Even CON voters think that ministers should provide all the COVID-19 messages – politicalbetting.com
Even CON voters think that ministers should provide all the COVID-19 messages – politicalbetting.com
The big UK political story concerns the effort by the COVID 19 inquiry into getting access to the WhatsApp accounts of leading politicians on what happened during the period when it was at its most rampant.
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Well.
The Cabinet Office has warned Boris Johnson it will pull public funding for his legal advice for the Covid inquiry if he “undermines the government’s position” or releases evidence without permission.
Government lawyers wrote to Johnson last week saying money would “cease to be available” if he broke any of their conditions.
These include the requirement to co-operate with any “reasonable” demand and to send them his witness statements and any requested documents for pre-approval and redaction before they are submitted to the inquiry.
The advice puts the former prime minister on a collision course with officials, with experts suggesting that he may have already breached some of its provisions.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/boris-johnson-covid-inquiry-funding-cut-k03r96mws
https://twitter.com/paddypower/status/1665032923634978817/photo/1
https://twitter.com/HillsboroughSu1/status/1665043289660174338
But for it to now threaten Johnson for *co-operating* with an enquiry which it actually set up, is like something from a tinpot Latin American dictatorship.
Simon Case and Rishi Sunak.
GET RID.
Wearing a t-shirt in public saying "97 - Not Enough" is despicable, and there is a case for thinking it should be against the law, and a case for thinking it's against existing law, but it is not a provocation of violence. Little good is gained from the kind of warped thought that leads to such conclusions.
Meanwhile: It's true about landlords, though. What's the problem?
Third poll since the calling of the GE. All 3 polling companies showing a bigger poll lead for the PP over the PSOEthan their predecessors. Equally, no suggestion yet that there will be an absolute majority. Without some dramatic changes the early signs suggest the socilaist calling a quick GE after the local polling defeat is not working to thier advantage, with no possibility of a Centre Left Coalition.
On the anniversary of the Kingsmill Massacre (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingsmill_massacre) a Sein Fein politician tweeted a picture of a loaf of Kingsmill bread balanced on his head*.
The NI police said that it was harmless banter plus there was no evidence that it referred to anything.
*yes, they are fucking weird in NI
I don't think he should be arrested for it - thrown out of the stadium, banned from attending any future football matches and barred by any reputable pubs should be sufficient sanction in a free society.
The reality is that it is not beyond reasonable doubt because you haven't spoken to him. He is innocent until it goes to court and he is convicted.
I just find it interesting that an insult to the victims of a sectarian massacre isn’t fitting words as well.
I really cannot believe anyone could be so crass
If he is a United supporter he needs a life ban
The law is wrong on this. It needs repealing
for instance, if it were relevant in an English trial, you would have to call evidence to show that Freddie Mercury was the lead singer of Queen*. If I claim that FM was in fact the singer on Bohemian Rhapsody, are you going to dispute that?
*Unless judicial notice had been taken of the fact by a superior court in a previous case.
I am arguing that if a person uses their free speech to behave in such a way - and this would include similar references to the Munich disaster, say - then other people would be justified in using their freedom not to allow such a person to attend football matches, or use licensed premises.
If you repeatedly insult me, then free speech means that you don't go to jail for that, but it doesn't mean that I'm not allowed to tell you to piss off and exercise my right never to associate with you ever again.
In this NI case, I think the doubt about the direct allusion to one particular set of killings in its unfortunate history would be much more reasonable to assert, as would (say) tweeting about Miami Vice on the anniversary of the Miami Showband killings, whereas it would be much harder to create a custom-made shirt favourable to Bloody Sunday and pass it off as reasonable behaviour outwith intention to intimidate or provoke violence.
Most people do, actually, have respect for the law, lawyers and judges. Those of us not in your ivory tower know that. If you got down from your comfortable middle class existence and spoke to some real people you’d realise that.
If I stood outside a synagogue wearing a t-shirt that said “Six Million. Not enough”, I could expect to be arrested PDQ.
quote
"As approval of the police declines, so does Britons’ confidence in the police’s ability to deal with crime in their local area. The proportion of Britons saying they have ‘a great deal’ or ‘a fair amount’ of confidence in the police’s ability to tackle local crime now sits at 43%, and around half (47%) of the public now have ‘not very much confidence’ or ‘no confidence at all’ in the police"
source https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2022/03/15/confidence-police-sinks-two-years
I know two solicitors, both struck off for embezzling sums in the hundreds of thousands, who have never been prosecuted.
A chap I knew had a quad bike stolen from his property. It was in a shed, being repaired. When stolen the two thieves got a certain distance before a nasty crash.
The police investigated thoroughly.
Him, for the alleged claim that he’d booby trapped the quad bike to deliberately target thieves.
Compare, btw, the failed Scottish legislation much decried by PBTory/Unionists at the time, to ban singing of songs about, for instance, murdering people of the same religion and/or nationality as a lot of the opposing fans.
It’s about due process. Governments can fail to follow due process in two ways: by prosecuting and convicting on flimsy evidence and cutting corners, and persecuting particular groups based on people “looking dodgy”; or by failing to investigate and prosecute actual crimes because they can’t be arsed. Both are wrong.
Someone nicks your car? Investigate it, carry it through to a conclusion, use the resources and data available to you, and thereby deter future crime. Someone embezzles a load of money from their employer or helps out with a fraudulent transaction, but speaks nicely? Investigate them, prosecute them, bring the full force of the law down on them.
