In regards to lockdowns, yesterday 24 days into their lockdown there were still well over 4000 new cases in Italy. Now I know that means the percentage increase is low, but that is still 4000+ new infections when people haven’t been out for 24 days.
The Italians had a different definition of "lockdown" in the early days
OT Pluralsight's online IT/computing courses are free in April and after 30 seconds' examination, I cannot see a catch since no credit card or other payment information is required (normally I'd worry about automatic rollover to a charged option after the free period). There is a warning that enrolment might not be processed for hours, suggesting this is a popular offer. https://www.pluralsight.com/offer/2020/free-april-month
Some people can not comprehend an event that doesn’t have binary blame for the bad outcome. The same people think it is the job of the government to insure them against any event.
I see the right-wing headbangers are marching in force this morning. I shall gracefully retire therefore.
Rant and rave all you like on here but you've lost this argument so you're wasting your energy. Even the tory press have called the Government to account.
As I say, I'm currently broadly supportive of the Gov't but lying about their crass mistakes demeans the integrity of your posting both now and in the future.
Have a good day everyone.
xx
Not at all Rose, the argument has at least now moved on. At least they are not all embarrassing themselves with their China bashing.
When all this is over you should take Rose on a wonderful holiday to Wuhan and sample the local cuisine.
Planes and airports - way higher. Ubers. Also, hotels with aircon.
So sporting events singled out as they are highly visible and happen to someone else rather than because of their contribution to the spread compared to daily activities everyone participated in.
It very nicely describes the risks associated with different environments and also, importantly, emphasises that when outside the amount of live virus (as opposed to fragments) will probably not be enough to infect. The difference would be places where people congregate (e.g., supermarket queues) or settings where people are very close to one another. It also touches on the mask debate.
Plus as you say, now is not the time to be seen to be making party political attacks on the PM.
On the contrary. Now is exactly the time to highlight the PM's recent blunders before he just bumbles along into his next one. If an effective LOTO had existed a few weeks back and said "Cheltenham? Are you mad? Of course it must not go ahead" then we would probably has less cases of the bug.
Several PBer's said, at the time, that allowing Cheltenham was madness
Not at all Rose, the argument has at least now moved on. At least they are not all embarrassing themselves with their China bashing.
When all this is over you should take Rose on a wonderful holiday to Wuhan and sample the local cuisine.
"Sorry, pangolin's off...."
To justify China bashing by saying the alternative is defending them is rubbish.
I’m no lover or defender of China today. I don’t see them as communist, Marxist, or particularly Maoist anymore. They have no consciousness of consumerism, no fair industrial relations, democracy, human rights. After the USA they have the most millionaires and billionaires in the world. But no unions are allowed. Workers sweat for slave wages to undercut western jobs and take home barely enough for their families, yet turn up to factory Monday, gates locked that’s the end of their livelihoods. China is capitalist. The culture is market place. Rhino’s hunted to extinction for horns for that market place, for quack ancient medicines and aphrodisiacs. But mixed with their excessive nationalism, contempt for democracy and basic human rights China is the most corrupt and contemptible capitalist nation on earth. A capitalist dictatorship. And they have been playing a game with us for years. Beautifully scripted. The investment in military, the nuclear subs, the nukes. The IPR theft. The materiel investment throughout the world, bridges and other gifts not just across the developing nations, but cHinckley point, U.K. 5g. The siren calls to help out with HS2. And best part of their plan, the new Silk Road being built between China and here, not so much to finish off U’k as manufacturing nation, though this road surely will, not so much to stack goods on shop shelves, as the road will butcher British high street, but when you click for what you want online, and the delivery comes, it will be from those slave factories in China along that super fast Silk Road.
The Shadow chancellor made exactly this point at the dispatch box, stop cuddling up to these scoundrels, do we really need to? the governments response was hysterical.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
In regards to lockdowns, yesterday 24 days into their lockdown there were still well over 4000 new cases in Italy. Now I know that means the percentage increase is low, but that is still 4000+ new infections when people haven’t been out for 24 days.
For a variant of "haven't been out for 24 days" that included still going to bars and restaurants, of course.
The nationwaide Italian lockdown was set up in a staged manner. Restaurants and bars, for example, were still allowed to be open originally (from the lockdown on the 9th of March), as long as you stayed 1 metre apart.
It was toughened on the 11 March to closing non-essential businesses, and further toughened on 21 March to all “non-necessary” businesses (no, I’m not sure of the difference).
There were, of course, regional lockdowns prior to that (Lombardy and Northern Italy)
Deaths reported as of yesterday would have occurred the day before. So 09 March equates to reports on 03 April (ie today). 11 March equates to reports from 05 April; 21 March to reports from 15 April. (Very loosely because these are just averages. And, of course, the averages will get thrown out of whack if we get big chunks of former deaths reported on a given day (such as the France deaths in nursing homes).
My worry is that in 2 weeks time there will still be 4000+ plus cases in Italy. If that is the case how does a lockdown ever end?
Either: 1 - Tighten it further 2 - Sustain until effective treatment or vaccine available 3 - Come up with other steps (antibody test, better testing and tracking, etc.) 4 - Pulse lockdowns on and off to try to keep things ticking over for as long as 2 or 3 take to come into fruition.
Anecdote, my friend who has an ongoing heart condition, it sometimes beats out of rhythm, was admiitted to hospital yesterday as an emergency to have it shocked back into rhythm. He was chatting to one of the doctors who said they were learning new stuff about Covid-19 each day. The doctor said that the virus will only survive on your skin for 30 seconds but will last on surfaces for 24 hours. That seemed mad to me, but this is the oddest virus.
