A simple question and probably shows my ignorance, why does the R number appear to go up even when the number of new cases reduces. I’ve watched the number of new cases reduce in Valencia drop dramatically with 0 yesterday but the R number creeps upwards to 1?
.
It really is a nonsense and it is frightening that our policy seems to be built around this mythical number. To determine R one needs to make a series of assumptions. You can assume that a person becomes infected is infectious for a period of time. How long? We really have no idea but the fact that people in hospitals get infected suggest its longer than we think, at least in some cases. We have to assume that person has a certain number of meaningful contacts. We have to assume that the people he or she comes in contact with have average vulnerability (something that clearly would not apply to those working on a care home, for example). And we have to assume that the level of infectivity is something we can usefully average. What we know in fact is that some people, for reasons we do not understand, can infect hundreds of people in a very short time. Others can literally share a bed with their partner night after night without infecting them.
You can obviously take a statistical average of infectivity but it does not tell you anything useful. What is clear is that super spreaders need to be traced and isolated very fast or numbers will increase. For the rest of us common sense precautions and self isolation is probably enough.
We need far more work done on how people are still being infected so many weeks into lockdown. Who are they? What age are they? What environments are causing that infection to spread? And then we need to concentrate on those weak spots whilst building the capacity to identify and trace super spreaders in the general population. I see little evidence we are doing either of these things.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
Even when the lockdown is completely over there is no guarantee that people will return to how they were before.
If my friends and neighbours are in any way typical the over 60s will not be going to concerts / pubs / cinemas/ restaurants / sports events / theatres for the vey simple reason that it will be impossible to avoid the numpties who don't give a shit.
Most of the hospitality industry is going to have to figure out how to turn a profit without the grey pound until such times as there is a vaccine.
The U3a, whose membership is 'over 55 and retired' has been told it's insurers will not cover it's activities "Given that the current advice is"stay at home as much as possible"and"limit contact with other people" it follows that face to face U3A activity should not be undertaken at present The U3A insurers have advised that this is crucial from a public liability insurance perspective." To be fair, no-one has, to my knowledge, ever claimed for catching 'flu at a meeting.
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
What's your alternative "sustainable method?"
Seriously, I'd love a practical alternative. I'm having to explain the entire problem every sodding day to a distressed severely autistic boy.
Saying "Well, this is unacceptable" ain't going to cut the mustard. It's less unacceptable than hundreds of thousands dying.
Encourage “social distancing”, encourage “staying at home” as much as possible. Encourage hand-washing and public hygiene. Let people be sensible and to think for themselves.
This whole thing would be massively more bearable if people could see their closest friends and family. Yes ‘R’ will increase a bit, but yet this could continue for much longer. What other option is there? Realistically there will be no second lockdown.
The critics are only looking at the numbers, and are getting angry at people for not acting like robots. Humans are not robots.
"Yes ‘R’ will increase a bit, but yet this could continue for much longer." By definition if 'R' does increase it will comtinue for longer.
‘R’ is going to increase. There’s no realistic way of preventing that. To think otherwise is just naive.
Key point is to keep it below 1. The Gov't might be lucky if healthier people have an innate resistance (Though I'm not sure that's true) or if the spreading mechanism is highly skewed - that can mean a higher effective partial herd immunity effect at lower infection levels (Research suggests this may well be the case). It's clear the Gov't needs to have luck on its side. It might get lucky, it might not.
With the amount of resources at the Government's disposal they shouldn't need to get lucky.They should know.
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
What's your alternative "sustainable method?"
Seriously, I'd love a practical alternative. I'm having to explain the entire problem every sodding day to a distressed severely autistic boy.
Saying "Well, this is unacceptable" ain't going to cut the mustard. It's less unacceptable than hundreds of thousands dying.
Encourage “social distancing”, encourage “staying at home” as much as possible. Encourage hand-washing and public hygiene. Let people be sensible and to think for themselves.
This whole thing would be massively more bearable if people could see their closest friends and family. Yes ‘R’ will increase a bit, but yet this could continue for much longer. What other option is there? Realistically there will be no second lockdown.