Someone is hanging around on the street looking a bit dodgy? Leave them alone unless you have a real legal basis to stop them.
https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1665022137730572292
And it doesn't matter if it's not true- actually, quite a lot of things work remarkably well. Neither does it matter that many of the problems don't have much to do with the government in general or Rishi Sunak in particular.
He's going to cop the blame. After all, one of the (probably genuine) Brexit benefits is giving the British voter one unambiguous target for their ire.
If you're that sort of person (and I really hope you are just bragging), then what other offensive things might trigger you?
But since when did we arrest people for that?
In this country, if you return the money, or obtain an IVA, the police will say “it’s a civil matter.”
Worse, I knew a financial adviser who stole £14m, and he served 42 months in open prisons.
97 - not enough
Implausible, may be, but can it be ruled out?
She quickly removed her hand and apologised. I heard one officer tell his colleagues to get the names of anyone filming.
I explained I was a journalist but I was then asked repeatedly for my date of birth, I again explained that I was a reporter and one officer apologised to me.
Then another tried to read my notebook - clearly suspicious I had some kind of relevant information (I did not).
https://news.sky.com/story/epsom-derby-nineteen-people-arrested-over-plans-to-disrupt-race-festival-as-protester-runs-on-reace-course-12895476
Rishi Sunak is facing a barrage of criticism in the run-up to the official Covid-19 inquiry as a leading scientist attacks his “spectacularly stupid” eat out to help out scheme, which is believed to have caused a sudden rise in cases of the virus.
The prime minister’s role as chancellor during the pandemic is under increasing scrutiny – as is that of his predecessor at No 10, Boris Johnson – in an escalating Covid blame game at Westminster as Lady Hallett prepares to open her investigation into the government’s pandemic response later this month.
The president of the British Medical Association, Prof Martin McKee, also criticises the “dysfunctional” way in which the government, including the Treasury under Sunak, overlooked scientific advice throughout the pandemic.....
....This weekend, there are signs that while Johnson will be firmly in Hallett’s sights, so, too, will Sunak – particularly over the way the Treasury failed to involve scientists in decisions and the formulation of policy. Hallett has already sent questions to Johnson asking if scientific evidence and opinion was sought before eat out to help out was launched, which appears not to have been the case.
Speaking to the Observer, Prof John Edmunds of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, who was a member of the Sage committee of advisers to ministers and who has submitted written evidence to the inquiry, said the controversial eat out to help out scheme – which gave people discounts for eating in restaurants and pubs – was never discussed with scientists.
“If we had [been consulted], I would have been clear what I thought about it,” said Edmunds. “As far as I am concerned, it was a spectacularly stupid idea and an obscene way to spend public money.”
Eat out to help out was launched in August 2020. It allowed diners to claim 50% off more than 160m meals at a cost to the Treasury of about £850m. In the process, it also drove new Covid-19 infections up by between 8 and 17%, according to one study carried out a few weeks later.
In his recently published book Johnson at 10: The Inside Story, Anthony Seldon says that the then health secretary, Matt Hancock, first found about the scheme when he read a press release about it. Asked to comment on the claim on Saturday, Hancock’s spokesperson did not deny the account but said he was unable to comment before the inquiry.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/jun/03/sunak-under-fire-as-stupid-eat-out-to-help-out-scheme-to-be-focus-of-covid-inquiry?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
If he could (and I have my doubts) show any track record of political activity…
"You must still not visit family or friends inside their homes or in their gardens unless you’ve formed a social bubble with them.
You cannot stay overnight in another person’s home, unless you’ve formed a bubble with them
You cannot meet up with anyone from outside your household inside a café, bar or restaurant."
Yet EOTHO still went ahead here. I remember driving home via the London Road restaurant strip and seeing queues outside each.
I suspect Whitty or someone at Dept of Health would have objected tbh and Rishi probably ignored them.
Another critical decision set to be investigated by Hallett was made in September 2020, when the government was urged by Sage to impose a mini-lockdown to dampen rising case numbers, with both Johnson and Sunak opposing the move. “I said then that the question was either do it now and get on top of the epidemic and keep it under control, or be forced into doing it in a few weeks’ time, by which time the epidemic will be much worse,” Edmunds said. “There will be many more hospitalisations and deaths, and you will have to take more stringent action. Unfortunately that is exactly what happened.”
Here's some of the publicity from August 2020. It doesn't exactly need Sherlock Holmes to work out whose policy it was.
(It was a decent plan for when COVID was Definitely Tamed. Which, despite wishful thinking and Oxford epidemiology, wasn't August 2020.)
SAGE models were too 'scary' and held too much weight... says lockdown architect behind them!
No10 Covid expert admits death forecasts were 'eye watering' and should have considered economy
Professor John Edmunds said Covid models were only supposed to be 'one component' of decision-making
He accepted models failed to account for the economic and health harms that Covid lockdowns caused
SAGE member admitted these harms 'in principle' could have been factored in 'but in practice they were not
I see the grubby hand of Simon Case in all this. He's the common link, and has rather a lot to hide about how he managed the conduct of Government at that time. I suspect he prevailed on Sunak to back the JR on a pretty bogus "chilling effect on free discussion basis". And Sunak, being actually really bad ad judging the optics of these kinds of things, said "okay, Simon".
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/4419058#Comment_4419058