Suggests an attractive way out of lockdown using digital contact tracing and proves, mathematically, that it can work. Definitely one of the more optimistic pieces I've read recently.
Some people can not comprehend an event that doesn’t have binary blame for the bad outcome. The same people think it is the job of the government to insure them against any event.
Rant and rave all you like on here but you've lost this argument so you're wasting your energy. Even the tory press have called the Government to account.
Have a good day everyone.
xx
At least they are not all embarrassing themselves with their China bashing.
When all this is over you should take Rose on a wonderful holiday to Wuhan and sample the local cuisine.
"Sorry, pangolin's off...."
WAYCIST !
I get what you are saying. The governments brains trust got together in February and concluded, based on the facts out of China that we didn’t need to fly into action. But those facts out of China were just damned lies, so they are the ones to blame. Those damned lies wrong footed us.
I do understand; I do get it. But that argument is just bollox. Because it doesn’t matter diddly squat If the Chinese aren’t being honest or not, we still knew enough, we still knew it was corona, how quickly it spread, how it spread, the phone cam footage of hospitals over run with full on pneumonia. the lockdown that was introduced, the villages self isolating, we still knew more than enough that if it could come into our communities too we would need to take rapid action/.
You have to include WHO in your conspiracy theory because WHO praised China from the start for being open and honest with them.
And then it hits Italy. And how quickly Italy got into problems up north. And how quickly Italy went into lockdowns, where you couldn’t travel out of those areas on trains or cars to other parts of Italy, but you could as holiday maker, businessman, migrant worker fly out of those regions of Italy to the U.K. and just breeze through airport completely untested, right up to the very day Bojo told the nation he doesn’t want us going to pubs, gigs or theatre anymore. You can’t say that’s fake news. They were doing it live in front of us on our 24hr news channel. We all know what we saw. We all know what it means.
I’m sorry, but you are embarrassing yourselves. You are behaving no better than when the Black Death hit Italy and Catholic Church burned the Jewish villages so everyone knew who to blame.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
Plus as you say, now is not the time to be seen to be making party political attacks on the PM.
On the contrary. Now is exactly the time to highlight the PM's recent blunders before he just bumbles along into his next one. If an effective LOTO had existed a few weeks back and said "Cheltenham? Are you mad? Of course it must not go ahead" then we would probably has less cases of the bug.
Several PBer's said, at the time, that allowing Cheltenham was madness
I see swords made before 1954 are fine. I might start carrying my Crimean era RN Officer's sword with its Toledo blade and full patent solid hilt at all times.
I think that's legal to sell or buy, not legal to carry without cause.
(Personally I was wondering whether it would be legal to shoot one of those feral goats for the freezer in my back garden, were I to have a suitable back garden and a suitable rifle in Llandudno.)
Speak nicely to Big_G. He might bag one for you, as it nibbles his petunias....
Conwy Borough Council decreed on the 7th November 1996 that no goats could be shot unless they were sick or injured. So they are protected
I'm not clear that a Council can make Byelaws which apply to shooting on private land.
I see swords made before 1954 are fine. I might start carrying my Crimean era RN Officer's sword with its Toledo blade and full patent solid hilt at all times.
I think that's legal to sell or buy, not legal to carry without cause.
(Personally I was wondering whether it would be legal to shoot one of those feral goats for the freezer in my back garden, were I to have a suitable back garden and a suitable rifle in Llandudno.)
Speak nicely to Big_G. He might bag one for you, as it nibbles his petunias....
Conwy Borough Council decreed on the 7th November 1996 that no goats could be shot unless they were sick or injured. So they are protected
I'm not clear that a Council can make Byelaws which apply to shooting on private land.
Perhaps it is different in Wales. :-)
More importantly - has someone told the police? That the goats are legally protected?
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
For clarity Norman should have added "..with the required level of accuracy". Hancock was explaining that less reliable tests would cause as many problems as they solve, and he wants to avoid sending false positives into danger as far as is possible.
Given the purposes these tests will be used for, arguably the government should be a little more relaxed on the false positive front. If decent herd immunity kicks in at 60%, a test giving 1 in 10 false positives (which would normally be an horrendous accuracy level) probably doesn't undermine what you're trying to achieve here too much given the result of a false positive is not to proceed with a medical treatment
Politically it wouldn't be great to send a nurse back to hospital on the back of an unreliable negative test result.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Plus as you say, now is not the time to be seen to be making party political attacks on the PM.
On the contrary. Now is exactly the time to highlight the PM's recent blunders before he just bumbles along into his next one. If an effective LOTO had existed a few weeks back and said "Cheltenham? Are you mad? Of course it must not go ahead" then we would probably has less cases of the bug.
Several PBer's said, at the time, that allowing Cheltenham was madness
fewer cases of the bug #grammar police
Well technically we're incapable of counting how many people have the bug, or how many less would have had the bug - so since its uncountable less works 😛
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Is there difference between US and U.K. mechanism for getting money to people? Trump personally signing check to each voter... furloughed person, dropped straight into their mail can? What’s the U.K. equivalent?
Johnson promising cash that turns out to be XBox Live points delivered 6 months late.
Plus as you say, now is not the time to be seen to be making party political attacks on the PM.
On the contrary. Now is exactly the time to highlight the PM's recent blunders before he just bumbles along into his next one. If an effective LOTO had existed a few weeks back and said "Cheltenham? Are you mad? Of course it must not go ahead" then we would probably has less cases of the bug.
Several PBer's said, at the time, that allowing Cheltenham was madness
Care to argue that sporting events should be higher up the list of transmission in March?
