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So what is Johnson trying to cover up? – politicalbetting.com

SystemSystem Posts: 12,218
edited June 2023 in General
imageSo what is Johnson trying to cover up? – politicalbetting.com

Given the lengths that appear to be being taken not to release certain information about the Johnson’s government handling of COVID the assumption must be that there is something very big that ministers are trying to cover up.

Read the full story here

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Comments

  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    Interesting thread on a defection to Russia.
    The dodgy Trumpworld connections are extensive.

    Live now: Tara Reade, who falsely accused Joe Biden of sexual assault in 2020, then spoke at the pro-Russia, no-aid-to-Ukraine "Rage Against the War Machine" DC rally in Feb 2023, is announcing her defection to Russia on Russian state TV. Her crowd is tied to Jan 6 too. 1/..
    https://twitter.com/capitolhunters/status/1663624442940125184

    All sheer coincidence, no doubt.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    That is something of a separate question.

    Though certainly if the government gets to decide what it can and can't look at - after having set its terms if reference and the enquiry started - it's not going to help the process.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    The interesting thing is what Sunak has to lose by the WhatsApp evidence being turned over.

    It isn't saving Johnson or Hancock, it must be about something that compromises him.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,914
    edited May 2023
    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 54,032
    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 50,161
    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 55,035
    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    The point isn’t to critisise named individuals, it’s to look at what happened in 2020, and document the knowledge the country gained from the experience, so that the next emergency is dealt with in a better way.

    It’s already become far too political, as we see from the Mirror’s headline.

    The staff of the inquiry should speak to everyone involved confidentially, with no lawyers present, and the final report should contain findings and recommendations, with individual actors not named. This is how the AAIB works, and the result is that fewer planes crash. Far fewer planes. Which is what we all want from this, isn’t it?
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 50,161
    Foxy said:

    The interesting thing is what Sunak has to lose by the WhatsApp evidence being turned over.

    It isn't saving Johnson or Hancock, it must be about something that compromises him.

    I suspect it is that it will reveal (confirm!) that Johnson was never capable of taking anything seriously and there are probably a string of comments that many people will find crass or offensive.
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 119,976
    I think the texts will show Rishi and Boris saying what a turd Brexit is.

    That’s the rumour I’ve heard anyway.
  • WestieWestie Posts: 426
    edited May 2023
    A coverup doesn't just mean that officials try not to release documents. A coverup is when witnesses are pressured regarding what to say and not say, or to change what they say, or in some cases they can be disappeared.

    "Given that Sunak was Chancellor for all this period it must be assumed that he has an interest in this not being made available."

    Understatement!

    Hopefully Sunak won't emerge in the same way as Gordon Brown, who is as big a war criminal as Tony Blair but rarely called such.

    Who was at Chequers during Covid restrictions? I don't care whether they went or didn't go within 2 metres of anyone else. Just want the list.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,504
    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    No. I didn't say that. But it's fairly clear to me that the inquiry is going to produce a lot more heat than light.
  • CiceroCicero Posts: 3,126
    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 55,035
    edited May 2023
    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    That’s a letter from all the existing big players in AI, trying to argue for enough regulation to entrench their own companies in place with barriers to entry.

    “Bad people could use AI badly. We are all good people, so trust us to use it goodly”. I paraphrase slightly.
  • WestieWestie Posts: 426
    edited May 2023
    Foxy said:

    The interesting thing is what Sunak has to lose by the WhatsApp evidence being turned over.

    It isn't saving Johnson or Hancock, it must be about something that compromises him.

    Yes. People keep asking whether Johnson can "survive", but what office does he hold? He's obviously not returning to the cabinet or Downing Street and may not even keep his seat or indeed try to.
  • CiceroCicero Posts: 3,126
    Bad taste comments aside, could this be about the money? That not just Michelle Mone rode the system and that the Cabinet knew and tacitly approved? That really would be explosive.

    After all its hardly a state secret that Boris is crass, so seems stupid to try and keep it out of the public domain.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    TheScreamingEagles said:

    I think the texts will show Rishi and Boris saying what a turd Brexit is.

    That’s the rumour I’ve heard anyway.

    Yes, that could be dangerous. It would show that they have some intelligence and understanding.
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 55,035
    edited May 2023
    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    With the background that, because of the nature of the pandemic, people had many fewer face-to-face meetings than would normally happen. So many of those face-to-face and internal phone calls were done electronically. Ministers generally worked from their own departmental offices.

    Information security of government communications is definitely fair game for the inquiry though. Why the hell are they all on WhatsApp - owned by Facebook - in the first place?

    The first lesson to learn is that electronic communications of any type, live on forever unless explicitly designed to be deleted.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,914
    edited May 2023
    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) and it's squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

  • Nigel_ForemainNigel_Foremain Posts: 14,352
    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 55,035
    Mexicanpete said:

    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

    The whole point is that the inquiry shouldn’t be trying to prosecute individuals, it should be trying to lead the country in the right direction for the next emergency.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 63,657
    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    Good morning

    It appears that evidence will conclude in 2026 so it looks as if it could he 2027 or later before the final report

    Kicking into touch comes to mind
  • FF43FF43 Posts: 17,246
    Interesting comment from someone who enthusiastically suppresses free speech.

    A free society requires free debate.

    @Docstockk
    's invitation to the
    @OxfordUnion
    should stand and students should be allowed to hear and debate her views.

    We mustn’t allow a small but vocal few to shut down discussion.

    https://twitter.com/RishiSunak/status/1663543575991435265
  • Nigel_ForemainNigel_Foremain Posts: 14,352
    Sandpit said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

    The whole point is that the inquiry shouldn’t be trying to prosecute individuals, it should be trying to lead the country in the right direction for the next emergency.
    I don't think it is, is it? They are legitimately trying to get to see communications that took place during that time that are now being refused. The government hasn't used the usual "national security" defence, so one has to conclude that it is highly politically embarrassing, along the lines of TSE's suggestion. Perhaps The Clown has said that he knew all along that Brexit was pointless? It wouldn't be surprising, and presumably because it was on WhatsApp the Clown thought he would be immune from FoI requests.

