it bluntly, tent hospitals and doctors having to decide which Covid patient gets a ventilator and which one gets a big shot of morphine, then that's what's going to end up happening. After all, selectively abandoning non-Covid patients to perish through lack of care capacity is already a reality in the NHS. Why should selectively abandoning Covid patients to perish as well seem so unimaginable?
Basically, if we are fortunate and this latest wave of the disease is moderate then we can all breathe a sigh of relief, and if we aren't and it's bad then there are no workable strategies left for avoiding a massacre. Draconian restrictions are over. Finished.
I'm not sure it's as "mild" as we all hope
Benedict Barclay @BarclayBenedict · 2m Replying to @BarclayBenedict The total number of people in hospital with Covid is 4,252, which is very sharply up on 2,550 last week.
Gauteng has fallen from 72% of cases to 59%, which shows that cases are now rising faster in other provinces.
The report from a couple of days ago was that 76% of the admissions testing positive with Covid were incidental infections i.e. the patient was not being admitted with Covid.
I believe that turned out to be wishful thinking bolleaux
Really? Source?
I found it last night down some 3am rabbit hole, I fear I can't find it again. Feel free to ignore, or not
Anyway, I just don't believe South African hospitals are taking in loads more people with broken limbs who just "happen" to have Covid as well
From yesterday
"South Africa's Covid Hospital Admissions More Than Double In A Day
"South Africa Covid Cases: According to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases 383 people have been admitted to hospital with the disease in the last 24 hours compared with 175 in the preceding period."
"Worst day yet for hospital admissions in South Africa. #Omicron Cases and Daily Admissions are 3x what we saw with Delta. But the silver lining is that ICU is still 72% below the most applicable Delta comparison period. How many will end up in ICU is the question. #COVID19"
Given the test positivity rate in South Africa is more than 20%, why does it surprise you that people with other ailments (cancer, eye surgery, gunshot wounds, kidney disease, etc.) might have Covid?
Enough people are now going through the whole grisly, inevitable process - infection, admission, then on to ventilation and ICU - for us to know the surge in Gauteng is real and it is Covid
There are also reports of the first deaths circling Twitter, and that statistical leap in excess deaths to consider (which might of course be random, or not, or Delta, who the F knows?)
OK time to watch Boris scratch the blackboard
So: time to nail your colours to the mast: So you think we should be strengthening measures against Covid (moving towards Lockdown), or continuing with current measures?
I said earlier that I think we should stick with what we have, and instead focus on surging the booster drive, and prepping the NHS for a big wave of new cases between now and late Jan
I fear a grim and foolish logic is, however, leading us to Plan B, and then Lockdown
And some on here are still saying Oh that will be fine, you stay home and eat chocolates.
Jesus F Christ. For many many people the last winter lockdown was pretty much unbearable
It will not be fine. But neither is having a very high rate of hospitalisation and deaths.
You fuck people and their businesses over too much, you run out of money, the health service collapses, you get the deaths anyway.
The odd thing is: we have been at war; in many ways a much worse situation, and your scenario did not come to pass.
When the country was at war the Government didn't respond by telling everybody to sit at home all the bloody time.
They did, when it was needed. 'Stay put if the invader comes.' 'Holiday at home' to prevent 'unnecessary travel'. 'Coughs and sneezes spread diseases'. .
I’m old enough to remember having been told to hide under the kitchen table in the event of the four minute warning.
Whatever happened to kitchen tables?
I'm typing this drivel on my family's old kitchen table, formica top, metal legs, which I use as my desk.
Don't know what your lot did with yours'.
I do recall a kitchen table when I was young. It had fold out flaps and the steel mechanisms that sprung them into place were like Normandy beach defenses.
We had pews as seat for out kitchen table. Dad demolished an old chapel in the 60's, and rescued some of the old pews. My brother still uses one as seats for side of his table, and my sister has the other somewhere.
I miss them; many of my childhood memories revolve around mealtimes and those pews. But I've got the clock that hung above the table.
Devon friend of mine has them in his (former hall-) house's kitchen. Same provenance. Very flexible for different numbers, lovely old wood.
I haven't been able to get one, but the sort of schooldesks kids used when I were knee-high to a grasshopper (*) are apparently very good for kids to work from. A friend of ours says theirs is brilliant.
(*) The sort that had inkpots and a lifting lid
Flat or tilted top? My late father made several of different heights.
Sensible and moderate proposals by the PM tonight. Vaccine passports for nightclubs and large venues and facemasks for cinemas and theatres given Omicron but crucially no new lockdown
These measures are pretty much what we have in Scotland already. HYUFD in "SNP are sensible and moderate" shocker.
And which appear have had zero effect on either the case or vaccination rate in Scotland. The reality is this won't make any difference to the outcomes, it just means more miserable people, ruined business, and a "papers please" society.
Restrictions have always been the wrong answer to this pandemic, but at least last time round there was a point "we're waiting for the vaccines" / "we're rolling out the vaccines". There is no point now - we have vaccines, we've double jabbed almost everyone at any real risk, and triple jabbed the most vulnerable.
Polling on this is massively skewed because - most people want to WFH for reasons unrelated to the pandemic, and those least in favour of restrictions are least likely to be polled because they will be out living their lives rather than cowering at home being rung by opinion pollsters.
Scotland is top of the vaccination rate (1st, 2nd & booster) and bottom of the case rate in the UK isn't it?
Going to a football match means either proving you are vaccinated or taking a LFT prior to entry - is that right? How practical is that at the turnstiles?
Quite practical if it were limited to vaccines only, but it needs a longer lead in time so that it is not done at the turnstiles themselves. Everything's booked online now, and that makes it practical.
i.e. 25,000 of those going to my PL club are season ticket holders. The rest of the home supporters are members who pay £35 per year to get priority access to tickets. Ditto away supporters. It's virtually impossible for anyone without one or the other to get a ticket, but in the rare matches when at present tickets go on general sale they could cover the rest by introducing a membership scheme with no priority access for tickets. Then you just need the season ticket holder/member to register their vaccine status once, well in advance of match day, and allow tickets to be issued only to those who have done so. Then you also have it on record for future matches, no need to register again.
But the insistence on allowing a one-off lateral flow test messes all that up. Chaos on the day I think if you've got to cater for last minute LFTs at the turnstiles.
By the way, when I went to see the Wolves on Saturday, once again no more than 2% of fans were wearing masks even in the crowded-like-sardine indoor areas behind the stands. And given the age demographic and the fact that so many were prepared to flout the regulations, a high proportion of those were likely to have been unvaccinated.
I've always said that if Johnson cocks up, Starmer is the best opposition. And we are now seeing that.