Less than 2 million visits per week go to sporting events in the UK.
There are 5 million tube journeys per day. There are 40,000 pubs who might have an average 50 customers per day = 2million per day. A similar number of restaurants and cafes = 2 million per day There are 9 million school kids going to school each day, plus parents at drop off and teachers.
It seems very unlikely to me that closing sporting events 1 week earlier (that is what is being discussed) would have made even a 1% difference in the outcome.
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
US covid19 stimulus payments going out, if printing money and giving it directly to the voters turns out to be as popular as it sounds we could see a lot more of it in the future...
A tongue in cheek tweet judging by the payments shown.
Is there difference between US and U.K. mechanism for getting money to people? Trump personally signing check to each voter... furloughed person, dropped straight into their mail can? What’s the U.K. equivalent?
There is still no website for companies to claim Furlough. If this does not happen very quickly then people will not be getting paid.
There are whispers that all Rishi Sunak's good work is to be undone by lamentable implementation, not unlike everything else in this Covid-19 saga.
Rush’s good work. you entirely sure. Is the plan realistic, it’s just bad implementation? at the size and speed Rushak promised, it was good work? Feasible.
Fighting this is about control. overpromising is where promise is beyond control, economic measures, testing, PPE, ventilators. A lot of these promises I concede are politically necessary to keep the riot from the gate, but only practical if the contingency planning had been stronger over course of many years. As example, promising ramp up in testing as Germany ramps down due to lack of reagent. Talking about setting up right now a new industry for post brexit Britain when the press conference focus should have been on the testing needed last week, this week next week.
I’ll give you a clear example, when the blame game really floors politicians it’s not the promises and hopes they raised and failed to deliver that lands the blow, it will be the lack of beds, equipment, trained staff in place the moment the pangolin coughed. It will be lack of action after dry run exercises. The lack of financial investment in contingency planning.
Any party who won last December would get floored by that, particularly the one in power the previous ten years.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Crumpets were one of the things that vanished off the shelves her ein Devon.
Weird.
Also, has anyone still got parmesan? That vanished here too. I must be missing out on grated parmesan on hot crumpets, to while away the lockdown afternoons.....
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
Indeed. It may well turn out that however the government perform the received wisdom of the nation in years to come will be that they did badly whereas at the time they will receive support.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Crumpets were one of the things that vanished off the shelves her ein Devon.
Weird.
Also, has anyone still got parmesan? That vanished here too. I must be missing out on grated parmesan on hot crumpets, to while away the lockdown afternoons.....
Grates parmesan on crumpets? Why have I not ever done that before?
With the speculation about the Stereophonics concerts and Cheltenham as hot spots for CV I have to say I am hugely relived I made the decision not to go to the Roxy Music concert on 13th March.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Crumpets were one of the things that vanished off the shelves her ein Devon.
Weird.
Also, has anyone still got parmesan? That vanished here too. I must be missing out on grated parmesan on hot crumpets, to while away the lockdown afternoons.....
I bought two of a few things just before the lockdown was announced - parmesan, rose harissa paste, pitted kalamata olives, baby capers, sardines, butter.
Things I forgot and am now regretting: fennel seeds and baked beans (!). The good news is you can make a lovely chickpea dish with pasata, various sauces (Worcs, Soy, rose harissa paste, and sugar) and spices (cumin, coriander and paprika) that tastes even better on jacket potatoes!
The Shadow chancellor made exactly this point at the dispatch box, stop cuddling up to these scoundrels, do we really need to? the governments response was hysterical.
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
Did the defendant have his story off pat?
No, he was unable to butter-up the Judge
To be fair, the judge had to listen to what had oc-curd and whey up the evidence....
The government was slow to spot the danger, slow to warm up the public to the danger and slow to take the necessary measures to lock down. It has been slow at procurement and slow to put into place the financial measures required.
On all fronts it eventually did the right thing. The cost of this government’s lethargy has yet to be calculated.
The UK government’s handling of the crisis - health-wise and economic - has been mainstream European. What’s happened here is pretty much what’s happened across the continent. It’s fascinating to see all the criticisms here are exactly the ones being levelled at other governments. Everyone was too complacent for too long, everyone has taken stringent action subsequently, everyone is discovering that decisions previously taken are becoming millstones, everyone is thanking God that Donald Trump is not in charge.
As I said earlier - all you need to do is listen to France 24/Euronews/RTVE/RAI....
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
Indeed. It may well turn out that however the government perform the received wisdom of the nation in years to come will be that they did badly whereas at the time they will receive support.
I'd put good money on thst being the case. Particularly as the mood will be sour for s long time in an extended economic recession I expect, and he wont get to do many of the flashy spending plans which would have tried to set the narrative of the government.
It'll be drip by drip. Doctor after nurse after care worker talking about failures here and there. Unless we clearly doba lot better than most places, which does not seem the case, it wont matter if we are not the worst.
I get what you are saying. The governments brains trust got together in February and concluded, based on the facts out of China that we didn’t need to fly into action. But those facts out of China were just damned lies, so they are the ones to blame. Those damned lies wrong footed us.
I do understand; I do get it. But that argument is just bollox. Because it doesn’t matter diddly squat If the Chinese aren’t being honest or not, we still knew enough, we still knew it was corona, how quickly it spread, how it spread, the phone cam footage of hospitals over run with full on pneumonia. the lockdown that was introduced, the villages self isolating, we still knew more than enough that if it could come into our communities too we would need to take rapid action/.
You have to include WHO in your conspiracy theory because WHO praised China from the start for being open and honest with them.