The critics are only looking at the numbers, and are getting angry at people for not acting like robots. Humans are not robots.
I'm massively in favour of certain relaxations. You may have seen my previous posts on the subject. "Lockdown is over," though is pointing to loads of idiots acting as though it's all over and in the past and they can do what they like. And that's the best way to screwing things back up.
And, if it runs riot again, of course there will be a second lockdown, no matter how much we all may hate the concept. No Government, especially one whose core vote demographic is amongst the older electors, can afford to let a virus like this run free. They'll not abandon the elderly any more than they'd abandon Brexiteers. Maybe they'll call it something different to save face.
And if the death toll starts mounting, yes, people will comply again. They'll focus their ire on those who relaxed it too quickly and too soon and swiftly forget that they themselves were calling for it.
I'm hoping really strongly that the R-number doesn't climb too rapidly. I'm stone-cold certain there are a number of things we can do in the relaxation way that would keep it below 1 (we're finding out more and more things like outdoor activities being comparatively far less risky, for example); it's always possible that people will keep their heads (by and large) and keep to the less risky stuff.
I bloody well hope so, anyway. I was just getting used to being able to do more stuff.
My main fear is that we land in a situation where there are too many cases for effective contact tracing and isolation, and so we end up with a long-term pseudo-lockdown anyway. People like me, who can work from home and can avoid going out much, will continue to do so. Group events like conferences, festivals, sporting events, concerts, even university lectures will remain cancelled indefinitely. Activity will resume, but only reluctantly so, and any sign of outbreaks will cause panic in the affected areas.
If we're running at 8,000 infections per day, and if the R rate stays around 1, then we'd see about 240,000 infections in a month. Very roughly this is about 1-in-200 of the adult population being infected at any moment, which seems like an awful lot of people to trace. Of course, it still makes much more sense to quarantine the 1-in-200 rather than sort-of-quarantining everyone with a lockdown, but can the system actually achieve this?
This is where lockdown timing matters a lot. Would a further week of lockdown cut infections to 4,000 per day? Is halving the number of cases you need to contact-trace going to make a substantial difference to the difficulty of the task?
I feel like we're back in the situation of mid-March, where anyone with a pocket calculator and a bit of common sense would start asking these questions, but the government doesn't seem to want to tell us what it thinks the answers are, presumably because they can't agree amongst themselves.
Where does the 8,000 infections per day come from? Government figure is 1,936 yesterday.
Where does "R rate stays around 1" come from? It is under 1.
The UK government is using deaths to calculate the R rate which means it is 2-3 weeks out of date because of the lags.
The German government uses confirmed cases which is more up to date.
I am using the German methodology on UK data (ignoring the latest five days as the numbers are incomplete) so my estimate is 5 days out of date.
England R = 0.74 (-0.05) on previous day (i.e. 25th May versus 24th May) R calculated as latest days 1-7 divided by days 8-14 i.e. 7 day moving averages to deal with weekend effects and average incubation period) London 0.58 (-0.06) Richmond 0.38 (-0.26) no reported cases in last five days.
A simple question and probably shows my ignorance, why does the R number appear to go up even when the number of new cases reduces. I’ve watched the number of new cases reduce in Valencia drop dramatically with 0 yesterday but the R number creeps upwards to 1?
.
It really is a nonsense and it is frightening that our policy seems to be built around this mythical number. To determine R one needs to make a series of assumptions. You can assume that a person becomes infected is infectious for a period of time. How long? We really have no idea but the fact that people in hospitals get infected suggest its longer than we think, at least in some cases. We have to assume that person has a certain number of meaningful contacts. We have to assume that the people he or she comes in contact with have average vulnerability (something that clearly would not apply to those working on a care home, for example). And we have to assume that the level of infectivity is something we can usefully average. What we know in fact is that some people, for reasons we do not understand, can infect hundreds of people in a very short time. Others can literally share a bed with their partner night after night without infecting them.