I can legitimately believe the Tories get into the low 30s or high 20s in the next GE, 1997 repeat - if things go even more badly.
Starmer just needs to be seen as vaguely truthful and competent. I think more would look at Labour in the current context (and I’ve never voted Labour in my life - but that doesn’t matter according to some people on here)
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband in 2012 and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
I think you may find that those numbers will be eclipsed as Johnson´s government faces a wave of rage and contempt. The pathetic attempt to use the Plan B announcement as a distraction from Partygate is so transparent that it is more likely to reduce support than boost it. It is a cowardly and contemptible way to behave, and that is a trope that the British voters are getting quite familiar with. They are also getting quite sick of it.
HY always told us that it didn’t matter that the clown would be a dishonest incompetent in office, provided that he beat Corbyn and (supposedly) got Brexit done.
The time has arrived for him to own the tails side of his coin.
I remember when people called me crazy for saying restrictions would be back.
Wrong again.
I missed your prediction of omicron. That’s the reason for this, not anything else. We need to see how this plays out in our well vaccinated population. 21 million boosted, including the most at risk. That’s the key.
1/ Re UK gov announcement of Covid Plan B today, all these protections are already in place in Scotland and have helped us get Delta cases down. Tough question we all face in period ahead is whether these protections will be strong enough against a rapidly spreading Omicron variant…
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
Sensible and moderate proposals by the PM tonight. Vaccine passports for nightclubs and large venues and facemasks for cinemas and theatres given Omicron but crucially no new lockdown
These measures are pretty much what we have in Scotland already. HYUFD in "SNP are sensible and moderate" shocker.
And which appear have had zero effect on either the case or vaccination rate in Scotland. The reality is this won't make any difference to the outcomes, it just means more miserable people, ruined business, and a "papers please" society.
Restrictions have always been the wrong answer to this pandemic, but at least last time round there was a point "we're waiting for the vaccines" / "we're rolling out the vaccines". There is no point now - we have vaccines, we've double jabbed almost everyone at any real risk, and triple jabbed the most vulnerable.
Polling on this is massively skewed because - most people want to WFH for reasons unrelated to the pandemic, and those least in favour of restrictions are least likely to be polled because they will be out living their lives rather than cowering at home being rung by opinion pollsters.
Scotland is top of the vaccination rate (1st, 2nd & booster) and bottom of the case rate in the UK isn't it?
Buit it has also varied in case rate out of step of the rest of hte UK - so there are other factors operating and it's impossible to refute the prima facie hypothesis that masks do work by helping reduce the infection rate.
Going to a football match means either proving you are vaccinated or taking a LFT prior to entry - is that right? How practical is that at the turnstiles?
Quite practical if it were limited to vaccines only, but it needs a longer lead in time so that it is not done at the turnstiles themselves. Everything's booked online now, and that makes it practical.
i.e. 25,000 of those going to my PL club are season ticket holders. The rest of the home supporters are members who pay £35 per year to get priority access to tickets. Ditto away supporters. It's virtually impossible for anyone without one or the other to get a ticket, but in the rare matches when at present tickets go on general sale they could cover the rest by introducing a membership scheme with no priority access for tickets. Then you just need the season ticket holder/member to register their vaccine status once, well in advance of match day, and allow tickets to be issued only to those who have done so.
But the insistence on allowing a one-off lateral flow test messes all that up. Chaos on the day I think if you've got to cater for last minute LFTs at the turnstiles.
By the way, when I went to see the Wolves on Saturday, once again no more than 2% of fans were wearing masks even in the crowded-like-sardine indoor areas behind the stands. And given the age demographic and the fact that so many were prepared to flout the regulations, a high proportion of those were likely to have been unvaccinated.
So I had a glance at the iPad of the girl surveying the Emirates a few games ago and I reckon c.80-90% of records were marked as green (i.e. vaccinated).
Now, lets deal with this part...
Then you just need the season ticket holder/member to register their vaccine status once, well in advance of match day, and allow tickets to be issued only to those who have done so.
From the other side of the compass than me, do you imagine there's any way that Labour can mess up this lead in the next couple of years?
Realistically Boris needs to be almost perfect AND needs Labour to mess up in order to win a majority.
Yes, re-admitting Corbyn would be a good way to do that.
Apart from that, the left has decided to marginalise itself and the polls are showing that by not being Corbyn and not being Johnson, Labour is capable of polling 40%.
In 1997 they managed 43%, with a bit more effort they could legitimately beat that.
I can't see that Labour will achieve big numbers. Their problem is economics. Reeves though is easily the best Labour person in that role ... er ever! Obviously I don't think she's good because I'd vote Labour if I did, but she's not the ghastly awfulness of (say) Brown.
What's also really odd is that this is being justified by "1m infections between now and the end of December" which is basically our current run rate, so the scientists don't expect a major explosion in the virus, Delta or Omicron. The modelling wouldn't support it either because there's such high levels of population immunity and Delta or Omicron will run into sub-standard hosts far too often to really break out.
All of this is being done to cover up Boris and his dodgy parties.
A million infections by Omicron by the end of the month would be - on average over the next 3 weeks - nearly 50 TIMES the current estimate of the infection rate (1000 a day).
This thing will displace Delta, not complement it. as has happened with all previous variants.
1/ Re UK gov announcement of Covid Plan B today, all these protections are already in place in Scotland and have helped us get Delta cases down. Tough question we all face in period ahead is whether these protections will be strong enough against a rapidly spreading Omicron variant…
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
Pretending this is a magic "cure all" may be a tad optimistic.....
Have a look at Malmesbury's charts of case rate per population, and the order of geographical areas. At the moment Scotland is generally low down. I'm not sure what is going on here.
Every SA doctor that has been interviewed over the past week, including today has said that Omicron is currently much milder and the situation is totally different to the Beta & Delta waves. There is no lockdown at all in South Africa.
I'm really concerned by the blurring of "I don't trust the Govenment" with "I'm not willing to do what I can to slow the pandemic". It's absolutely obvious that we should vaccinate and boost as quickly as possible, and we shouldn't take any unnecessary risks in mingling. Whether you love, hate, adore or despise Boris Johnson is completely irrelevant to that, and it's also irrelevant whether an illegal party was held or not.
What's also really odd is that this is being justified by "1m infections between now and the end of December" which is basically our current run rate, so the scientists don't expect a major explosion in the virus, Delta or Omicron. The modelling wouldn't support it either because there's such high levels of population immunity and Delta or Omicron will run into sub-standard hosts far too often to really break out.
All of this is being done to cover up Boris and his dodgy parties.
A million infections by Omicron by the end of the month would be - on average over the next 3 weeks - nearly 50 TIMES the current estimate of the infection rate (1000 a day).