And then it hits Italy. And how quickly Italy got into problems up north. And how quickly Italy went into lockdowns, where you couldn’t travel out of those areas on trains or cars to other parts of Italy, but you could as holiday maker, businessman, migrant worker fly out of those regions of Italy to the U.K. and just breeze through airport completely untested, right up to the very day Bojo told the nation he doesn’t want us going to pubs, gigs or theatre anymore. You can’t say that’s fake news. They were doing it live in front of us on our 24hr news channel. We all know what we saw. We all know what it means.
I’m sorry, but you are embarrassing yourselves. You are behaving no better than when the Black Death hit Italy and Catholic Church burned the Jewish villages so everyone knew who to blame.
Thanks, people. That's another two weeks of lockdown then.
We'll keep doing it unil you get it right.
It's your time you're wasting...
At the risk of breaking the blog, I'll ask: is there a chance this is a SE thing?
Very very quiet around my Midlands patch. A tweet in reply to O'hara's tweet said it was v quiet in E Yorkshire.
Extremely quiet in my part of Newcastle too.
I don't think car or foot traffic round my neighbourhood in Huddersfield has changed in any noticeable way since day 1.
As I said yesterday I am in rural Lincolnshire and sadly I am seeing a lot more non-lorry traffic on the roads this week compared to last. The morning and evening commute hours are markedly quieter still but people still seem to be out and about in large numbers the rest of the day.
For f*ck sake. I assume this is London? Quarantine the whole city and nuke from orbit.
Oxford.
The place is a dump.
Remaniacs complaining about Brexit to each other....
And rightly so. We have a lot of catching up to do. Leavers complained about being in the EU for 40 years....
I'd advise not doing it for 40 years at the same level of intensity, seems like it would be bad for the old ticker. I dont know how Bill Cash and other die hards kept it up for so long, its exhausting.
3 weeks seems like years ago on the current timelines, things change so quickly. The next day the Football leagues suspended their fixtures.
Yes, smug fucks were confidently stating that because of science mass sporting events should go ahead as they were far less likely to spread corona virus than any other activity on Earth and shutting down schools would be counter productive.
Shutting the schools and universities early in Spain led to a mad dash to second homes spreading the virus all over the shop. Is that smug enough for you?
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Crumpets were one of the things that vanished off the shelves her ein Devon.
Weird.
Also, has anyone still got parmesan? That vanished here too. I must be missing out on grated parmesan on hot crumpets, to while away the lockdown afternoons.....
Grates parmesan on crumpets? Why have I not ever done that before?
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Crumpets were one of the things that vanished off the shelves her ein Devon.
Weird.
Also, has anyone still got parmesan? That vanished here too. I must be missing out on grated parmesan on hot crumpets, to while away the lockdown afternoons.....
Grates parmesan on crumpets? Why have I not ever done that before?
Plus as you say, now is not the time to be seen to be making party political attacks on the PM.
On the contrary. Now is exactly the time to highlight the PM's recent blunders before he just bumbles along into his next one. If an effective LOTO had existed a few weeks back and said "Cheltenham? Are you mad? Of course it must not go ahead" then we would probably has less cases of the bug.
Several PBer's said, at the time, that allowing Cheltenham was madness
Care to argue that sporting events should be higher up the list of transmission in March?
Less than 2 million visits per week go to sporting events in the UK.
There are 5 million tube journeys per day. There are 40,000 pubs who might have an average 50 customers per day = 2million per day. A similar number of restaurants and cafes = 2 million per day There are 9 million school kids going to school each day, plus parents at drop off and teachers.
It seems very unlikely to me that closing sporting events 1 week earlier (that is what is being discussed) would have made even a 1% difference in the outcome.
Except that a major event like Cheltenham is ideal for spreading the virus from localised clusters to other parts of the country.
FPT - I’m going to enjoy drinking as much as I can (consistent with being functional during the day and getting a decent sleep) during this crisis. I’ve ordered in some great wines and champagnes.
The hair shirt brigade / busybodies seem mainly interested in policing people who leave the house, policing that they properly clap according to approved doctrine on the doorsteps of their houses, and trying to shame them as to what they do inside their houses.
They can fuck off.
Who exactly are "policing that people clap according to the doctrine on their doorsteps". "Quasi-Stalinist" I believe you called it last night.
Certainly hasn't made any of the news outlets I've seen. Could it possibly all be in your fevered imagination?
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
I disagree, politically it's really important for him to create a narrative right now that Britain is where it is because the government botched the initial response. I agree the tone shouldn't look full-throatedly political but he needs to get people talking on the lines of "how to we avoid [insert catchy name for that period] when dealing with x, y and z.
The timing for this is pretty much perfect, because it's not too late to argue about the pre-lockdown period, but it's late enough that people are starting to get grumpy and receptive to an anti-government message.
Thanks, people. That's another two weeks of lockdown then.
We'll keep doing it unil you get it right.
It's your time you're wasting...
At the risk of breaking the blog, I'll ask: is there a chance this is a SE thing?
Very very quiet around my Midlands patch. A tweet in reply to O'hara's tweet said it was v quiet in E Yorkshire.
Extremely quiet in my part of Newcastle too.
I don't think car or foot traffic round my neighbourhood in Huddersfield has changed in any noticeable way since day 1.
As I said yesterday I am in rural Lincolnshire and sadly I am seeing a lot more non-lorry traffic on the roads this week compared to last. The morning and evening commute hours are markedly quieter still but people still seem to be out and about in large numbers the rest of the day.
Sadly the same on the roads here in metropolitan Dorset - and I'm even seeing people waiting at bus stops again. In the last two days I have seen a marked increase whilst walking the dog - but it will be interesting to see if it is the same today. Yesterday and wednesday: beautiful weather. Today; cloudy and dull...