    Whoever thought it a good idea to make someone as inappropriate as Boris Johnson our PM FFS?!
  • eekeek Posts: 28,592
    edited May 2023
    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    Good morning

    It appears that evidence will conclude in 2026 so it looks as if it could he 2027 or later before the final report

    Kicking into touch comes to mind
    It's not the final report they are worried about - it's things that may be within the evidence if the cabinet office doesn't stop some items becoming part of the evidence.

    Which then opens up the question what are in those messages / letters / minutes that need to be hidden? Is it things about Brexit as TSE alludes to below, outright corruption in getting PPE supplies or something else..

    It can't just be Bozo having friends round in Chequers?
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

    The whole point is that the inquiry shouldn’t be trying to prosecute individuals, it should be trying to lead the country in the right direction for the next emergency.
    I don't think it is, is it? They are legitimately trying to get to see communications that took place during that time that are now being refused. The government hasn't used the usual "national security" defence, so one has to conclude that it is highly politically embarrassing, along the lines of TSE's suggestion. Perhaps The Clown has said that he knew all along that Brexit was pointless? It wouldn't be surprising, and presumably because it was on WhatsApp the Clown thought he would be immune from FoI requests.

    Whoever thought it a good idea to make someone as inappropriate as Boris Johnson our PM FFS?!
    The Conservative Party.

    It is rather striking that the only Tory leader elected by the wider party membership that hasn’t proved both manifestly the wrong choice and a total disaster was Cameron in 2005. And he was at best a mixed success.

    William Hague has a lot to answer for.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 63,657
    eek said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    Good morning

    It appears that evidence will conclude in 2026 so it looks as if it could he 2027 or later before the final report

    Kicking into touch comes to mind
    It's not the final report they are worried about - it's things that may be within the evidence if the cabinet office doesn't stop some items becoming part of the evidence.

    Which then opens up the question what are in those messages / letters / minutes that need to be hidden? Is it things about Brexit as TSE alludes to below, outright corruption in getting PPE supplies or something else..

    It can't just be Bozo having friends round in Chequers?
    I have no idea why government business is conducted over what's app and it seems like an accident waiting to happen

    It certainly gives an impression of a cover up which in turn results in all kinds of speculation

    Just provide the information and trust the judge to decide
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,546
    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,914
    edited May 2023
    Sandpit said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

    The whole point is that the inquiry shouldn’t be trying to prosecute individuals, it should be trying to lead the country in the right direction for the next emergency.
    It should be about getting at the truth, and if it transpires in getting to the truth, industrial scale malpractice, for example financial impropriety or God -forbid fraud is uncovered, details should be passed on to the appropriate authority to take a look.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    Cicero said:

    Bad taste comments aside, could this be about the money? That not just Michelle Mone rode the system and that the Cabinet knew and tacitly approved? That really would be explosive.

    After all its hardly a state secret that Boris is crass, so seems stupid to try and keep it out of the public domain.

    It seems possible to me.

    There were clearly some appallingly bad PPE contracts, with 1,000% profit margins commonplace, and tens and hundreds of millions involved.
    Ministers vehemently denied any malfeasance. A WhatsApp trail might render some of those denials implausible.

    If all if this stuff is redacted, we'll never know one way or the other.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,914
    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    Should Baroness Hallet thus be able to sequester his WhatsApp messaging?
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    eek said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    Good morning

    It appears that evidence will conclude in 2026 so it looks as if it could he 2027 or later before the final report

    Kicking into touch comes to mind
    It's not the final report they are worried about - it's things that may be within the evidence if the cabinet office doesn't stop some items becoming part of the evidence.

    Which then opens up the question what are in those messages / letters / minutes that need to be hidden? Is it things about Brexit as TSE alludes to below, outright corruption in getting PPE supplies or something else..

    It can't just be Bozo having friends round in Chequers?
    I have no idea why government business is conducted over what's app and it seems like an accident waiting to happen

    It certainly gives an impression of a cover up which in turn results in all kinds of speculation

    Just provide the information and trust the judge to decide
    Agreed.
    On the one hand, if it's politically embarrassing chatter about Brexit, she's quite unlikely to publish it.
    On the other, PPE corruption would clearly not be covered up.

    There's probably quite a large grey area in between, but I'd expect a judge to tend, if in doubt, not to publish.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,914
    Theuniondivvie said:

    It’s remarkable that in spite of all those pics of BJ jogging he still looks like a bin bag full of used chip fat and old chicken skins. How bad would he look without a rigorous fitness regime?

    I recall reading on these pages a while back that it's all muscle. Don't forget muscle is heavier than fat, which is why Johnson looks heavy.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 42,679
    In a sense this is all a waste of time. It will drag on for ages, people will fight their corner, there'll be no clear 'truth' settled upon, lessons will not be learned. Or rather they will but not via this process.

    However the Inquiry is absolutely necessary. We can't not have one. We owe it to all the people who suffered during the pandemic. That's the real point of it imo. To give the whole episode its due weight and as a mark of respect to the victims.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    Beyond the initial report though, who cares ?
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    kinabalu said:

    In a sense this is all a waste of time. It will drag on for ages, people will fight their corner, there'll be no clear 'truth' settled upon, lessons will not be learned. Or rather they will but not via this process.

    However the Inquiry is absolutely necessary. We can't not have one. We owe it to all the people who suffered during the pandemic. That's the real point of it imo. To give the whole episode its due weight and as a mark of respect to the victims.

    If there was actual malfeasance, one lesson at least ought to be that it won't be covered up.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    Quite possibly so, but isn't there a long history of similar behaviour by TV and music talent?

    I don't see why MPs should get involved. They need to deal with the beam in their own eye before tackling that mote.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    Mexicanpete said:

    Theuniondivvie said:

    It’s remarkable that in spite of all those pics of BJ jogging he still looks like a bin bag full of used chip fat and old chicken skins. How bad would he look without a rigorous fitness regime?

    I recall reading on these pages a while back that it's all muscle. Don't forget muscle is heavier than fat, which is why Johnson looks heavy.
    The solid bone from ear to ear may not help in this regard…
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    Nigelb said:

    Cicero said:

    Bad taste comments aside, could this be about the money? That not just Michelle Mone rode the system and that the Cabinet knew and tacitly approved? That really would be explosive.

    After all its hardly a state secret that Boris is crass, so seems stupid to try and keep it out of the public domain.

    It seems possible to me.