Yes, but Omicron displaces Delta. It doesn't infect in addition, and the numbers will be based on population sampling rather than the testing scheme which covers 40-50% of actual infections. Delta infections today are ~80k per day by the ONS numbers. At 1m Omicron infections they're suggesting it will hit a similar rate by the end of December.
BREAKING: A full Russian invasion of Ukraine would be on a scale “not seen in Europe since World War 2”, the new head of the armed forces has warned. Admiral Sir Tony Radakin described the Ukraine crisis - with a build of tens of thousands of Russian troops - as “deeply worrying”
For all those supporting BoJo - what success has he delivered over the last 2 years?
I am not supporting him, but he got us out of the EU, got a trade deal that protected our sovereignty more than anyone said was possible, and got us a vaccine program earlier than anyone else in Europe
The one that ended the United Kingdom as a trading block and forces GB and NI companies to have export licences to sell things to each other?
If that's protecting the sovereignty of the UK I'd hate to see what not ptotecting it looks like.
Theresa May's backstop.
Infinitely worse.
Perhaps, but isn't relevant to the argument @Aslan was promoting. He said that the current trade deal - which dissolved the UK trading area - "protected our sovereignty". I now need an export license to sell products in my own country. How has that protected our sovereignty to do things like not need an export license to trade inside our own country...
I don't need you to come back in with alternative takes on external sovereignty - you have one perspective on that, I have another. But the ending of the UK as a trading nation is indisputable - we are now split in two with GB as one trading zone and NI as another trading zone. Usually deals that protect a country's sovereignty doesn't split a chunk off it.
It did protect our sovereignty because we had Article 16 so could override it. The ending is not indisputable, we'll see what the situation is post-Article 16.
There are plenty of countries that have had chunks split off, where its convenient to do so, its far from unprecedented.
On that logic while in the EU our sovereignty was protected because we could always leave.
Either in the EU we were sovereign because we could leave and there is no compromise of sovereignty over NI because we can invoke A16; or in the EU we were not sovereign and we are not sovereign now because there is no free movement of goods between GB and NI.
You are a logical debater. Which is it; it can't be both.
We were always technically sovereign, we could only exercise that sovereignty by invoking Article 50 so we rightly did when people wanted to exercise that sovereignty.
Same deal with Article 16 - and I think it should be invoked too.
So as it stands we are not sovereign because we haven't exercised it. Is that right?
If memory serves, you've been trying variants (so to speak) of this line for a couple of years now, and I'm sorry, but I think it's a stupid argument. If we our sovereignty within the EU is only present because we have the option to leave it, then we clearly aren't sovereign while we're in it, and the fact that we assented (implicitly) to that reality is irrelevant.
He who [has to] break[s] a thing to find out what it is, has left the path of wisdom.
Apology accepted. Although your point is wrong. We were always sovereign whether we decided to exercise it or not. Of course we made compromises but did so as a sovereign nation.
But that is not the point. If we were not sovereign within the EU because we hadn't "proved" it by leaving, then the NI deal means we are not sovereign because as of this moment we haven't exercised A16. It can't be both.
If you think we weren't sovereign while in the EU and aren't sovereign now because the NI deal means that there is no free movement of goods between GB and NI that is fair enough. But you can't argue for one and not the other.
We were always sovereign for both. The question is if you wanted to exercise your sovereignty or not.
The English and Welsh voted to exercise their sovereignty, hence invoking Article 50. The NI did not, hence the special arrangements.
Now if the NI wish to exercise theirs, then A16 is the right answer for them, just as it was for the UK as a whole. For the same reasons. Using the same logic.
No inconsistencies.
Excellent. So we were sovereign while in the EU: tick. And we are sovereign with this NI deal: tick.
So why all the fuss about leaving the EU to reclaim our sovereignty.
Because we wanted to exercise our sovereignty.
Not just have it in abeyance.
Philip
I remember you telling me that the main benefit of leaving the EU was to get our sovereignty back.
Now you are telling me that we had it all the time!
So why leave?
So we could exercise it.
If you only have sovereignty so long as you can't exercise it, and you want to exercise it but can't, then do you have it.
So we only have something if we use it? Obviously we "could" exercise it, we did. So obviously we had it.
Is this some weird version of "having your cake and eating it?" ....or because we don't use a nuclear weapon we don't have it?
No its the polar opposite.
If you're not bothered about using your sovereignty then its OK to keep it in abeyance in something like the EU or NI Protocol, so long as you have an exit mechanism like A50 or A16.
If you are bothered about using it then you need to invoke the relevant Article first before you can.
How is that not clear?
But I am not bothered about using it. There are more important things to worry about, like Covid, the NHS, paying back borrowed monies, trying to keep our trade figures up to where they were, you know, and of course not dying (even though I am old and I will die sooner or later...)
That's fine, you're not bothered. So vote Remain then. That's entirely valid. I had no philosophical objection to Remain.
But that wasn't the nations choice. You were a minority and lost the vote. A majority were bothered so that's the decision made.
So you think of sovereignty within the EU like money in a piggy bank? You have to smash the piggy bank to get the sovereignty out. Taking that analogy I wonder what we've actually spent our sovereignty on and was it worth destroying the piggy bank.
1/ Re UK gov announcement of Covid Plan B today, all these protections are already in place in Scotland and have helped us get Delta cases down. Tough question we all face in period ahead is whether these protections will be strong enough against a rapidly spreading Omicron variant…
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
On topic, the worst thing from this polling is this.
Three in ten say they are less likely to follow Covid rules as a result (29%).
This rises to a third of Labour voters (33%) and those aged 18-34 (33%) who say the same.
Over half say they are just as likely to follow the rules (54%)
Whatever Boris Johnson announces tonight will be ignored by large parts of the country making us less secure.
He needs to go and be replaced by someone with the credibility and authority to launch you new Covid-19 measures.
Except it wouldn't matter if Jesus were to descend from heaven to promote any new Covid measures. First of all, the country, or a large enough fraction of it at any rate, has had enough of Covid measures and will happily ignore them if they think they can get away with it. And secondly, there's probably nothing short of a full lockdown that will do anything to seriously impede the latest version of this bloody virus, it's questionable as to whether or not even that will work, and neither the economy nor wider society can sustain an annual cycle of hokey cokey house arrest for the next thousand years.
The Government can plausibly get away with yet more masks (useless) and WFH (not useful enough,) and after that it is out of options. Reinstating large scale business support and putting about five or six million people back on furlough until various roadmap steps between April and July, let alone shutting all the schools again for the Winter, is a non-starter. And if declining to go to those lengths means, to put it bluntly, tent hospitals and doctors having to decide which Covid patient gets a ventilator and which one gets a big shot of morphine, then that's what's going to end up happening. After all, selectively abandoning non-Covid patients to perish through lack of care capacity is already a reality in the NHS. Why should selectively abandoning Covid patients to perish as well seem so unimaginable?