For f*ck sake. I assume this is London? Quarantine the whole city and nuke from orbit.
Oxford.
The place is a dump.
Remaniacs complaining about Brexit to each other....
And rightly so. We have a lot of catching up to do. Leavers complained about being in the EU for 40 years....
I'd advise not doing it for 40 years at the same level of intensity, seems like it would be bad for the old ticker. I dont know how Bill Cash and other die hards kept it up for so long, its exhausting.
To be fair, it's much easier when you have no heart....
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
That reminds me - when I went to Aldi yesterday I intended to purchase Crumpets and forgot when I got there.
Unfortunately we all eventually reach the age where we can forget crumpet.
FPT - I’m going to enjoy drinking as much as I can (consistent with being functional during the day and getting a decent sleep) during this crisis. I’ve ordered in some great wines and champagnes.
The hair shirt brigade / busybodies seem mainly interested in policing people who leave the house, policing that they properly clap according to approved doctrine on the doorsteps of their houses, and trying to shame them as to what they do inside their houses.
They can fuck off.
Who exactly are "policing that people clap according to the doctrine on their doorsteps". "Quasi-Stalinist" I believe you called it last night.
Certainly hasn't made any of the news outlets I've seen. Could it possibly all be in your fevered imagination?
It may not have made your news outlets but it is certainly happening. Personally I disagree with Casino and think the clap is a good thing, but it is sad to see on the local village facebook page this morning complaints about certain houses and certain streets not taking part. As with all social media it turns nasty rather quickly.
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
I disagree, politically it's really important for him to create a narrative right now that Britain is where it is because the government botched the initial response. I agree the tone shouldn't look full-throatedly political but he needs to get people talking on the lines of "how to we avoid [insert catchy name for that period] when dealing with x, y and z.
The timing for this is pretty much perfect, because it's not too late to argue about the pre-lockdown period, but it's late enough that people are starting to get grumpy and receptive to an anti-government message.
The press is already doing that for super Keir. The second-coming of Blair alright.
All shops apart from food shops & corner shops are shut - A couple of the shut places seem to be used inside as staging for deliveries for their chains.
Lots of criminal vandalism by using black&yellow tape on the pavement to mark out 2m queues on the pavement outside the places that are open.
Very few people about - was out for a run at 6-7pm yesterday. No one getting off the Tube or on. The Tube station is major one - normally rammed at this time.
Judging by the driving you see during the day, people are using their cars more. This is a part of the world where, if you have a car, it is parked Monday-too-Friday. everyone uses local public transport to get to the shops. This has reversed - I think quite a lot of people are using their cars as a moving 2m zone. Easy to feel safer in your own metal box....
Normally run early morning - no commuters then either. Not just rich/middle class people locally - the early morning tube is normally full of people obviously working pretty basic jobs.
Buses running with 1 -2 passengers. When there are people on the streets, everyone is giving everyone else a wide birth.
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
I disagree, politically it's really important for him to create a narrative right now that Britain is where it is because the government botched the initial response. I agree the tone shouldn't look full-throatedly political but he needs to get people talking on the lines of "how to we avoid [insert catchy name for that period] when dealing with x, y and z.
The timing for this is pretty much perfect, because it's not too late to argue about the pre-lockdown period, but it's late enough that people are starting to get grumpy and receptive to an anti-government message.
Advocating playing politics with this is one of the reasons I have such a dim view of you Edmund.
FPT - I’m going to enjoy drinking as much as I can (consistent with being functional during the day and getting a decent sleep) during this crisis. I’ve ordered in some great wines and champagnes.
The hair shirt brigade / busybodies seem mainly interested in policing people who leave the house, policing that they properly clap according to approved doctrine on the doorsteps of their houses, and trying to shame them as to what they do inside their houses.
They can fuck off.
Who exactly are "policing that people clap according to the doctrine on their doorsteps". "Quasi-Stalinist" I believe you called it last night.
Certainly hasn't made any of the news outlets I've seen. Could it possibly all be in your fevered imagination?
It may not have made your news outlets but it is certainly happening. Personally I disagree with Casino and think the clap is a good thing, but it is sad to see on the local village facebook page this morning complaints about certain houses and certain streets not taking part. As with all social media it turns nasty rather quickly.
Plus as you say, now is not the time to be seen to be making party political attacks on the PM.
On the contrary. Now is exactly the time to highlight the PM's recent blunders before he just bumbles along into his next one. If an effective LOTO had existed a few weeks back and said "Cheltenham? Are you mad? Of course it must not go ahead" then we would probably has less cases of the bug.
Several PBer's said, at the time, that allowing Cheltenham was madness
Care to argue that sporting events should be higher up the list of transmission in March?
Less than 2 million visits per week go to sporting events in the UK.
There are 5 million tube journeys per day. There are 40,000 pubs who might have an average 50 customers per day = 2million per day. A similar number of restaurants and cafes = 2 million per day There are 9 million school kids going to school each day, plus parents at drop off and teachers.
It seems very unlikely to me that closing sporting events 1 week earlier (that is what is being discussed) would have made even a 1% difference in the outcome.
Except that a major event like Cheltenham is ideal for spreading the virus from localised clusters to other parts of the country.
How many long distance train journeys per day? How many flights? How many lorries driven all over the country? Sporting events are visible but a small proportion even in terms of geographic spread.
The much quoted Madrid - Liverpool travel would probably be less than half the Madrid - UK travel that day, and definitely a small proportion of the Madrid - UK travel that week.