    There were clearly some appallingly bad PPE contracts, with 1,000% profit margins commonplace, and tens and hundreds of millions involved.
    Ministers vehemently denied any malfeasance. A WhatsApp trail might render some of those denials implausible.

    If all if this stuff is redacted, we'll never know one way or the other.
    There were also some very weird decisions in education funding, such as the millions pumped to Ark Academies for dubious online lessons.

    But personally I would guess that Sunak’s unease is because there were some very strong reservations expressed about the cost, benefit and possible impact of Eat Out to Help Out.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 18,915
    It might be that Boris Johnson isn't really sure what he has to hide, but he's sure he doesn't want other people to find out and let him know.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 11,491
    The Govt claim is that the redactions are of material unrelated to the Inquiry. If the redactions actually are of material clearly related to the Inquiry, that would be a monumentally stupid lie to have made. Thus, is it not more plausible that the redacted material is indeed not or only peripherally related, but that it is embarrassing in some other way?
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 28,972
    It is the most extraordinary thing. The extension yesterday was only allowed if the Cabinet Office submitted a sworn statement that what they had said was truthful - the assumption from the enquiry is that they are lying to stall for time.

    I can support the principle of civil servants needing to be able to freely communicate - but as the email system is completely secure, they can. For the stuff they do not want to put in writing, don't put it in writing!

    So much went wrong during Covid, with various proven and suspected issues and in some cases offences. So we cannot have WhatsApp as some kind of secrecy barrier to prevent a statutory enquiry from carrying out its task.

    I'm not bothered about colourful language or thinking the unthinkable. I am bothered by things like shit decisions which killed the elderly en mass, and the open corruption in the Tory party where billions of our money was handed to their mates for nothing.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    Theuniondivvie said:

    It’s remarkable that in spite of all those pics of BJ jogging he still looks like a bin bag full of used chip fat and old chicken skins. How bad would he look without a rigorous fitness regime?

    Has he ever run anything other than a 5 min photoshoot? Other than after buxom young blondes of course.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    ydoethur said:

    Nigelb said:

    Cicero said:

    Bad taste comments aside, could this be about the money? That not just Michelle Mone rode the system and that the Cabinet knew and tacitly approved? That really would be explosive.

    After all its hardly a state secret that Boris is crass, so seems stupid to try and keep it out of the public domain.

    It seems possible to me.

    There were clearly some appallingly bad PPE contracts, with 1,000% profit margins commonplace, and tens and hundreds of millions involved.
    Ministers vehemently denied any malfeasance. A WhatsApp trail might render some of those denials implausible.

    If all if this stuff is redacted, we'll never know one way or the other.
    There were also some very weird decisions in education funding, such as the millions pumped to Ark Academies for dubious online lessons.

    But personally I would guess that Sunak’s unease is because there were some very strong reservations expressed about the cost, benefit and possible impact of Eat Out to Help Out.
    Also quite likely that it's not just one thing that they're anxious to keep obscured.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,914
    kinabalu said:

    In a sense this is all a waste of time. It will drag on for ages, people will fight their corner, there'll be no clear 'truth' settled upon, lessons will not be learned. Or rather they will but not via this process.

    However the Inquiry is absolutely necessary. We can't not have one. We owe it to all the people who suffered during the pandemic. That's the real point of it imo. To give the whole episode its due weight and as a mark of respect to the victims.

    The Report might not be available until ten years after the event, nonetheless if details of significant suspected illegality is passed to the police prosecutions could be concluded way before the Inquiry sees the light of day.

    This is bad for the Government on "a no smoke, no fire, what are they trying to hide" basis. It might be that Johnson is merely concerned about innocuous, but what Mrs Johnson might deem saucy, content between him and Mad Nad rather than the fear of uncovering any wide scale criminality.
  • TazTaz Posts: 15,049
    edited May 2023
    Theuniondivvie said:

    It’s remarkable that in spite of all those pics of BJ jogging he still looks like a bin bag full of used chip fat and old chicken skins. How bad would he look without a rigorous fitness regime?

    It's a fair question.

    He's an avid cyclist too.

    It's probably part of his USP. Brand Boris.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    ydoethur said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

    The whole point is that the inquiry shouldn’t be trying to prosecute individuals, it should be trying to lead the country in the right direction for the next emergency.
    I don't think it is, is it? They are legitimately trying to get to see communications that took place during that time that are now being refused. The government hasn't used the usual "national security" defence, so one has to conclude that it is highly politically embarrassing, along the lines of TSE's suggestion. Perhaps The Clown has said that he knew all along that Brexit was pointless? It wouldn't be surprising, and presumably because it was on WhatsApp the Clown thought he would be immune from FoI requests.

    Whoever thought it a good idea to make someone as inappropriate as Boris Johnson our PM FFS?!
    The Conservative Party.

    It is rather striking that the only Tory leader elected by the wider party membership that hasn’t proved both manifestly the wrong choice and a total disaster was Cameron in 2005. And he was at best a mixed success.

    William Hague has a lot to answer for.
    Not just the Tory party making this error. Party fanatics picking unsuitable leaders seems to be the rule rather than the exception.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 23,156
    Taz said:

    Theuniondivvie said:

    It’s remarkable that in spite of all those pics of BJ jogging he still looks like a bin bag full of used chip fat and old chicken skins. How bad would he look without a rigorous fitness regime?

    It's a fair question.

    He's an avid cyclist too.

    It's probably part of his USP. Brand Boris.
    Weight is more like 70% diet 15% exercise 15% genetics than 50/50 diet and exercise. Easy to be fat and very active with modern food supply.
  • twistedfirestopper3twistedfirestopper3 Posts: 2,453
    What's the betting that when the report is delivered in some point in the distant future (much delayed and over budget), it will include the phrase "Lessons will be learnt"?
  • TazTaz Posts: 15,049
    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 23,156
    Foxy said:

    Theuniondivvie said:

    It’s remarkable that in spite of all those pics of BJ jogging he still looks like a bin bag full of used chip fat and old chicken skins. How bad would he look without a rigorous fitness regime?

    Has he ever run anything other than a 5 min photoshoot? Other than after buxom young blondes of course.
    He cycled further than Govey thought we should do (and falsely implied we were allowed to) during lockdown.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    Nigelb said:

    ydoethur said:

    Nigelb said:

    Cicero said:

    Bad taste comments aside, could this be about the money? That not just Michelle Mone rode the system and that the Cabinet knew and tacitly approved? That really would be explosive.