Basically, if we are fortunate and this latest wave of the disease is moderate then we can all breathe a sigh of relief, and if we aren't and it's bad then there are no workable strategies left for avoiding a massacre. Draconian restrictions are over. Finished.
I'm not sure it's as "mild" as we all hope
Benedict Barclay @BarclayBenedict · 2m Replying to @BarclayBenedict The total number of people in hospital with Covid is 4,252, which is very sharply up on 2,550 last week.
Gauteng has fallen from 72% of cases to 59%, which shows that cases are now rising faster in other provinces.
The report from a couple of days ago was that 76% of the admissions testing positive with Covid were incidental infections i.e. the patient was not being admitted with Covid.
I believe that turned out to be wishful thinking bolleaux
Really? Source?
I found it last night down some 3am rabbit hole, I fear I can't find it again. Feel free to ignore, or not
Anyway, I just don't believe South African hospitals are taking in loads more people with broken limbs who just "happen" to have Covid as well
From yesterday
"South Africa's Covid Hospital Admissions More Than Double In A Day
"South Africa Covid Cases: According to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases 383 people have been admitted to hospital with the disease in the last 24 hours compared with 175 in the preceding period."
"Worst day yet for hospital admissions in South Africa. #Omicron Cases and Daily Admissions are 3x what we saw with Delta. But the silver lining is that ICU is still 72% below the most applicable Delta comparison period. How many will end up in ICU is the question. #COVID19"
Given the test positivity rate in South Africa is more than 20%, why does it surprise you that people with other ailments (cancer, eye surgery, gunshot wounds, kidney disease, etc.) might have Covid?
Enough people are now going through the whole grisly, inevitable process - infection, admission, then on to ventilation and ICU - for us to know the surge in Gauteng is real and it is Covid
There are also reports of the first deaths circling Twitter, and that statistical leap in excess deaths to consider (which might of course be random, or not, or Delta, who the F knows?)
OK time to watch Boris scratch the blackboard
So: time to nail your colours to the mast: So you think we should be strengthening measures against Covid (moving towards Lockdown), or continuing with current measures?
I said earlier that I think we should stick with what we have, and instead focus on surging the booster drive, and prepping the NHS for a big wave of new cases between now and late Jan
I fear a grim and foolish logic is, however, leading us to Plan B, and then Lockdown
And some on here are still saying Oh that will be fine, you stay home and eat chocolates.
Jesus F Christ. For many many people the last winter lockdown was pretty much unbearable
It will not be fine. But neither is having a very high rate of hospitalisation and deaths.
You fuck people and their businesses over too much, you run out of money, the health service collapses, you get the deaths anyway.
The odd thing is: we have been at war; in many ways a much worse situation, and your scenario did not come to pass.
When the country was at war the Government didn't respond by telling everybody to sit at home all the bloody time.
They did, when it was needed. 'Stay put if the invader comes.' 'Holiday at home' to prevent 'unnecessary travel'. 'Coughs and sneezes spread diseases'. .
I’m old enough to remember having been told to hide under the kitchen table in the event of the four minute warning.
Whatever happened to kitchen tables?
I'm typing this drivel on my family's old kitchen table, formica top, metal legs, which I use as my desk.
Don't know what your lot did with yours'.
I do recall a kitchen table when I was young. It had fold out flaps and the steel mechanisms that sprung them into place were like Normandy beach defenses.
We had pews as seat for out kitchen table. Dad demolished an old chapel in the 60's, and rescued some of the old pews. My brother still uses one as seats for side of his table, and my sister has the other somewhere.
I miss them; many of my childhood memories revolve around mealtimes and those pews. But I've got the clock that hung above the table.
Devon friend of mine has them in his (former hall-) house's kitchen. Same provenance. Very flexible for different numbers, lovely old wood.
I haven't been able to get one, but the sort of schooldesks kids used when I were knee-high to a grasshopper (*) are apparently very good for kids to work from. A friend of ours says theirs is brilliant.
(*) The sort that had inkpots and a lifting lid
Flat or tilted top? My late father made several of different heights.
Tilted top. Ink-pot hole in the right-hand corner. Brass hinges. Just thinking about it brings back the sights and smells of my old school.
Having observed the little 'un learn to write, I am of the (scientifically unproven) opinion that slanted surfaces are far better than flat ones to write or draw on. At one point, I gave him my old draughtsman's board to write on, on its lowest setting. Until he drew all over it in permanent ink ...
Just 4 points ahead is not much for Starmer after the barrage of attacks Boris has faced. Ed Miliband in 2012 and Kinnock pre 1990 were often 10+ points ahead, Blair was 20+ points ahead pre 1997
I think you may find that those numbers will be eclipsed as Johnson´s government faces a wave of rage and contempt. The pathetic attempt to use the Plan B announcement as a distraction from Partygate is so transparent that it is more likely to reduce support than boost it. It is a cowardly and contemptible way to behave, and that is a trope that the British voters are getting quite familiar with. They are also getting quite sick of it.
HY always told us that it didn’t matter that the clown would be a dishonest incompetent in office, provided that he beat Corbyn and (supposedly) got Brexit done.
The time has arrived for him to own the tails side of his coin.
He beat Corbyn and got Brexit done, as I voted for him to do.
Anything beyond that is a bonus given the only PM to have won a general election after 10 years of their party in power since 1918 was Major in 1992. Plus even then Kinnock led most polls before that election
I'm really concerned by the blurring of "I don't trust the Govenment" with "I'm not willing to do what I can to slow the pandemic". It's absolutely obvious that we should vaccinate and boost as quickly as possible, and we shouldn't take any unnecessary risks in mingling. Whether you love, hate, adore or despise Boris Johnson is completely irrelevant to that, and it's also irrelevant whether an illegal party was held or not.
But it's also why it's obvious he must go, now. He's blurring multiple arguments together, for everyone.
1/ Re UK gov announcement of Covid Plan B today, all these protections are already in place in Scotland and have helped us get Delta cases down. Tough question we all face in period ahead is whether these protections will be strong enough against a rapidly spreading Omicron variant…
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
Pretending this is a magic "cure all" may be a tad optimistic.....
Sturgeon can blithely lock down Scotland because she doesn't have to pay for it. London does
But, she is surely hinting at the extremely obvious. This will not be enough. There will be proper lockdowns.
I suspect their big concern is actually that the most severe lockdowns won't be enough, and then what?