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
I disagree, politically it's really important for him to create a narrative right now that Britain is where it is because the government botched the initial response. I agree the tone shouldn't look full-throatedly political but he needs to get people talking on the lines of "how to we avoid [insert catchy name for that period] when dealing with x, y and z.
The timing for this is pretty much perfect, because it's not too late to argue about the pre-lockdown period, but it's late enough that people are starting to get grumpy and receptive to an anti-government message.
It depends how much he actually thinks or said at the time that pre lockdown and initial lockdown measures should be different and on what basis. Hes sensible so probably hasn't constrained himself by past comments too much.
But it's a long haul and I've little doubt the government will get pilloried over time with very little effort needed from the opposition, so he can be patient and ride the wave once the rallying round the flag ends.
Of European countries, Greece stands out has having most successfully dealt with the coronavirus crisis. Its early, rapid and wide-ranging response seems to have paid off with a modest (although still rising) number of cases, and a low number of deaths to date. This is all the more remarkable, given the effect of years of austerity on public finances and health provision. If only we'd had a similarly decisive government capable of acting quickly on the news from Italy!
With the speculation about the Stereophonics concerts and Cheltenham as hot spots for CV I have to say I am hugely relived I made the decision not to go to the Roxy Music concert on 13th March.
On my one man mission to convert people to watching Babylon Berlin, you can catch Bryan Ferry doing a turn as a 20s style crooner in series one (I think he was involved in some of the excellent soundtrack also).
I live in a quiet area of SE Spain - few people, few cases. Just back from chemist and supermarket. Police checkpoints almost everywhere. Stopped twice - documents photographed [NIE & Passport copy - you have to have them!]. Everyone calm and polite but very much easier when you are able to speak Spanish - mine supposedly intermediate/higher now - and sent on my way. Checked my phone to see network message [Quedateencasa!] ie get home pronto!
Maybe people in the UK should be a little more thankful for the liberties they still have and follow the advice to stay home. It makes sense in so many ways.
FPT - I’m going to enjoy drinking as much as I can (consistent with being functional during the day and getting a decent sleep) during this crisis. I’ve ordered in some great wines and champagnes.
The hair shirt brigade / busybodies seem mainly interested in policing people who leave the house, policing that they properly clap according to approved doctrine on the doorsteps of their houses, and trying to shame them as to what they do inside their houses.
They can fuck off.
Who exactly are "policing that people clap according to the doctrine on their doorsteps". "Quasi-Stalinist" I believe you called it last night.
Certainly hasn't made any of the news outlets I've seen. Could it possibly all be in your fevered imagination?
It may not have made your news outlets but it is certainly happening. Personally I disagree with Casino and think the clap is a good thing, but it is sad to see on the local village facebook page this morning complaints about certain houses and certain streets not taking part. As with all social media it turns nasty rather quickly.
Certain houses? That is genuinely horrific.
Yep. That is what has sparked the arguments this morning. Thankfully the vast majority of people are seeing how wrong this is but there are one or two persistent offenders who are taking offence at anything less than 100% compliance.
Thanks, people. That's another two weeks of lockdown then.
We'll keep doing it unil you get it right.
It's your time you're wasting...
At the risk of breaking the blog, I'll ask: is there a chance this is a SE thing?
Very very quiet around my Midlands patch. A tweet in reply to O'hara's tweet said it was v quiet in E Yorkshire.
Extremely quiet in my part of Newcastle too.
I don't think car or foot traffic round my neighbourhood in Huddersfield has changed in any noticeable way since day 1.
As I said yesterday I am in rural Lincolnshire and sadly I am seeing a lot more non-lorry traffic on the roads this week compared to last. The morning and evening commute hours are markedly quieter still but people still seem to be out and about in large numbers the rest of the day.
Sadly the same on the roads here in metropolitan Dorset - and I'm even seeing people waiting at bus stops again. In the last two days I have seen a marked increase whilst walking the dog - but it will be interesting to see if it is the same today. Yesterday and wednesday: beautiful weather. Today; cloudy and dull...
Such sad news this morning that a 36 year old nurse and mother of three succumbed to the virus last night. The news just gets more upsetting and sad as so many across europe and the world fall to the onslaught of this deadly virus
And yet we have political point scoring and keyboard warriors, with little or no technical knowledge, jumping on every perceived false move by HMG, mainly from hindsight, and almost always without reference to the speed this virus has overwhelmed the nations (approx 12 weeks) and any comparision with the majority of other countries, apart from Germany and South Korea who seem to have performed better (but the jury is out until this whole nightmare is behind us)
Boris, HMG, Cobra and others have made mistakes but are those attacking him and the government confident that they would have performed better, had fewer deaths, and not made their own mistakes
There are huge obstacles ahead and more mistakes will be made but the ones who have performed badly by some distances are the journalists, tv presenters and the media who frankly have not got the technical knowledge and only know one form of journalism, the 'gotcha' moment and right now that is a huge negative.
Lets have examination of the government from those with the scientific knowledge and not some hidden or even open agenda
With the speculation about the Stereophonics concerts and Cheltenham as hot spots for CV I have to say I am hugely relived I made the decision not to go to the Roxy Music concert on 13th March.
On my one man mission to convert people to watching Babylon Berlin, you can catch Bryan Ferry doing a stint as a 20s style crooner in series one (I think he was involved in some of the excellent soundtrack also).
I agree that a locking knife is safer to use, but it can be considerably more dangerous if used to stab somebody. I imagine that even a relatively short locked blade will be capable of reaching the heart or aorta and that the law has come about because of this.
But a short fixed blade is still legal.
When carried with a good reason.
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
Did the defendant have his story off pat?