    After all its hardly a state secret that Boris is crass, so seems stupid to try and keep it out of the public domain.

    It seems possible to me.

    There were clearly some appallingly bad PPE contracts, with 1,000% profit margins commonplace, and tens and hundreds of millions involved.
    Ministers vehemently denied any malfeasance. A WhatsApp trail might render some of those denials implausible.

    If all if this stuff is redacted, we'll never know one way or the other.
    There were also some very weird decisions in education funding, such as the millions pumped to Ark Academies for dubious online lessons.

    But personally I would guess that Sunak’s unease is because there were some very strong reservations expressed about the cost, benefit and possible impact of Eat Out to Help Out.
    Also quite likely that it's not just one thing that they're anxious to keep obscured.
    Yes, probably enough headlines to dominate the next 18 months, and not some spurious Culture War headlines that the Tories want.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 72,263
    Engineering from the last century.

    Photos of what South Korea says are likely part of the failed North Korean space launch vehicle fired today
    https://twitter.com/joshjonsmith/status/1663723843608002560
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 23,156
    twistedfirestopper3 said:

    What's the betting that when the report is delivered in some point in the distant future (much delayed and over budget), it will include the phrase "Lessons will be learnt"?

    About the same as none of the establishment will be held accountable?
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 61,967
    Good morning, everyone.

    Mr. B2, the M-AI-L newspaper, however, is running with the headline: Humanity could wipe out AI.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,504
    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,546
    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    It’s deja vu, all over again.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 28,972
    edited May 2023
    If this was the police, would "sorry its all on WhatsApp" get you off? They suspect you of fraud, you turn over emails and there is little there. They ask for your diary to see your movements but you say you can't as you don't have them. And everything else was on WhatsApp which is private and you can't have it.

    I don't think so. WhatsApp is an audit trail. It is written. Documented. When the shit hits the fan everything that is written - or not written - is there for inspection. If you want to have off-the-record chats, don't do it in writing.

    We already know there is fire. 9 figure contracts. Awarded without tender. To a company days old. Who have no knowledge of PPE. Who then order it from Ali Express. Which is unusable when delivered. But the money is paid anyway. And then the director tries to strike off the business without ever filing any accounts.

    If we can't investigate that - and its not a singular example - then what is the point in anything? We may as well just have a Tory tax where we pay a tythe to the people who own the Tory party.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,914
    RochdalePioneers said:

    It is the most extraordinary thing. The extension yesterday was only allowed if the Cabinet Office submitted a sworn statement that what they had said was truthful - the assumption from the enquiry is that they are lying to stall for time.

    I can support the principle of civil servants needing to be able to freely communicate - but as the email system is completely secure, they can. For the stuff they do not want to put in writing, don't put it in writing!

    So much went wrong during Covid, with various proven and suspected issues and in some cases offences. So we cannot have WhatsApp as some kind of secrecy barrier to prevent a statutory enquiry from carrying out its task.

    I'm not bothered about colourful language or thinking the unthinkable. I am bothered by things like shit decisions which killed the elderly en mass, and the open corruption in the Tory party where billions of our money was handed to their mates for nothing.

    This particular coalition of chaos have created a "what have they got to hide?" optic, which if they had just handed over the evidence wouldn't now exist.

    Johnson is such a toxic toad.
  • noneoftheabovenoneoftheabove Posts: 23,156
    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    eek said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    Good morning

    It appears that evidence will conclude in 2026 so it looks as if it could he 2027 or later before the final report

    Kicking into touch comes to mind
    It's not the final report they are worried about - it's things that may be within the evidence if the cabinet office doesn't stop some items becoming part of the evidence.

    Which then opens up the question what are in those messages / letters / minutes that need to be hidden? Is it things about Brexit as TSE alludes to below, outright corruption in getting PPE supplies or something else..

    It can't just be Bozo having friends round in Chequers?
    I have no idea why government business is conducted over what's app and it seems like an accident waiting to happen

    It certainly gives an impression of a cover up which in turn results in all kinds of speculation

    Just provide the information and trust the judge to decide
    It is conducted over whatsapp because whatsapp is very easy to use and our cabinet are and have been a bunch of lazy and entitled toddlers for the last few years.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 28,972
    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    bondegezou said:

    The Govt claim is that the redactions are of material unrelated to the Inquiry. If the redactions actually are of material clearly related to the Inquiry, that would be a monumentally stupid lie to have made. Thus, is it not more plausible that the redacted material is indeed not or only peripherally related, but that it is embarrassing in some other way?

    The issue is, that hypothesis rather depends on the government *not* being monumentally stupid.

    Recent experience suggests this is a bold assumption.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 63,657
    noneoftheabove said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    eek said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    Good morning

    It appears that evidence will conclude in 2026 so it looks as if it could he 2027 or later before the final report

    Kicking into touch comes to mind
    It's not the final report they are worried about - it's things that may be within the evidence if the cabinet office doesn't stop some items becoming part of the evidence.

    Which then opens up the question what are in those messages / letters / minutes that need to be hidden? Is it things about Brexit as TSE alludes to below, outright corruption in getting PPE supplies or something else..

    It can't just be Bozo having friends round in Chequers?
    I have no idea why government business is conducted over what's app and it seems like an accident waiting to happen

    It certainly gives an impression of a cover up which in turn results in all kinds of speculation

    Just provide the information and trust the judge to decide
    It is conducted over whatsapp because whatsapp is very easy to use and our cabinet are and have been a bunch of lazy and entitled toddlers for the last few years.
    I very much doubt this is confined to conservative cabinet ministers and mps

    I would expect most politicians across the political divide use what's app
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.

  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,983
    Mexicanpete said:

    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) and it's squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

    I heard Lord Stuart Rose on a news program yesterday describing a proposed government policy of price fixing basic foodstuffs as '...completely barking mad...simply ridiculous....' at which point the interviewer interrupted and said 'so you think this government have got it wrong?"

    'Well I AM a Conservative..'