You can obviously take a statistical average of infectivity but it does not tell you anything useful. What is clear is that super spreaders need to be traced and isolated very fast or numbers will increase. For the rest of us common sense precautions and self isolation is probably enough.
We need far more work done on how people are still being infected so many weeks into lockdown. Who are they? What age are they? What environments are causing that infection to spread? And then we need to concentrate on those weak spots whilst building the capacity to identify and trace super spreaders in the general population. I see little evidence we are doing either of these things.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
It may be tradition that he should get a peerage but I doubt it will hurt Boris politically, most Tories loathe Bercow despite the fact he was a former Tory MP. Indeed the current incumbent, Lindsay Hoyle, is far more popular with Tories despite being Labour
Because he's a better Speaker? With Hoyle in the chair it's all about the House. With Bercow in the chair it was all about Bercow.
The Grauniad version:
John Bercow will not be awarded a peerage despite being nominated by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, it has been reported.
The nomination of the former Speaker of the House of Commons will not be passed on to the Queen for approval because he is the subject of an investigation into alleged wrongdoing and will not pass a “propriety test” unless he is cleared before the nominations are sent.
So Johnson should have nominated an alleged bully?
Do you think that bullying is a complete bar on entry in the House of Lords?
I don't think someone should "automatically" get a peerage when investigations into their alleged bullying behaviour are under way.
Do you?
Do tell me which bit of that you disagree with. Just so we can understand why things are magically different for the next Conservative bully who's up for consideration.
He had a duty of care to employees. So I'm holding him to a higher standard than any random bully. Why the rush to elevate him before the report?
Gordon Brown was just as much in an employment relationship with those on the receiving end of flying implements as John Bercow. So, logic fail.
You have yet to explain why you see bullying, even if proven, as an automatic bar on ennoblement. One has to conclude that it's just your usual mindless partisanship.
Well, if the Remoaners are going to start name calling.
1) Brown isn't in the Lords - your logic fail 2) Brown's alleged bullying (which read as more temper than systematic, unlike the Bercow allegations) was in Downing Street - not the Houses of Parliament. Which is where you want to return Bercow to.
I haven't said its an "automatic bar on ennoblement" - I've said it shouldn't happen while an investigation is underway.
But to you the Remoaners hero should be elevated whatever the result of the enquiry....
So the investigation happens and John Bercow is found to have been a bully. You then conclude he should not be a member of the House of Lords?
Rather depends on the results of the enquiry - why your rush to prejudge it?
What's so terribly wrong with waiting for its outcome? A question you have assiduously failed to address.
It must be frustrating to see your hero removed from the public stage of which he was so fond.
1) He really isn't my hero. Your idea that he might be just shows how blinded by your pathological hatred you are.
2) We know the allegations. We can work on the basis of what in Scottish law I believe is known as a demurrer (ie assume the allegations are all proven). It would be ridiculous to bar him from the House of Lords now if they do not if proven amount to a reason to bar him. I have now asked you this question multiple times and you still seem to stumble over it.
It's now pretty obvious that you just don't like John Bercow and that if, hypothetically in the future, allegations of bullying are made against a Conservative candidate for a peerage (let's hypothetically call her Mitty Mattel), you will ardently argue that Ms Mattel should on no account see her peerage held up because her undoubted contribution to the upper house is one that the nation should not be deprived of.
In other words, naked hypocritical partisanship.
I'll answer that. If he's guilty of what he's accused of - systematically bullying staff to whom he had a duty of care - he shouldn't be getting a peerage. The fact that bullies may have got them in the past doesn't make it right to keep doing it. He's innocent until proven guilty of course, but given the difficulty of revoking a peerage, there's no harm in holding off.
As for Priti Patel, the wheels seem to have come off the allegations against her. But sure, if it's proven that she bullied her staff, that should call into question not just her suitability for a peerage in future but her current position.
Clear enough?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
Be nice if she applied it to Scottish matters as well where shall we say she is a little bit bitter and one sided.