No, he was unable to butter-up the Judge
To be fair, the judge had to listen to what had oc-curd and whey up the evidence....
In central London the level of daytime traffic is equivalent to that at 4am pre lockdown.
London is complying. It's incredibly quiet and people are keeping well away from each other. Lots of masks too. There is no way that the virus is still on the rise here. I expect deaths per day in London 6 weeks from now to be low 2 digits.
Starmer would be making a strategic mistake if he goes down that route as his first act imo. Playing the supportive statesman with gentle prodding on the medias issue of the day is where he should be for now.
Makes sense. He will have plenty of time to pick apart government failures on this later, and even optimistically there will be failures to pick apart because no one ever responds perfectly in a crisis.
I disagree, politically it's really important for him to create a narrative right now that Britain is where it is because the government botched the initial response. I agree the tone shouldn't look full-throatedly political but he needs to get people talking on the lines of "how to we avoid [insert catchy name for that period] when dealing with x, y and z.
The timing for this is pretty much perfect, because it's not too late to argue about the pre-lockdown period, but it's late enough that people are starting to get grumpy and receptive to an anti-government message.
Advocating playing politics with this is one of the reasons I have such a dim view of you Edmund.
Agreed - to advocate weaponising this kind of crisis for political ends is about as low as it gets.
FPT - I’m going to enjoy drinking as much as I can (consistent with being functional during the day and getting a decent sleep) during this crisis. I’ve ordered in some great wines and champagnes.
The hair shirt brigade / busybodies seem mainly interested in policing people who leave the house, policing that they properly clap according to approved doctrine on the doorsteps of their houses, and trying to shame them as to what they do inside their houses.
They can fuck off.
Who exactly are "policing that people clap according to the doctrine on their doorsteps". "Quasi-Stalinist" I believe you called it last night.
Certainly hasn't made any of the news outlets I've seen. Could it possibly all be in your fevered imagination?
It may not have made your news outlets but it is certainly happening. Personally I disagree with Casino and think the clap is a good thing, but it is sad to see on the local village facebook page this morning complaints about certain houses and certain streets not taking part. As with all social media it turns nasty rather quickly.
Certain houses? That is genuinely horrific.
The Gestapo, it was discovered after the war, nearly collapsed under the strain of trying to deal with all the denunciations from the general public.
They had to build a filtering pyramid of workers to deal with the avalanche of letter...
In the event of the Germans successfully invading Britain* - One third of the population would have fought. One third would not have noticed. One third would have queued up round the block to get an armband and be a blockfurhrer.
Comments
https://www.pluralsight.com/offer/2020/free-april-month
It very nicely describes the risks associated with different environments and also, importantly, emphasises that when outside the amount of live virus (as opposed to fragments) will probably not be enough to infect. The difference would be places where people congregate (e.g., supermarket queues) or settings where people are very close to one another. It also touches on the mask debate.
Several PBer's said, at the time, that allowing Cheltenham was madness
Going all out for a quick and easy headline is no substitute for putting in the hard work.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1245675084934795265
I’m no lover or defender of China today. I don’t see them as communist, Marxist, or particularly Maoist anymore. They have no consciousness of consumerism, no fair industrial relations, democracy, human rights. After the USA they have the most millionaires and billionaires in the world. But no unions are allowed. Workers sweat for slave wages to undercut western jobs and take home barely enough for their families, yet turn up to factory Monday, gates locked that’s the end of their livelihoods.
China is capitalist. The culture is market place. Rhino’s hunted to extinction for horns for that market place, for quack ancient medicines and aphrodisiacs. But mixed with their excessive nationalism, contempt for democracy and basic human rights China is the most corrupt and contemptible capitalist nation on earth. A capitalist dictatorship.
And they have been playing a game with us for years. Beautifully scripted. The investment in military, the nuclear subs, the nukes. The IPR theft. The materiel investment throughout the world, bridges and other gifts not just across the developing nations, but cHinckley point, U.K. 5g. The siren calls to help out with HS2. And best part of their plan, the new Silk Road being built between China and here, not so much to finish off U’k as manufacturing nation, though this road surely will, not so much to stack goods on shop shelves, as the road will butcher British high street, but when you click for what you want online, and the delivery comes, it will be from those slave factories in China along that super fast Silk Road.
The Shadow chancellor made exactly this point at the dispatch box, stop cuddling up to these scoundrels, do we really need to? the governments response was hysterical.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwVJTHtqs9Y
Whose laughing now. 😡
Section 139 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 makes it an offence to have any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed in a public place except a folding pocketknife.
I recall a case involving a butter knife reaching the High Court.
1 - Tighten it further
2 - Sustain until effective treatment or vaccine available
3 - Come up with other steps (antibody test, better testing and tracking, etc.)
4 - Pulse lockdowns on and off to try to keep things ticking over for as long as 2 or 3 take to come into fruition.
We'll keep doing it unil you get it right.
It's your time you're wasting...
Also, never forget that SOMETHING MUST BE DONE
Suggests an attractive way out of lockdown using digital contact tracing and proves, mathematically, that it can work. Definitely one of the more optimistic pieces I've read recently.
Very very quiet around my Midlands patch. A tweet in reply to O'hara's tweet said it was v quiet in E Yorkshire.
I do understand; I do get it. But that argument is just bollox. Because it doesn’t matter diddly squat If the Chinese aren’t being honest or not, we still knew enough, we still knew it was corona, how quickly it spread, how it spread, the phone cam footage of hospitals over run with full on pneumonia. the lockdown that was introduced, the villages self isolating, we still knew more than enough that if it could come into our communities too we would need to take rapid action/.