    I think we're all beginning to get a clearer idea what BEING a Conservative is and it goes beyond independent thought and into the realm of religion as you've just delicately pointed out.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 63,657
    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,546
    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    His attempt to embarrass Cameron, over alleged Tory nonces, in 2012, now seems more than a little hypocritical.
  • MiklosvarMiklosvar Posts: 1,855
    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Students of karma are counting the days till Timothy Schofield says: "I no longer have a brother."
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    edited May 2023
    Foxy said:

    ydoethur said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    DavidL said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Yes. I think the problem is how on earth is a government supposed to speak to each other informally and off the record if things like WhatsApp are going to be examined in this way. In times past most of such conversations would have been on the phone or in person but now there is an electronic trail that can be followed to see what Ministers "really" thought.

    My guess is that there will be a lot of sarcasm, black humour, raw politics, profound ignorance and idiotic questions in this material. I can fully see why there is some apprehension about this going to an independent inquiry and depending on them to redact the embarrassing but irrelevant stuff.

    One consequence of this is that government communications will lose some of the efficiencies that come with more modern technologies as they revert to less recoverable methods of speaking to each other.
    If you were prosecuting senior figures in an imaginary political party in Scotland, say for example, massive financial impropriety, wouldn't you as prosecutor expect to see all channels of communication that bolster your case to have been reviewed? You would ignore the gossip and tittle tattle, but be more than interested in the "I've syphoned off the cash I need to buy the motor cruiser (to exclusively use for party events) squirrelled away in my sock drawer".

    Now I understand my scenario is pure fiction but you can understand why I am suggesting viewing the electronic "paper" trail is pertinent to any review of facts. Perhaps logging events on WhatsApp isn't ideal as a tool of government.

    The whole point is that the inquiry shouldn’t be trying to prosecute individuals, it should be trying to lead the country in the right direction for the next emergency.
    I don't think it is, is it? They are legitimately trying to get to see communications that took place during that time that are now being refused. The government hasn't used the usual "national security" defence, so one has to conclude that it is highly politically embarrassing, along the lines of TSE's suggestion. Perhaps The Clown has said that he knew all along that Brexit was pointless? It wouldn't be surprising, and presumably because it was on WhatsApp the Clown thought he would be immune from FoI requests.

    Whoever thought it a good idea to make someone as inappropriate as Boris Johnson our PM FFS?!
    The Conservative Party.

    It is rather striking that the only Tory leader elected by the wider party membership that hasn’t proved both manifestly the wrong choice and a total disaster was Cameron in 2005. And he was at best a mixed success.

    William Hague has a lot to answer for.
    Not just the Tory party making this error. Party fanatics picking unsuitable leaders seems to be the rule rather than the exception.
    Not so much with Labour, oddly. It was the PLP elected Foot, and you could make a case that Kinnock, Smith, Blair and Starmer were all the best choices while Miliband if with hindsight not a success wasn't necessarily a grade A catastrophe or even obviously inferior to the other candidates (admittedly in rather a weak field).

    Corbyn, twice, I will give you.

    And the SNP, Plaid and even the Liberal Democrats have made some funny choices in the past.

    But the Tory wider membership consistently makes not just the wrong choice but clearly a disastrous choice. It was obvious Johnson, Truss and Smith were inferior to Hunt, Sunak and Clarke for the role they were choosing and simply not up to it - but they still chose them.

    Striking that the Tories were always considered arch-pragmatists. Clearly that may be true of the MPs but it isn't true of the majority of the ordinary members.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,504
    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.
    And you keep on saying that, and you ignore that there were other panics as well: like, for instance, the later lockdowns.

    The government was pretty much in panic from March 2020 to March 2021. As were all of us. We needed PPE. Which would have been okay, except virtually every other country in the world needed PPE.
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 22,415
    EPG said:

    williamglenn said:

    CorrectHorseBat said:



    @williamglenn do you think this image is a lie or not?

    If "is" can mean "is in the process of" then it's not a lie and it was true that at the time, the prospect of accelerating the accession process was dangled before Turkey.

    Even if you think it was never likely to happen, the ad was fair game for a political campaign. Cameron could have said he would veto it, but it didn't because it would have contradicted British policy.
    If "is" can mean "is in the process of" then we are all dead.
    "-ing" means in the process of so we are all dying, we are not all dead.

    Do you say that a dead person is dying? No, a dead person is already dead, only living people are dying.

    Turkey hadn't joined the EU. It was joining the EU. That is a matter of fact, joining is a process and it was in that process and was having rounds of accession talks and agreements with one taking place the week before the referendum.
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,468
    noneoftheabove said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    eek said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    Mexicanpete said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    I fear this covid inquiry is going to be a massive ****-up. Too many people have already made up their minds either way, and will spend months and years examining in minute details decisions that ministers and others had hours or days to reach on imperfect data.

    And whilst it will be used as a way to get at those who had to make decisions (rightly or wrongly), it will end up doing f-all to what we need it to do: to ensure we can improve our decision-making process if faced with such a situation in the future.

    Best to just call the whole thing off then?

    My view fwiw, is if there is a criticism it is it will take far too long to report.
    Good morning

    It appears that evidence will conclude in 2026 so it looks as if it could he 2027 or later before the final report

    Kicking into touch comes to mind
    It's not the final report they are worried about - it's things that may be within the evidence if the cabinet office doesn't stop some items becoming part of the evidence.

    Which then opens up the question what are in those messages / letters / minutes that need to be hidden? Is it things about Brexit as TSE alludes to below, outright corruption in getting PPE supplies or something else..

    It can't just be Bozo having friends round in Chequers?
    I have no idea why government business is conducted over what's app and it seems like an accident waiting to happen

    It certainly gives an impression of a cover up which in turn results in all kinds of speculation

    Just provide the information and trust the judge to decide
    It is conducted over whatsapp because whatsapp is very easy to use and our cabinet are and have been a bunch of lazy and entitled toddlers for the last few years.
    Wasn't this a tendency introduced by Cummings? Don't use the official communication channels (gov emails and whatnot) because of the risk that... those messages could fall into the wrong hands. Civil servants and judges, for example.
  • WestieWestie Posts: 426
    edited May 2023
    Might be worth observing that Simon Case is the least experienced civil service chief in modern times. He was the youngest for more than a century...and he's the first for half a century to be appointed to the Privy Council while still in post. A friend in high places? :-)


  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 28,972
    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.

    Also, there does seem to be a desperate attempt to blanket all of these deals together like they are all the same.