I'm not Carlotta, you've misgendered me #triggered
But if you read what I replied to, it was the long string of posts between Alastair and Carlotta, your initial one was long forgotten. However if you are one of those halfwitted woke nutjobs that runs about whining about misgendering , jog on loser, if not good joke.
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
What's your alternative "sustainable method?"
Seriously, I'd love a practical alternative. I'm having to explain the entire problem every sodding day to a distressed severely autistic boy.
Saying "Well, this is unacceptable" ain't going to cut the mustard. It's less unacceptable than hundreds of thousands dying.
Encourage “social distancing”, encourage “staying at home” as much as possible. Encourage hand-washing and public hygiene. Let people be sensible and to think for themselves.
This whole thing would be massively more bearable if people could see their closest friends and family. Yes ‘R’ will increase a bit, but yet this could continue for much longer. What other option is there? Realistically there will be no second lockdown.
The critics are only looking at the numbers, and are getting angry at people for not acting like robots. Humans are not robots.
I'm massively in favour of certain relaxations. You may have seen my previous posts on the subject. "Lockdown is over," though is pointing to loads of idiots acting as though it's all over and in the past and they can do what they like. And that's the best way to screwing things back up.
And, if it runs riot again, of course there will be a second lockdown, no matter how much we all may hate the concept. No Government, especially one whose core vote demographic is amongst the older electors, can afford to let a virus like this run free. They'll not abandon the elderly any more than they'd abandon Brexiteers. Maybe they'll call it something different to save face.
And if the death toll starts mounting, yes, people will comply again. They'll focus their ire on those who relaxed it too quickly and too soon and swiftly forget that they themselves were calling for it.
I'm hoping really strongly that the R-number doesn't climb too rapidly. I'm stone-cold certain there are a number of things we can do in the relaxation way that would keep it below 1 (we're finding out more and more things like outdoor activities being comparatively far less risky, for example); it's always possible that people will keep their heads (by and large) and keep to the less risky stuff.
I bloody well hope so, anyway. I was just getting used to being able to do more stuff.
My main fear is that we land in a situation where there are too many cases for effective contact tracing and isolation, and so we end up with a long-term pseudo-lockdown anyway. People like me, who can work from home and can avoid going out much, will continue to do so. Group events like conferences, festivals, sporting events, concerts, even university lectures will remain cancelled indefinitely. Activity will resume, but only reluctantly so, and any sign of outbreaks will cause panic in the affected areas.
If we're running at 8,000 infections per day, and if the R rate stays around 1, then we'd see about 240,000 infections in a month. Very roughly this is about 1-in-200 of the adult population being infected at any moment, which seems like an awful lot of people to trace. Of course, it still makes much more sense to quarantine the 1-in-200 rather than sort-of-quarantining everyone with a lockdown, but can the system actually achieve this?
This is where lockdown timing matters a lot. Would a further week of lockdown cut infections to 4,000 per day? Is halving the number of cases you need to contact-trace going to make a substantial difference to the difficulty of the task?
I feel like we're back in the situation of mid-March, where anyone with a pocket calculator and a bit of common sense would start asking these questions, but the government doesn't seem to want to tell us what it thinks the answers are, presumably because they can't agree amongst themselves.
Where does the 8,000 infections per day come from? Government figure is 1,936 yesterday.
Where does "R rate stays around 1" come from? It is under 1.
The UK government is using deaths to calculate the R rate which means it is 2-3 weeks out of date because of the lags.
The German government uses confirmed cases which is more up to date.
I am using the German methodology on UK data (ignoring the latest five days as the numbers are incomplete) so my estimate is 5 days out of date.
England R = 0.74 (-0.05) on previous day (i.e. 25th May versus 24th May) R calculated as latest days 1-7 divided by days 8-14 i.e. 7 day moving averages to deal with weekend effects and average incubation period) London 0.58 (-0.06) Richmond 0.38 (-0.26) no reported cases in last five days.
The problem with that approach is that it is entirely dependent on the number of tests. If a significant number of people are getting it in a minor way and don't get tested reported infections are entirely a function of the testing regime.