You have to include WHO in your conspiracy theory because WHO praised China from the start for being open and honest with them.
And then it hits Italy. And how quickly Italy got into problems up north. And how quickly Italy went into lockdowns, where you couldn’t travel out of those areas on trains or cars to other parts of Italy, but you could as holiday maker, businessman, migrant worker fly out of those regions of Italy to the U.K. and just breeze through airport completely untested, right up to the very day Bojo told the nation he doesn’t want us going to pubs, gigs or theatre anymore. You can’t say that’s fake news. They were doing it live in front of us on our 24hr news channel. We all know what we saw. We all know what it means.
I’m sorry, but you are embarrassing yourselves. You are behaving no better than when the Black Death hit Italy and Catholic Church burned the Jewish villages so everyone knew who to blame.
The place is a dump.
Perhaps it is different in Wales. :-)
Less than 2 million visits per week go to sporting events in the UK.
There are 5 million tube journeys per day.
There are 40,000 pubs who might have an average 50 customers per day = 2million per day.
A similar number of restaurants and cafes = 2 million per day
There are 9 million school kids going to school each day, plus parents at drop off and teachers.
It seems very unlikely to me that closing sporting events 1 week earlier (that is what is being discussed) would have made even a 1% difference in the outcome.
Is the plan realistic, it’s just bad implementation? at the size and speed Rushak promised, it was good work? Feasible.
Fighting this is about control. overpromising is where promise is beyond control, economic measures, testing, PPE, ventilators. A lot of these promises I concede are politically necessary to keep the riot from the gate, but only practical if the contingency planning had been stronger over course of many years.
As example, promising ramp up in testing as Germany ramps down due to lack of reagent. Talking about setting up right now a new industry for post brexit Britain when the press conference focus should have been on the testing needed last week, this week next week.
I’ll give you a clear example, when the blame game really floors politicians it’s not the promises and hopes they raised and failed to deliver that lands the blow, it will be the lack of beds, equipment, trained staff in place the moment the pangolin coughed. It will be lack of action after dry run exercises. The lack of financial investment in contingency planning.
Any party who won last December would get floored by that, particularly the one in power the previous ten years.
Weird.
Also, has anyone still got parmesan? That vanished here too. I must be missing out on grated parmesan on hot crumpets, to while away the lockdown afternoons.....
You, sir, are a genius and I am in your debt.
Things I forgot and am now regretting: fennel seeds and baked beans (!). The good news is you can make a lovely chickpea dish with pasata, various sauces (Worcs, Soy, rose harissa paste, and sugar) and spices (cumin, coriander and paprika) that tastes even better on jacket potatoes!
It'll be drip by drip. Doctor after nurse after care worker talking about failures here and there. Unless we clearly doba lot better than most places, which does not seem the case, it wont matter if we are not the worst.
https://twitter.com/Emily_Baum/status/1245875443309228032
Crumpets? Pah !
Social death.
Certainly hasn't made any of the news outlets I've seen. Could it possibly all be in your fevered imagination?
The timing for this is pretty much perfect, because it's not too late to argue about the pre-lockdown period, but it's late enough that people are starting to get grumpy and receptive to an anti-government message.
The second-coming of Blair alright.
All shops apart from food shops & corner shops are shut - A couple of the shut places seem to be used inside as staging for deliveries for their chains.
Lots of criminal vandalism by using black&yellow tape on the pavement to mark out 2m queues on the pavement outside the places that are open.
Very few people about - was out for a run at 6-7pm yesterday. No one getting off the Tube or on. The Tube station is major one - normally rammed at this time.
Judging by the driving you see during the day, people are using their cars more. This is a part of the world where, if you have a car, it is parked Monday-too-Friday. everyone uses local public transport to get to the shops. This has reversed - I think quite a lot of people are using their cars as a moving 2m zone. Easy to feel safer in your own metal box....
Normally run early morning - no commuters then either. Not just rich/middle class people locally - the early morning tube is normally full of people obviously working pretty basic jobs.
Buses running with 1 -2 passengers. When there are people on the streets, everyone is giving everyone else a wide birth.
It’s very sad.
The much quoted Madrid - Liverpool travel would probably be less than half the Madrid - UK travel that day, and definitely a small proportion of the Madrid - UK travel that week.
But it's a long haul and I've little doubt the government will get pilloried over time with very little effort needed from the opposition, so he can be patient and ride the wave once the rallying round the flag ends.
Maybe people in the UK should be a little more thankful for the liberties they still have and follow the advice to stay home. It makes sense in so many ways.
And yet we have political point scoring and keyboard warriors, with little or no technical knowledge, jumping on every perceived false move by HMG, mainly from hindsight, and almost always without reference to the speed this virus has overwhelmed the nations (approx 12 weeks) and any comparision with the majority of other countries, apart from Germany and South Korea who seem to have performed better (but the jury is out until this whole nightmare is behind us)
Boris, HMG, Cobra and others have made mistakes but are those attacking him and the government confident that they would have performed better, had fewer deaths, and not made their own mistakes
There are huge obstacles ahead and more mistakes will be made but the ones who have performed badly by some distances are the journalists, tv presenters and the media who frankly have not got the technical knowledge and only know one form of journalism, the 'gotcha' moment and right now that is a huge negative.
Lets have examination of the government from those with the scientific knowledge and not some hidden or even open agenda
They had to build a filtering pyramid of workers to deal with the avalanche of letter...
In the event of the Germans successfully invading Britain* - One third of the population would have fought. One third would not have noticed. One third would have queued up round the block to get an armband and be a blockfurhrer.
*With the Aid of Alien Space Bats, obviously.