    They are not.

    It looks awful that Tory mates were awarded £107m contracts without tender. But if they actually delivered the PPE then they did at least do the job. And they made a fat profit? Meh - had the same fat profit been made by the proper PPE companies ignored by government we would have spent similar amounts.

    No, the scandal is where mates were awarded these 9-figure contracts, delivered nothing, and took the money anyway. So that's our money, stolen, and nothing in return. Some of these spiv outfits are now hastily being wound up to avoid publishing accounts.

    The right get *incensed* when a single mother gets too many social security payments. Yet when its billions they are only angry at those of us asking the questions.

    Why is that...?
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    Westie said:

    Might be worth observing that Simon Case is the least experienced civil service chief in modern times. He's also the only one for half a century to have been appointed to the Privy Council while still in post. A friend in high places? :-)


    He was Prince William's private secretary.
  • WestieWestie Posts: 426
    ydoethur said:

    Westie said:

    Might be worth observing that Simon Case is the least experienced civil service chief in modern times. He's also the only one for half a century to have been appointed to the Privy Council while still in post. A friend in high places? :-)

    He was Prince William's private secretary.
    Indeed. And who okayed that appointment?
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,504
    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 28,972
    JosiasJessop said:

    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.
    And you keep on saying that, and you ignore that there were other panics as well: like, for instance, the later lockdowns.

    The government was pretty much in panic from March 2020 to March 2021. As were all of us. We needed PPE. Which would have been okay, except virtually every other country in the world needed PPE.
    So why - when mates rates fail to deliver usable PPE - do we not claw back the money? Any boiler plate contract for anything has clauses about delivery - unless you are a mate of a Tory minister.

    I am not that bothered about the lining of pockets where actually usable PPE was delivered. I am bothered when it was not - and we paid anyway. They have stolen - and it is stolen as they did not fulfil the contract - YOUR money. And you are fine with it. Why is that?
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,504
    RochdalePioneers said:

    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.

    Also, there does seem to be a desperate attempt to blanket all of these deals together like they are all the same.

    They are not.

    It looks awful that Tory mates were awarded £107m contracts without tender. But if they actually delivered the PPE then they did at least do the job. And they made a fat profit? Meh - had the same fat profit been made by the proper PPE companies ignored by government we would have spent similar amounts.

    No, the scandal is where mates were awarded these 9-figure contracts, delivered nothing, and took the money anyway. So that's our money, stolen, and nothing in return. Some of these spiv outfits are now hastily being wound up to avoid publishing accounts.

    The right get *incensed* when a single mother gets too many social security payments. Yet when its billions they are only angry at those of us asking the questions.

    Why is that...?
    It appears we don't need an inquiry, as you already know the truth... ;)
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 78,415
    JosiasJessop said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
    I'd guess Schofield votes conservative. Anyway it's simply a good old fashioned kicking of a fallen hero going on. Cathartic.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 11,491
    JosiasJessop said:

    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.
    And you keep on saying that, and you ignore that there were other panics as well: like, for instance, the later lockdowns.

    The government was pretty much in panic from March 2020 to March 2021. As were all of us. We needed PPE. Which would have been okay, except virtually every other country in the world needed PPE.
    Panic in March 2020, yes, but that had largely subsided by, say, August.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    edited May 2023
    Westie said:

    ydoethur said:

    Westie said:

    Might be worth observing that Simon Case is the least experienced civil service chief in modern times. He's also the only one for half a century to have been appointed to the Privy Council while still in post. A friend in high places? :-)

    He was Prince William's private secretary.
    Indeed. And who okayed that appointment?
    I presumed it was William. If you know better feel free to tell me who it really was.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,504
    RochdalePioneers said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.
    And you keep on saying that, and you ignore that there were other panics as well: like, for instance, the later lockdowns.

    The government was pretty much in panic from March 2020 to March 2021. As were all of us. We needed PPE. Which would have been okay, except virtually every other country in the world needed PPE.
    So why - when mates rates fail to deliver usable PPE - do we not claw back the money? Any boiler plate contract for anything has clauses about delivery - unless you are a mate of a Tory minister.

    I am not that bothered about the lining of pockets where actually usable PPE was delivered. I am bothered when it was not - and we paid anyway. They have stolen - and it is stolen as they did not fulfil the contract - YOUR money. And you are fine with it. Why is that?
    We desperately needed PPE and were willing to try anything to get it - just look at some of the companies *Labour* politicians were asking us to use as an example. If we had used normal procurement channels we would still be waiting - and people like Dr Foxy would have been placed in more danger.

    The nearest parallel is a war. We were in a war, and we had to make decisions fast, with massive competition worldwide for a limited resource. There was waste, and there were charlatans. But the primary need was to get the kit. And we did - in fact, we ended up with too much. True fraudsters should be prosecuted.

    It'd be interesting to know the percentages of all of this: how much was spent; how much was delivered, how much was usable etc. I think I've seen it somewhere before, but cannot immediately find it.

    As I've said all through this hideous mess - I'm glad I'm not the one who had to make the decisions.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 11,491
    BartholomewRoberts said:

    EPG said:

    williamglenn said:

    CorrectHorseBat said:



    @williamglenn do you think this image is a lie or not?

    If "is" can mean "is in the process of" then it's not a lie and it was true that at the time, the prospect of accelerating the accession process was dangled before Turkey.

    Even if you think it was never likely to happen, the ad was fair game for a political campaign. Cameron could have said he would veto it, but it didn't because it would have contradicted British policy.
    If "is" can mean "is in the process of" then we are all dead.
    "-ing" means in the process of so we are all dying, we are not all dead.

    Do you say that a dead person is dying? No, a dead person is already dead, only living people are dying.