And then the inevitable, 1% of the idiot unvaccinated and 0.5% the unlucky vulnerable die of COVID. I know it seems harsh but this is going to happen everywhere with Omicron. We're all going to get it now, I'm thankful that I'm in good health and have no underlying conditions but ultimately the reality of the world has changed due to COVID.
Every SA doctor that has been interviewed over the past week, including today has said that Omicron is currently much milder and the situation is totally different to the Beta & Delta waves. There is no lockdown at all in South Africa.
You're an idiot
Here's a head of a South African ICU. Is she saying "this is much milder"?
"Head of ICU at Chris Hani Baragwanatnath Hospital in Gauteng, South Africa, Professor Rudo Mathivha says they are seeing many children arriving at hospital with Covid-19 with mild to severe symptoms and requiring oxygen."
I'm really concerned by the blurring of "I don't trust the Govenment" with "I'm not willing to do what I can to slow the pandemic". It's absolutely obvious that we should vaccinate and boost as quickly as possible, and we shouldn't take any unnecessary risks in mingling. Whether you love, hate, adore or despise Boris Johnson is completely irrelevant to that, and it's also irrelevant whether an illegal party was held or not.
Spot on Nick.
But I don't think most of the public will blur the two.
Yes, political anoraks on here will blur them. As will obsessives whipping themselves up into hysteria about restrictions.
But the public are quite different as they don't think it's a political issue.
Every SA doctor that has been interviewed over the past week, including today has said that Omicron is currently much milder and the situation is totally different to the Beta & Delta waves. There is no lockdown at all in South Africa.
We need to be careful taking medical inspirations from South Africa, given their (under Mbeki) behaviour wrt AIDS ...
He is someone who should drop straight down to the warm, blazing place ...
Every SA doctor that has been interviewed over the past week, including today has said that Omicron is currently much milder and the situation is totally different to the Beta & Delta waves. There is no lockdown at all in South Africa.
You're an idiot
Here's a head of a South African ICU. Is she saying "this is much milder"?
"Head of ICU at Chris Hani Baragwanatnath Hospital in Gauteng, South Africa, Professor Rudo Mathivha says they are seeing many children arriving at hospital with Covid-19 with mild to severe symptoms and requiring oxygen."
Most South Africans are not double vaccinated unless most Brits, let alone had their boosters. What that shows is the need to give more vaccines to South Africa
Every SA doctor that has been interviewed over the past week, including today has said that Omicron is currently much milder and the situation is totally different to the Beta & Delta waves. There is no lockdown at all in South Africa.
Whilst not disagreeing with your view that Omicron is probably not the monster people fear there is a potentially major difference in comparing SA with UK in that SA is in summer so lower risk from being cooped up indoors socialising and the knock on effect of risk of spread to the more vulnerable so the pressure for lockdown would be less there I would have thought.
But I’m hoping it’s no much worse than current strain and this is an over-reaction.
BREAKING: A full Russian invasion of Ukraine would be on a scale “not seen in Europe since World War 2”, the new head of the armed forces has warned. Admiral Sir Tony Radakin described the Ukraine crisis - with a build of tens of thousands of Russian troops - as “deeply worrying”
1/ Re UK gov announcement of Covid Plan B today, all these protections are already in place in Scotland and have helped us get Delta cases down. Tough question we all face in period ahead is whether these protections will be strong enough against a rapidly spreading Omicron variant…
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
On topic, the worst thing from this polling is this.
Three in ten say they are less likely to follow Covid rules as a result (29%).
This rises to a third of Labour voters (33%) and those aged 18-34 (33%) who say the same.
Over half say they are just as likely to follow the rules (54%)
Whatever Boris Johnson announces tonight will be ignored by large parts of the country making us less secure.
He needs to go and be replaced by someone with the credibility and authority to launch you new Covid-19 measures.
Except it wouldn't matter if Jesus were to descend from heaven to promote any new Covid measures. First of all, the country, or a large enough fraction of it at any rate, has had enough of Covid measures and will happily ignore them if they think they can get away with it. And secondly, there's probably nothing short of a full lockdown that will do anything to seriously impede the latest version of this bloody virus, it's questionable as to whether or not even that will work, and neither the economy nor wider society can sustain an annual cycle of hokey cokey house arrest for the next thousand years.
The Government can plausibly get away with yet more masks (useless) and WFH (not useful enough,) and after that it is out of options. Reinstating large scale business support and putting about five or six million people back on furlough until various roadmap steps between April and July, let alone shutting all the schools again for the Winter, is a non-starter. And if declining to go to those lengths means, to put it bluntly, tent hospitals and doctors having to decide which Covid patient gets a ventilator and which one gets a big shot of morphine, then that's what's going to end up happening. After all, selectively abandoning non-Covid patients to perish through lack of care capacity is already a reality in the NHS. Why should selectively abandoning Covid patients to perish as well seem so unimaginable?
Basically, if we are fortunate and this latest wave of the disease is moderate then we can all breathe a sigh of relief, and if we aren't and it's bad then there are no workable strategies left for avoiding a massacre. Draconian restrictions are over. Finished.
I'm not sure it's as "mild" as we all hope
Benedict Barclay @BarclayBenedict · 2m Replying to @BarclayBenedict The total number of people in hospital with Covid is 4,252, which is very sharply up on 2,550 last week.
Gauteng has fallen from 72% of cases to 59%, which shows that cases are now rising faster in other provinces.
The report from a couple of days ago was that 76% of the admissions testing positive with Covid were incidental infections i.e. the patient was not being admitted with Covid.
I believe that turned out to be wishful thinking bolleaux
Really? Source?
I found it last night down some 3am rabbit hole, I fear I can't find it again. Feel free to ignore, or not
Anyway, I just don't believe South African hospitals are taking in loads more people with broken limbs who just "happen" to have Covid as well
From yesterday
"South Africa's Covid Hospital Admissions More Than Double In A Day
"South Africa Covid Cases: According to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases 383 people have been admitted to hospital with the disease in the last 24 hours compared with 175 in the preceding period."
"Worst day yet for hospital admissions in South Africa. #Omicron Cases and Daily Admissions are 3x what we saw with Delta. But the silver lining is that ICU is still 72% below the most applicable Delta comparison period. How many will end up in ICU is the question. #COVID19"
Given the test positivity rate in South Africa is more than 20%, why does it surprise you that people with other ailments (cancer, eye surgery, gunshot wounds, kidney disease, etc.) might have Covid?
Enough people are now going through the whole grisly, inevitable process - infection, admission, then on to ventilation and ICU - for us to know the surge in Gauteng is real and it is Covid
There are also reports of the first deaths circling Twitter, and that statistical leap in excess deaths to consider (which might of course be random, or not, or Delta, who the F knows?)