"In blocking a peerage to Bercow Johnson is also going against the advice of Bercow’s successor, Lindsay Hoyle. Back in December he urged Downing Street to follow “custom and practice”."
I have respect for Lindsay Hoyle, certainly after Bercow, but he's hardly uninterested in this row, is he?
They do if they don't make sense in a particular case, as is arguably true here.
I personally think honours should be earned, rather than be given automatically for doing your job.
Anyway, if the HLAC decided not to recommend Bercow, at least until the allegations are settled, then wouldn't it be a breach of convention for Boris to nominate him?
'Honours should be earned'. How does that apply to people such as Andrew Cooper - Lord Cooper of Populus fame? He started off campaigning for Labour at the 1979 election before joining the SDP in 1981 whilst at LSE. He became a policy adviser to David Owen and followed him into the rump SDP in 1988. In the runup to the 1992 election, he defected to the Tories with others such as Danny Finkelstein. Eventually he became Cameron's Polling guru at No 10 and was rewarded by his patronage. His political journey showed little evidence of principle - did he really deserve a peerage more than Bercow?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I see in the Independent that actually he wasn't blocked because of the bullying allegations but because he wasn't Labour, so the Appointments Commission felt it wasn't appropriate for the Labour leader to nominate him. That seems utterly bizarre and a really bad precedent - why shouldn't party leaders be open-minded enough to nominate people who are not party loyalists?
The leaked comments also say that they was a lot of um'ing and ah'ing over Watson, but in his case it was the paedophile claims issue, while Murphy was seen as a "slam-dunk" for unspecified reasons presumed to relate to the handling of anti-semitism allegations.
To be fair, none of this seems to have Johnson's fingerprints on it - it's all the Commission. But their decision-making criteria seem mysterious and subjective, and the willingness of a member (presumably) to gossip anonymously about them makes it even worse.
Yes whether Bercow gets a peerage or not, I couldnt care less about, but if we are going to have peerages decided by politicians, surely there is nothing wrong with them selecting someone outside their own party?
Anyone willing to argue to the contrary, because it seems a terrible rule to me?
Ashdown used one of his nominations for david Alton after he had resigned the whip and I think party membership.
"In blocking a peerage to Bercow Johnson is also going against the advice of Bercow’s successor, Lindsay Hoyle. Back in December he urged Downing Street to follow “custom and practice”."
I have respect for Lindsay Hoyle, certainly after Bercow, but he's hardly uninterested in this row, is he?
They do if they don't make sense in a particular case, as is arguably true here.
I personally think honours should be earned, rather than be given automatically for doing your job.
Anyway, if the HLAC decided not to recommend Bercow, at least until the allegations are settled, then wouldn't it be a breach of convention for Boris to nominate him?
'Honours should be earned'. How does that apply to people such as Andrew Cooper - Lord Cooper of Populus fame? He started off campaigning for Labour at the 1979 election before joining the SDP in 1981 whilst at LSE. He became a policy adviser to David Owen and followed him into the rump SDP in 1988. In the runup to the 1992 election, he defected to the Tories with others such as Danny Finkelstein. Eventually he became Cameron's Polling guru at No 10 and was rewarded by his patronage. His political journey showed little evidence of principle - did he really deserve a peerage more than Bercow?
The correct slogan should be "Honours should be earned but can be bought".
A simple question and probably shows my ignorance, why does the R number appear to go up even when the number of new cases reduces. I’ve watched the number of new cases reduce in Valencia drop dramatically with 0 yesterday but the R number creeps upwards to 1?
.
It really is a nonsense and it is frightening that our policy seems to be built around this mythical number. To determine R one needs to make a series of assumptions. You can assume that a person becomes infected is infectious for a period of time. How long? We really have no idea but the fact that people in hospitals get infected suggest its longer than we think, at least in some cases. We have to assume that person has a certain number of meaningful contacts. We have to assume that the people he or she comes in contact with have average vulnerability (something that clearly would not apply to those working on a care home, for example). And we have to assume that the level of infectivity is something we can usefully average. What we know in fact is that some people, for reasons we do not understand, can infect hundreds of people in a very short time. Others can literally share a bed with their partner night after night without infecting them.