    Turkey hadn't joined the EU. It was joining the EU. That is a matter of fact, joining is a process and it was in that process and was having rounds of accession talks and agreements with one taking place the week before the referendum.
    Turkey was going through a process to try to join the EU. It was applying to join. But it hadn’t and has never had agreement that it definitely will join. Ergo, “joining” is misleading.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 51,152
    Westie said:

    ydoethur said:

    Westie said:

    Might be worth observing that Simon Case is the least experienced civil service chief in modern times. He's also the only one for half a century to have been appointed to the Privy Council while still in post. A friend in high places? :-)

    He was Prince William's private secretary.
    Indeed. And who okayed that appointment?
    The other point not mentioned is that the WhatsApp groups in question included permanent officials. Given the results of the Downing Street “Party” enquiries, my guess is that a very large number of permanent officials don’t want this stuff released, either.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,145
    Pulpstar said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
    I'd guess Schofield votes conservative. Anyway it's simply a good old fashioned kicking of a fallen hero going on. Cathartic.
    Nothing the media enjoy more than trashing the competition. See Murdoch on the BBC passim.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,081
    JosiasJessop said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
    As I understand it, PS had an affair with a much younger man while married; this came out a year or so back but was batted away by his PR deflecting the story onto him being gay. I wonder if there was a feeling in the media that he'd got away with it, and so with the story coming round again the pile-on is all the greater.
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,468
    JosiasJessop said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
    What's the overlap between the This Morning audience and the Mail's readership? I could imagine it being fairly substantial.

    In which case, the Mail are doing one of the things good journalism does- finding about about something important in the lives of their readers. But also something bad journalism does- doing down a commercial rival (for advertising, if nothing else).

    See also: newspaper crusades against WFH.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 28,972
    JosiasJessop said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.
    And you keep on saying that, and you ignore that there were other panics as well: like, for instance, the later lockdowns.

    The government was pretty much in panic from March 2020 to March 2021. As were all of us. We needed PPE. Which would have been okay, except virtually every other country in the world needed PPE.
    So why - when mates rates fail to deliver usable PPE - do we not claw back the money? Any boiler plate contract for anything has clauses about delivery - unless you are a mate of a Tory minister.

    I am not that bothered about the lining of pockets where actually usable PPE was delivered. I am bothered when it was not - and we paid anyway. They have stolen - and it is stolen as they did not fulfil the contract - YOUR money. And you are fine with it. Why is that?
    We desperately needed PPE and were willing to try anything to get it - just look at some of the companies *Labour* politicians were asking us to use as an example. If we had used normal procurement channels we would still be waiting - and people like Dr Foxy would have been placed in more danger.

    The nearest parallel is a war. We were in a war, and we had to make decisions fast, with massive competition worldwide for a limited resource. There was waste, and there were charlatans. But the primary need was to get the kit. And we did - in fact, we ended up with too much. True fraudsters should be prosecuted.

    It'd be interesting to know the percentages of all of this: how much was spent; how much was delivered, how much was usable etc. I think I've seen it somewhere before, but cannot immediately find it.

    As I've said all through this hideous mess - I'm glad I'm not the one who had to make the decisions.
    We're largely in agreement. I want the fraudsters done over. And the people who enabled the fraudsters.

    Your war analogy is interesting though. It was a war, and we had established generals (PPE companies) with a track record of fighting wars.

    We ignored them. And rang our mate who had heard of war but never done it. And put him in charge of fighting our war.

    I'm not voting Labour so the whataboutery doesn't work on me. The government ignored the actual PPE companies and bet our lives on Lady Mone and Matt Hancocks pub landlord...
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 22,415
    edited May 2023
    bondegezou said:

    BartholomewRoberts said:

    EPG said:

    williamglenn said:

    CorrectHorseBat said:



    @williamglenn do you think this image is a lie or not?

    If "is" can mean "is in the process of" then it's not a lie and it was true that at the time, the prospect of accelerating the accession process was dangled before Turkey.

    Even if you think it was never likely to happen, the ad was fair game for a political campaign. Cameron could have said he would veto it, but it didn't because it would have contradicted British policy.
    If "is" can mean "is in the process of" then we are all dead.
    "-ing" means in the process of so we are all dying, we are not all dead.

    Do you say that a dead person is dying? No, a dead person is already dead, only living people are dying.

    Turkey hadn't joined the EU. It was joining the EU. That is a matter of fact, joining is a process and it was in that process and was having rounds of accession talks and agreements with one taking place the week before the referendum.
    Turkey was going through a process to try to join the EU. It was applying to join. But it hadn’t and has never had agreement that it definitely will join. Ergo, “joining” is misleading.
    Joining is not misleading. It was an official accession country, accepted by the EU (like now Ukraine and unlike say Georgia) and listed on their own website as a nation that was in the process of joining the EU, which as they say is a complex process that does not happen overnight.

    If joining the EU only referred to the date of accession, then it would happen overnight, but the EU explicitly say that is not the case.

    Indeed if you go to the "joining EU" webpage of the EU's own website, Turkiye as its now called is still listed on that webpage.

    https://european-union.europa.eu/principles-countries-history/joining-eu_en
  • TazTaz Posts: 15,049
    edited May 2023
    Cookie said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
    As I understand it, PS had an affair with a much younger man while married; this came out a year or so back but was batted away by his PR deflecting the story onto him being gay. I wonder if there was a feeling in the media that he'd got away with it, and so with the story coming round again the pile-on is all the greater.
    He also met the person he had an affair with when they were a minor. Now there is no suggestion at all anything untoward happened until he was above the age of consent but this has led to allegations of grooming.

    A female presenter on Coast met her partner when she taught him at school, as a minor. Barely a murmur about that at the time. Favourable articles in the Mail. So there are some double standards at play.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2146126/Tessa-Dunlop-Presenter-TVs-Coast-tells-extraordinary-story-met-husband.html

    There is also the issue with his brother and Pip reportedly telling his brother not to do it again when his brother admitted his noncing activities to him instead of engaging Plod.

    All rather sordid. I do think Queuegate is the thing that led to his downfall.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 13,215
    Stuartinromford said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
    What's the overlap between the This Morning audience and the Mail's readership? I could imagine it being fairly substantial.

    In which case, the Mail are doing one of the things good journalism does- finding about about something important in the lives of their readers. But also something bad journalism does- doing down a commercial rival (for advertising, if nothing else).

    See also: newspaper crusades against WFH.
    Good point. I’d not considered the commercial rivalry angle.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 78,415
    Cookie said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Big_G_NorthWales said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    Taz said:

    Sean_F said:

    Nigel_Foremain said:

    Cicero said:

    IanB2 said:

    Meanwhile in the Mail: AI 'could wipe out humanity'

    Any kind of intelligence would wipe out the Daily Mail... their coverage of This Morning is bordering on the ludicrous today.
    I haven't been following it is detail because it like most DM stories is so puerile, but I can't help thinking that the Daily Mail obsession with this is just a thinly disguised excuse to cause outrage amongst it's largely homophobic readership
    Schofield’s behaviour, however, has been awful.
    As has that of ITV in how they dealt with it. Numerous people have come out of the woodwork, not with wisdom after the event, but to say they had made official complaints or representations about it.