OK time to watch Boris scratch the blackboard
So: time to nail your colours to the mast: So you think we should be strengthening measures against Covid (moving towards Lockdown), or continuing with current measures?
I said earlier that I think we should stick with what we have, and instead focus on surging the booster drive, and prepping the NHS for a big wave of new cases between now and late Jan
I fear a grim and foolish logic is, however, leading us to Plan B, and then Lockdown
And some on here are still saying Oh that will be fine, you stay home and eat chocolates.
Jesus F Christ. For many many people the last winter lockdown was pretty much unbearable
It will not be fine. But neither is having a very high rate of hospitalisation and deaths.
You fuck people and their businesses over too much, you run out of money, the health service collapses, you get the deaths anyway.
The odd thing is: we have been at war; in many ways a much worse situation, and your scenario did not come to pass.
When the country was at war the Government didn't respond by telling everybody to sit at home all the bloody time.
They did, when it was needed. 'Stay put if the invader comes.' 'Holiday at home' to prevent 'unnecessary travel'. 'Coughs and sneezes spread diseases'. .
I’m old enough to remember having been told to hide under the kitchen table in the event of the four minute warning.
Whatever happened to kitchen tables?
I'm typing this drivel on my family's old kitchen table, formica top, metal legs, which I use as my desk.
Don't know what your lot did with yours'.
I do recall a kitchen table when I was young. It had fold out flaps and the steel mechanisms that sprung them into place were like Normandy beach defenses.
We had pews as seat for out kitchen table. Dad demolished an old chapel in the 60's, and rescued some of the old pews. My brother still uses one as seats for side of his table, and my sister has the other somewhere.
I miss them; many of my childhood memories revolve around mealtimes and those pews. But I've got the clock that hung above the table.
Devon friend of mine has them in his (former hall-) house's kitchen. Same provenance. Very flexible for different numbers, lovely old wood.
I haven't been able to get one, but the sort of schooldesks kids used when I were knee-high to a grasshopper (*) are apparently very good for kids to work from. A friend of ours says theirs is brilliant.
(*) The sort that had inkpots and a lifting lid
Flat or tilted top? My late father made several of different heights.
Tilted top. Ink-pot hole in the right-hand corner. Brass hinges. Just thinking about it brings back the sights and smells of my old school.
Having observed the little 'un learn to write, I am of the (scientifically unproven) opinion that slanted surfaces are far better than flat ones to write or draw on. At one point, I gave him my old draughtsman's board to write on, on its lowest setting. Until he drew all over it in permanent ink ...
Ah, it was flat top tables my dad made - one recently repainted for the neighbour's grandchild.
Re tilted top ones, ESA used to make them and much else under the Esavian trade name - can be found on the net, including the cast iron framed ones with flip up seats. I don't fit in any more though ...
I don't support compulsory vaccination, but if unvaccinated people end up in hospital maybe they ought to contribute to some of the costs of their treatment if they're able to do so. They are idiots for not having the jab.
Every SA doctor that has been interviewed over the past week, including today has said that Omicron is currently much milder and the situation is totally different to the Beta & Delta waves. There is no lockdown at all in South Africa.
You're an idiot
Here's a head of a South African ICU. Is she saying "this is much milder"?
"Head of ICU at Chris Hani Baragwanatnath Hospital in Gauteng, South Africa, Professor Rudo Mathivha says they are seeing many children arriving at hospital with Covid-19 with mild to severe symptoms and requiring oxygen."
Most South Africans are not double vaccinated unless most Brits, let alone had their boosters. What that shows is the need to give more vaccines to South Africa
SA have been binning vaccines because of low take-up. Vaccine supply is not the issue.
For all those supporting BoJo - what success has he delivered over the last 2 years?
I am not supporting him, but he got us out of the EU, got a trade deal that protected our sovereignty more than anyone said was possible, and got us a vaccine program earlier than anyone else in Europe
The one that ended the United Kingdom as a trading block and forces GB and NI companies to have export licences to sell things to each other?
If that's protecting the sovereignty of the UK I'd hate to see what not ptotecting it looks like.
Theresa May's backstop.
Infinitely worse.
Perhaps, but isn't relevant to the argument @Aslan was promoting. He said that the current trade deal - which dissolved the UK trading area - "protected our sovereignty". I now need an export license to sell products in my own country. How has that protected our sovereignty to do things like not need an export license to trade inside our own country...
I don't need you to come back in with alternative takes on external sovereignty - you have one perspective on that, I have another. But the ending of the UK as a trading nation is indisputable - we are now split in two with GB as one trading zone and NI as another trading zone. Usually deals that protect a country's sovereignty doesn't split a chunk off it.
It did protect our sovereignty because we had Article 16 so could override it. The ending is not indisputable, we'll see what the situation is post-Article 16.
There are plenty of countries that have had chunks split off, where its convenient to do so, its far from unprecedented.
On that logic while in the EU our sovereignty was protected because we could always leave.
Either in the EU we were sovereign because we could leave and there is no compromise of sovereignty over NI because we can invoke A16; or in the EU we were not sovereign and we are not sovereign now because there is no free movement of goods between GB and NI.
You are a logical debater. Which is it; it can't be both.
We were always technically sovereign, we could only exercise that sovereignty by invoking Article 50 so we rightly did when people wanted to exercise that sovereignty.
Same deal with Article 16 - and I think it should be invoked too.
So as it stands we are not sovereign because we haven't exercised it. Is that right?
If memory serves, you've been trying variants (so to speak) of this line for a couple of years now, and I'm sorry, but I think it's a stupid argument. If we our sovereignty within the EU is only present because we have the option to leave it, then we clearly aren't sovereign while we're in it, and the fact that we assented (implicitly) to that reality is irrelevant.
He who [has to] break[s] a thing to find out what it is, has left the path of wisdom.
Apology accepted. Although your point is wrong. We were always sovereign whether we decided to exercise it or not. Of course we made compromises but did so as a sovereign nation.
But that is not the point. If we were not sovereign within the EU because we hadn't "proved" it by leaving, then the NI deal means we are not sovereign because as of this moment we haven't exercised A16. It can't be both.
If you think we weren't sovereign while in the EU and aren't sovereign now because the NI deal means that there is no free movement of goods between GB and NI that is fair enough. But you can't argue for one and not the other.
We were always sovereign for both. The question is if you wanted to exercise your sovereignty or not.
The English and Welsh voted to exercise their sovereignty, hence invoking Article 50. The NI did not, hence the special arrangements.