You can obviously take a statistical average of infectivity but it does not tell you anything useful. What is clear is that super spreaders need to be traced and isolated very fast or numbers will increase. For the rest of us common sense precautions and self isolation is probably enough.
We need far more work done on how people are still being infected so many weeks into lockdown. Who are they? What age are they? What environments are causing that infection to spread? And then we need to concentrate on those weak spots whilst building the capacity to identify and trace super spreaders in the general population. I see little evidence we are doing either of these things.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
Science is hard - who’d have thought it!
Hopefully one good thing to come out of all this, might be a bunch of teenagers getting inspired to be scientists.
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I see in the Independent that actually he wasn't blocked because of the bullying allegations but because he wasn't Labour, so the Appointments Commission felt it wasn't appropriate for the Labour leader to nominate him. That seems utterly bizarre and a really bad precedent - why shouldn't party leaders be open-minded enough to nominate people who are not party loyalists?
The leaked comments also say that they was a lot of um'ing and ah'ing over Watson, but in his case it was the paedophile claims issue, while Murphy was seen as a "slam-dunk" for unspecified reasons presumed to relate to the handling of anti-semitism allegations.
To be fair, none of this seems to have Johnson's fingerprints on it - it's all the Commission. But their decision-making criteria seem mysterious and subjective, and the willingness of a member (presumably) to gossip anonymously about them makes it even worse.
Yes whether Bercow gets a peerage or not, I couldnt care less about, but if we are going to have peerages decided by politicians, surely there is nothing wrong with them selecting someone outside their own party?
Anyone willing to argue to the contrary, because it seems a terrible rule to me?
Ashdown used one of his nominations for david Alton after he had resigned the whip and I think party membership.
Interesting that whilst many have approved of the decision to deny Bercow a peerage, it is because of either bullying or his bias, not a single poster has supported the decision on the basis that the Labour leader can only elected Labour members.
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
Even when the lockdown is completely over there is no guarantee that people will return to how they were before.
If my friends and neighbours are in any way typical the over 60s will not be going to concerts / pubs / cinemas/ restaurants / sports events / theatres for the vey simple reason that it will be impossible to avoid the numpties who don't give a shit.
Most of the hospitality industry is going to have to figure out how to turn a profit without the grey pound until such times as there is a vaccine.
The U3a, whose membership is 'over 55 and retired' has been told it's insurers will not cover it's activities "Given that the current advice is"stay at home as much as possible"and"limit contact with other people" it follows that face to face U3A activity should not be undertaken at present The U3A insurers have advised that this is crucial from a public liability insurance perspective." To be fair, no-one has, to my knowledge, ever claimed for catching 'flu at a meeting.
I don't see how U3A (or pubs, theatres, universities etc etc) can be held liable for infecting someone if they have chosen to attend voluntarily. And, in any case, it's probably impossible in the event of acquired infection to say how, when and from whom. Perhaps legislation is necessary to clarify this?
I genuinely have no idea. It is not at all clear who is doing the investigation. The Laura Cox Report came out in the autumn of 2018. More than enough time to complete the most thorough of investigations, not just into Bercow but others against whom allegations were made, including MPs, a point often forgotten.
From a professional perspective, it is utterly disgraceful that such an investigation should take so long.
Yes, I agree (we've been here before with the Labour panel dealing with complaints - not just about anti-semitism, they always take ridiculous amounts of time). A group of political opponents once made an unfounded complaint about me to the police - they took a year to consider and reject it, and then told me they'd not got round to it sooner as it appeared at first glance to be frivolous. I was never very worried but it would have been nice to know that right away. Generally, the recipients of complaints seem to suit themselves without worrying too much about the state of mind of both complainant and complainee (if that's a word).
I’d have been sacked if I took that long to do any sort of investigation.