    I suspect the beginning of the end for Pip was the queue jumping.

    I am not sure, however, this is a matter for politicians seeing they are hauling in ITV to interrogate them over it.
    The Heil are going after him because culture wars. He is yet another TV leftie* who comes over all sanctimonious. Instead of telling people Common Sense things like "isn't Boris great" and "the police should reopen currygate", he sits there with his heart on his sleeve with "I am gay" and people being sympathetic to his deviance.

    I honestly don't care about This Morning or Schofield. What he allegedly has done sounds a little *interestng* morally, but we all live in the same greenhouse armed with stones. What IS interesting is the reaction from the right, who are going after him like he is Rolf Harris. He isn't, but the Heil readership have been induced to be so judgemental that they're lapping it up.

    *anyone who isn't a GBeebies presenter is a TV leftie
    Sky have been leading on the Schofield story ad infinitum
    I get the impression that Schofield might just have upset a few other people in the media in the past. Both in front of, and behind, the camera.

    It's quite simple: what he did should have got him sacked much earlier than it did. It also highlights (sadly, yet again) a problem in the media, with the 'talent' abusing their position and power. And my goodness, the optics of it are terrible for him.
    As I understand it, PS had an affair with a much younger man while married; this came out a year or so back but was batted away by his PR deflecting the story onto him being gay. I wonder if there was a feeling in the media that he'd got away with it, and so with the story coming round again the pile-on is all the greater.
    I think he's possibly had injunctions, super-injunctions and definitely NDAs about the relationship so he'll have pissed off plenty of journos about a (Well certainly in my eyes) legitimate story.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 43,504
    RochdalePioneers said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.
    And you keep on saying that, and you ignore that there were other panics as well: like, for instance, the later lockdowns.

    The government was pretty much in panic from March 2020 to March 2021. As were all of us. We needed PPE. Which would have been okay, except virtually every other country in the world needed PPE.
    So why - when mates rates fail to deliver usable PPE - do we not claw back the money? Any boiler plate contract for anything has clauses about delivery - unless you are a mate of a Tory minister.

    I am not that bothered about the lining of pockets where actually usable PPE was delivered. I am bothered when it was not - and we paid anyway. They have stolen - and it is stolen as they did not fulfil the contract - YOUR money. And you are fine with it. Why is that?
    We desperately needed PPE and were willing to try anything to get it - just look at some of the companies *Labour* politicians were asking us to use as an example. If we had used normal procurement channels we would still be waiting - and people like Dr Foxy would have been placed in more danger.

    The nearest parallel is a war. We were in a war, and we had to make decisions fast, with massive competition worldwide for a limited resource. There was waste, and there were charlatans. But the primary need was to get the kit. And we did - in fact, we ended up with too much. True fraudsters should be prosecuted.

    It'd be interesting to know the percentages of all of this: how much was spent; how much was delivered, how much was usable etc. I think I've seen it somewhere before, but cannot immediately find it.

    As I've said all through this hideous mess - I'm glad I'm not the one who had to make the decisions.
    We're largely in agreement. I want the fraudsters done over. And the people who enabled the fraudsters.

    Your war analogy is interesting though. It was a war, and we had established generals (PPE companies) with a track record of fighting wars.

    We ignored them. And rang our mate who had heard of war but never done it. And put him in charge of fighting our war.

    I'm not voting Labour so the whataboutery doesn't work on me. The government ignored the actual PPE companies and bet our lives on Lady Mone and Matt Hancocks pub landlord...
    Did we ignore the 'established' generals? I assume these were the 'generals' Labour were going on about?

    In which case, I might ask how CQM Learning was an 'established general' in the PPE market. Or Issa Exchange Ltd (and those are just two from Labour's press release).

    The latter looks particularly interesting if you look at their 202 accounts...
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,772
    JosiasJessop said:

    RochdalePioneers said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Foxy said:

    JosiasJessop said:

    Nigelb said:

    PPE contracts ?
    A digital paper trail might be extraordinarily embarrassing.

    I would hope that any criticism other PPE contracts might also include lists of companies that MPs from other parties criticised the government for not taking. You know, for context.

    Like the following:
    https://labour.org.uk/press/dozens-of-companies-offering-ppe-ignored-by-government-labour-reveals/

    We should not lose sight of exactly how desperate things were at the time.
    People saying this ignore the fact that many of these sweetheart deals for mates were signed well after the initial wave panic.
    And you keep on saying that, and you ignore that there were other panics as well: like, for instance, the later lockdowns.

    The government was pretty much in panic from March 2020 to March 2021. As were all of us. We needed PPE. Which would have been okay, except virtually every other country in the world needed PPE.
    So why - when mates rates fail to deliver usable PPE - do we not claw back the money? Any boiler plate contract for anything has clauses about delivery - unless you are a mate of a Tory minister.

    I am not that bothered about the lining of pockets where actually usable PPE was delivered. I am bothered when it was not - and we paid anyway. They have stolen - and it is stolen as they did not fulfil the contract - YOUR money. And you are fine with it. Why is that?
    We desperately needed PPE and were willing to try anything to get it - just look at some of the companies *Labour* politicians were asking us to use as an example. If we had used normal procurement channels we would still be waiting - and people like Dr Foxy would have been placed in more danger.

    The nearest parallel is a war. We were in a war, and we had to make decisions fast, with massive competition worldwide for a limited resource. There was waste, and there were charlatans. But the primary need was to get the kit. And we did - in fact, we ended up with too much. True fraudsters should be prosecuted.

    It'd be interesting to know the percentages of all of this: how much was spent; how much was delivered, how much was usable etc. I think I've seen it somewhere before, but cannot immediately find it.

    As I've said all through this hideous mess - I'm glad I'm not the one who had to make the decisions.
    Johnson wanted to be PM. Wanted it so much he destroyed the careers of many others to make it happen.

    If he didn't want the decision making that came with it, he shouldn't have done that.
This discussion has been closed.