Now if the NI wish to exercise theirs, then A16 is the right answer for them, just as it was for the UK as a whole. For the same reasons. Using the same logic.
No inconsistencies.
Excellent. So we were sovereign while in the EU: tick. And we are sovereign with this NI deal: tick.
So why all the fuss about leaving the EU to reclaim our sovereignty.
Because we wanted to exercise our sovereignty.
Not just have it in abeyance.
Philip
I remember you telling me that the main benefit of leaving the EU was to get our sovereignty back.
Now you are telling me that we had it all the time!
So why leave?
So we could exercise it.
If you only have sovereignty so long as you can't exercise it, and you want to exercise it but can't, then do you have it.
So we only have something if we use it? Obviously we "could" exercise it, we did. So obviously we had it.
Is this some weird version of "having your cake and eating it?" ....or because we don't use a nuclear weapon we don't have it?
No its the polar opposite.
If you're not bothered about using your sovereignty then its OK to keep it in abeyance in something like the EU or NI Protocol, so long as you have an exit mechanism like A50 or A16.
If you are bothered about using it then you need to invoke the relevant Article first before you can.
How is that not clear?
But I am not bothered about using it. There are more important things to worry about, like Covid, the NHS, paying back borrowed monies, trying to keep our trade figures up to where they were, you know, and of course not dying (even though I am old and I will die sooner or later...)
That's fine, you're not bothered. So vote Remain then. That's entirely valid. I had no philosophical objection to Remain.
But that wasn't the nations choice. You were a minority and lost the vote. A majority were bothered so that's the decision made.
So you think of sovereignty within the EU like money in a piggy bank? You have to smash the piggy bank to get the sovereignty out. Taking that analogy I wonder what we've actually spent our sovereignty on and was it worth destroying the piggy bank.
I have tried to understand Philip's attitude and arguement but I feel it has changed over the last 2 months. I am obviously not bright enough to follow it. I can't get past the idea that economically we are up the creek without a paddle and the EU won't need to bend over backwards for us much longer.
Every SA doctor that has been interviewed over the past week, including today has said that Omicron is currently much milder and the situation is totally different to the Beta & Delta waves. There is no lockdown at all in South Africa.
Whilst not disagreeing with your view that Omicron is probably not the monster people fear there is a potentially major difference in comparing SA with UK in that SA is in summer so lower risk from being cooped up indoors socialising and the knock on effect of risk of spread to the more vulnerable so the pressure for lockdown would be less there I would have thought.
But I’m hoping it’s no much worse than current strain and this is an over-reaction.
Oddly this Doctor reports that the children being admitted with Covid are mainly incidental infections as there is another upper respiratory infection going round in SA.
Also does this Dr who is in the epicentre of the outbreak look worried.
I'm really concerned by the blurring of "I don't trust the Govenment" with "I'm not willing to do what I can to slow the pandemic". It's absolutely obvious that we should vaccinate and boost as quickly as possible, and we shouldn't take any unnecessary risks in mingling. Whether you love, hate, adore or despise Boris Johnson is completely irrelevant to that, and it's also irrelevant whether an illegal party was held or not.
Spot on Nick.
But I don't think most of the public will blur the two.
Yes, political anoraks on here will blur them. As will obsessives whipping themselves up into hysteria about restrictions.
But the public are quite different as they don't think it's a political issue.
I don't agree with this at all. The general public is on balance more in favour of health-led restrictions than the Tories, or indeed the PB average, partly because UK culture emphasises responsibility and public propriety.
But that doesn't mean that Johnson isn't doing huge damage to people's trust in the measures. What you'll then see is increasing lip-service being paid to restrictions, and more and more people, privately and semi-privately and around the edges of all this, circumventing them at any cost.
1/ Re UK gov announcement of Covid Plan B today, all these protections are already in place in Scotland and have helped us get Delta cases down. Tough question we all face in period ahead is whether these protections will be strong enough against a rapidly spreading Omicron variant…
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
Pretending this is a magic "cure all" may be a tad optimistic.....
Sturgeon can blithely lock down Scotland because she doesn't have to pay for it. London does
But, she is surely hinting at the extremely obvious. This will not be enough. There will be proper lockdowns.
I suspect their big concern is actually that the most severe lockdowns won't be enough, and then what?
And then the inevitable, 1% of the idiot unvaccinated and 0.5% the unlucky vulnerable die of COVID. I know it seems harsh but this is going to happen everywhere with Omicron. We're all going to get it now, I'm thankful that I'm in good health and have no underlying conditions but ultimately the reality of the world has changed due to COVID.
Sky News now talking about 4th and 5th jabs over the next couple of years, boffin agreeing. This is it. Years and years of this shite
BREAKING: A full Russian invasion of Ukraine would be on a scale “not seen in Europe since World War 2”, the new head of the armed forces has warned. Admiral Sir Tony Radakin described the Ukraine crisis - with a build of tens of thousands of Russian troops - as “deeply worrying”
1/ Re UK gov announcement of Covid Plan B today, all these protections are already in place in Scotland and have helped us get Delta cases down. Tough question we all face in period ahead is whether these protections will be strong enough against a rapidly spreading Omicron variant…
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
Pretending this is a magic "cure all" may be a tad optimistic.....
I suspect their big concern is actually that the most severe lockdowns won't be enough, and then what?
Some people will die, most won't.
Yes, this is likely to increase the death rate in the UK by 30-50k per year for a couple of years while natural immunity and wide spectrum vaccines are developed. With something as rapidly spreading as Omicron I'm not even sure the NHS would have time to react, I expect it would be like a very bad flu year with people dying in their houses and care homes.
Displacing infections into the future made sense when the future had a miracle cure (the vaccine), now that the miracle cure is here and works, displacing infections into the future is simply displacing infections.
Comments
But that wasn't the nations choice. You were a minority and lost the vote. A majority were bothered so that's the decision made.
I don't think I ever did get to the bottom of the CHB moniker. It's a quiet eveing, no PMs in trouble, no end to the world! Surely a (do dramatise) story of a famous PB moniker will draw an audience of ... er lots!
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10266581/Boris-Johnson-speech-leaving-Cleo-Watson.html
Labour will be 10+ points ahead soon
https://xkcd.com/936/
Restrictions have always been the wrong answer to this pandemic, but at least last time round there was a point "we're waiting for the vaccines" / "we're rolling out the vaccines". There is no point now - we have vaccines, we've double jabbed almost everyone at any real risk, and triple jabbed the most vulnerable.
Polling on this is massively skewed because - most people want to WFH for reasons unrelated to the pandemic, and those least in favour of restrictions are least likely to be polled because they will be out living their lives rather than cowering at home being rung by opinion pollsters.