Speed is essential - especially when the evidence (what someone said etc) is likely to fade over time. Anything involving harassment / bullying needs dealing with promptly - for pretty obvious reasons.
Should I make myself available to the House authorities on how to do investigations? It certainly sounds as if they need some help.
"In blocking a peerage to Bercow Johnson is also going against the advice of Bercow’s successor, Lindsay Hoyle. Back in December he urged Downing Street to follow “custom and practice”."
I have respect for Lindsay Hoyle, certainly after Bercow, but he's hardly uninterested in this row, is he?
They do if they don't make sense in a particular case, as is arguably true here.
I personally think honours should be earned, rather than be given automatically for doing your job.
Anyway, if the HLAC decided not to recommend Bercow, at least until the allegations are settled, then wouldn't it be a breach of convention for Boris to nominate him?
'Honours should be earned'. How does that apply to people such as Andrew Cooper - Lord Cooper of Populus fame? He started off campaigning for Labour at the 1979 election before joining the SDP in 1981 whilst at LSE. He became a policy adviser to David Owen and followed him into the rump SDP in 1988. In the runup to the 1992 election, he defected to the Tories with others such as Danny Finkelstein. Eventually he became Cameron's Polling guru at No 10 and was rewarded by his patronage. His political journey showed little evidence of principle - did he really deserve a peerage more than Bercow?
It may not. That's why I said "should" rather than "are". I'm saying what I want to happen rather than what does.
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
Even when the lockdown is completely over there is no guarantee that people will return to how they were before.
If my friends and neighbours are in any way typical the over 60s will not be going to concerts / pubs / cinemas/ restaurants / sports events / theatres for the vey simple reason that it will be impossible to avoid the numpties who don't give a shit.
Most of the hospitality industry is going to have to figure out how to turn a profit without the grey pound until such times as there is a vaccine.
The U3a, whose membership is 'over 55 and retired' has been told it's insurers will not cover it's activities "Given that the current advice is"stay at home as much as possible"and"limit contact with other people" it follows that face to face U3A activity should not be undertaken at present The U3A insurers have advised that this is crucial from a public liability insurance perspective." To be fair, no-one has, to my knowledge, ever claimed for catching 'flu at a meeting.
I don't see how U3A (or pubs, theatres, universities etc etc) can be held liable for infecting someone if they have chosen to attend voluntarily. And, in any case, it's probably impossible in the event of acquired infection to say how, when and from whom. Perhaps legislation is necessary to clarify this?
Track and trace would give a prima facie evidential pointer to, e.g., a U3A meeting, if say 60% of the audience go down with the lurgy within 4-9 days; genetic sequencing of virus strains, or less specific typing, would clinch that (and should become more important as actualk outbrteaks diminish).
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
Even when the lockdown is completely over there is no guarantee that people will return to how they were before.
If my friends and neighbours are in any way typical the over 60s will not be going to concerts / pubs / cinemas/ restaurants / sports events / theatres for the vey simple reason that it will be impossible to avoid the numpties who don't give a shit.
Most of the hospitality industry is going to have to figure out how to turn a profit without the grey pound until such times as there is a vaccine.
The U3a, whose membership is 'over 55 and retired' has been told it's insurers will not cover it's activities "Given that the current advice is"stay at home as much as possible"and"limit contact with other people" it follows that face to face U3A activity should not be undertaken at present The U3A insurers have advised that this is crucial from a public liability insurance perspective." To be fair, no-one has, to my knowledge, ever claimed for catching 'flu at a meeting.
This needs to be addressed by legislation.
And, frankly, insurers have a nerve: they flog business interruption insurance and then refuse to pay out on it.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
It may be tradition that he should get a peerage but I doubt it will hurt Boris politically, most Tories loathe Bercow despite the fact he was a former Tory MP. Indeed the current incumbent, Lindsay Hoyle, is far more popular with Tories despite being Labour
Because he's a better Speaker? With Hoyle in the chair it's all about the House. With Bercow in the chair it was all about Bercow.