I miss them; many of my childhood memories revolve around mealtimes and those pews. But I've got the clock that hung above the table.
All of this is being done to cover up Boris and his dodgy parties.
sex nymphbabysitter.Also this is 1m Omicron plus however many Delta can take before it disappears?
So it could be 2m, about 100,000 a day. Which is a fuck of a lot, to be fair
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-08/omicron-symptoms-far-milder-s-africa-hospital-group-ceo-says
Theatres! FFS.
You keep saying this because you want it to be true. But it isn't true. Its like listening to HYUFD click his jackboots together three times saying he still believes in fairies.
https://twitter.com/CiesekSandra/status/1468465347519041539
Hope you are well anyway.
Realistically Boris needs to be almost perfect AND needs Labour to mess up in order to win a majority.
How many will go to a theatre or a panto? To sit in a mask for 3 hours? Cinemas ditto
Everything will slowly shutter, as business evaporates, a chain reaction of minor calamity adding up to a big catastrophe
There is nothing to be cheerful about, I'm afraid. Nothing at all
While we’ve been poring over every twist and turn, very many people are yet to get back from work.
Are you incapable of learning from your past mistakes?
Interesting that the only criteria for being incidental is not needing oxygen treatment. Is this a lost in translation thing where incidental = mild?
As with the firebreak, and tiered restrictions last year, I'm yet to understand what the government is trying to achieve with plan b. If they said "look we think Omicron is really bad and to stop it completely overwhelming the NHS we're going into a full lockdown, it sucks but we have evidence that it presents severe symptoms in the double jabbed 25m who haven't had third doses and we will reopen in January when we've got all 46m double jabbed people a third dose" I would have respected the honesty of it, though disagreed with the content. There is logic in that kind of action. This is simply a "lets be seen to be doing something" kind of measure which will achieve little and change nothing.
Apart from that, the left has decided to marginalise itself and the polls are showing that by not being Corbyn and not being Johnson, Labour is capable of polling 40%.
In 1997 they managed 43%, with a bit more effort they could legitimately beat that.
(*) The sort that had inkpots and a lifting lid
I can legitimately believe the Tories get into the low 30s or high 20s in the next GE, 1997 repeat - if things go even more badly.
i.e. 25,000 of those going to my PL club are season ticket holders. The rest of the home supporters are members who pay £35 per year to get priority access to tickets. Ditto away supporters. It's virtually impossible for anyone without one or the other to get a ticket, but in the rare matches when at present tickets go on general sale they could cover the rest by introducing a membership scheme with no priority access for tickets. Then you just need the season ticket holder/member to register their vaccine status once, well in advance of match day, and allow tickets to be issued only to those who have done so. Then you also have it on record for future matches, no need to register again.
But the insistence on allowing a one-off lateral flow test messes all that up. Chaos on the day I think if you've got to cater for last minute LFTs at the turnstiles.
By the way, when I went to see the Wolves on Saturday, once again no more than 2% of fans were wearing masks even in the crowded-like-sardine indoor areas behind the stands. And given the age demographic and the fact that so many were prepared to flout the regulations, a high proportion of those were likely to have been unvaccinated.
The time has arrived for him to own the tails side of his coin.
2/ Even if (and it is still if) Omicron doesn’t cause more severe disease, the numbers of people who might be infected by its faster spread will create big challenges for NHS and economy - so we need to consider carefully (but quite quickly) what proportionate response needed...
3/ In meantime, all of us complying strictly with current protections will help. And even if you feel angry with a politician just now, please remember just how important compliance is for the health & safety of you, your loved ones and the country
https://twitter.com/NicolaSturgeon/status/1468653871794778112?s=20
And yet, case rates not remarkably different from England....
https://twitter.com/ONS/status/1466739582930665475?s=20
Pretending this is a magic "cure all" may be a tad optimistic.....
https://coronavirusexplained.ukri.org/en/article/vdt0008/
Now, lets deal with this part...
Then you just need the season ticket holder/member to register their vaccine status once, well in advance of match day, and allow tickets to be issued only to those who have done so.
This would require proof of ID on the turnstiles.
Allegra Stratton and Ellie Price were the final two candidates for PM's spokesman.
Ellie Price did miles better in the mock press conference yet Boris chose Allegra - supposedly because Carrie wanted Allegra.
If Boris had chosen Ellie, the whole thing may never have happened!
Admiral Sir Tony Radakin described the Ukraine crisis - with a build of tens of thousands of Russian troops - as “deeply worrying”
https://twitter.com/haynesdeborah/status/1468642094105432072?s=20
But, she is surely hinting at the extremely obvious. This will not be enough. There will be proper lockdowns.
I suspect their big concern is actually that the most severe lockdowns won't be enough, and then what?
Having observed the little 'un learn to write, I am of the (scientifically unproven) opinion that slanted surfaces are far better than flat ones to write or draw on. At one point, I gave him my old draughtsman's board to write on, on its lowest setting. Until he drew all over it in permanent ink ...
Anything beyond that is a bonus given the only PM to have won a general election after 10 years of their party in power since 1918 was Major in 1992. Plus even then Kinnock led most polls before that election
Here's a head of a South African ICU. Is she saying "this is much milder"?
"Head of ICU at Chris Hani Baragwanatnath Hospital in Gauteng, South Africa, Professor Rudo Mathivha says they are seeing many children arriving at hospital with Covid-19 with mild to severe symptoms and requiring oxygen."
https://twitter.com/Sam_BTT/status/1467576414882910208?s=20
But I don't think most of the public will blur the two.
Yes, political anoraks on here will blur them. As will obsessives whipping themselves up into hysteria about restrictions.
But the public are quite different as they don't think it's a political issue.
Also the article points out that those who have died with Covid in their hospitals had significant comorbidities
He is someone who should drop straight down to the warm, blazing place ...
But I’m hoping it’s no much worse than current strain and this is an over-reaction.
Re tilted top ones, ESA used to make them and much else under the Esavian trade name - can be found on the net, including the cast iron framed ones with flip up seats. I don't fit in any more though ...
Also does this Dr who is in the epicentre of the outbreak look worried.
https://edition.cnn.com/videos/health/2021/12/08/south-african-doctor-coetzee-omicron-patients-stats-newday-vpx.cnn
Sean Thomas Knox
has tied himself in
Hoax Names Knots
But that doesn't mean that Johnson isn't doing huge damage to people's trust in the measures. What you'll then see is increasing lip-service being paid to restrictions, and more and more people, privately and semi-privately and around the edges of all this, circumventing them at any cost.
Displacing infections into the future made sense when the future had a miracle cure (the vaccine), now that the miracle cure is here and works, displacing infections into the future is simply displacing infections.