The Grauniad version:
John Bercow will not be awarded a peerage despite being nominated by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, it has been reported.
The nomination of the former Speaker of the House of Commons will not be passed on to the Queen for approval because he is the subject of an investigation into alleged wrongdoing and will not pass a “propriety test” unless he is cleared before the nominations are sent.
So Johnson should have nominated an alleged bully?
Do you think that bullying is a complete bar on entry in the House of Lords?
I don't think someone should "automatically" get a peerage when investigations into their alleged bullying behaviour are under way.
Do you?
Do tell me which bit of that you disagree with. Just so we can understand why things are magically different for the next Conservative bully who's up for consideration.
He had a duty of care to employees. So I'm holding him to a higher standard than any random bully. Why the rush to elevate him before the report?
Gordon Brown was just as much in an employment relationship with those on the receiving end of flying implements as John Bercow. So, logic fail.
You have yet to explain why you see bullying, even if proven, as an automatic bar on ennoblement. One has to conclude that it's just your usual mindless partisanship.
Well, if the Remoaners are going to start name calling.
1) Brown isn't in the Lords - your logic fail 2) Brown's alleged bullying (which read as more temper than systematic, unlike the Bercow allegations) was in Downing Street - not the Houses of Parliament. Which is where you want to return Bercow to.
I haven't said its an "automatic bar on ennoblement" - I've said it shouldn't happen while an investigation is underway.
But to you the Remoaners hero should be elevated whatever the result of the enquiry....
So the investigation happens and John Bercow is found to have been a bully. You then conclude he should not be a member of the House of Lords?
Rather depends on the results of the enquiry - why your rush to prejudge it?
What's so terribly wrong with waiting for its outcome? A question you have assiduously failed to address.
It must be frustrating to see your hero removed from the public stage of which he was so fond.
1) He really isn't my hero. Your idea that he might be just shows how blinded by your pathological hatred you are.
2) We know the allegations. We can work on the basis of what in Scottish law I believe is known as a demurrer (ie assume the allegations are all proven). It would be ridiculous to bar him from the House of Lords now if they do not if proven amount to a reason to bar him. I have now asked you this question multiple times and you still seem to stumble over it.
It's now pretty obvious that you just don't like John Bercow and that if, hypothetically in the future, allegations of bullying are made against a Conservative candidate for a peerage (let's hypothetically call her Mitty Mattel), you will ardently argue that Ms Mattel should on no account see her peerage held up because her undoubted contribution to the upper house is one that the nation should not be deprived of.
In other words, naked hypocritical partisanship.
I'll answer that. If he's guilty of what he's accused of - systematically bullying staff to whom he had a duty of care - he shouldn't be getting a peerage. The fact that bullies may have got them in the past doesn't make it right to keep doing it. He's innocent until proven guilty of course, but given the difficulty of revoking a peerage, there's no harm in holding off.
As for Priti Patel, the wheels seem to have come off the allegations against her. But sure, if it's proven that she bullied her staff, that should call into question not just her suitability for a peerage in future but her current position.
Clear enough?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I like to think I would, but who knows. If Bercow were facing the same allegations, but had not had his (real or perceived) role in frustrating Brexit, would you be so keen on him being ennobled?
I've got a clear personal test for this, mentioned above:
1) does the person in question have a contribution to make worthy of the House of Lords? 2) does the person in question have a flaw that is disqualifying?
For me, the bullying allegations even if made out do not disqualify someone who otherwise has a substantial contribution to make. So I would admit both John Bercow and (should the circumstance ever arise) Priti Patel to the House of Lords regardless of how bullying allegations against them pan out. The allegations made are simply not serious enough to justify depriving the upper house of their undoubted experience.
On this test I suspect opinion would be divided as to whether John Bercow should be elevated. But I would say on 1) No, or not enough. 2) Yes.
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
What's your alternative "sustainable method?"
Seriously, I'd love a practical alternative. I'm having to explain the entire problem every sodding day to a distressed severely autistic boy.
Saying "Well, this is unacceptable" ain't going to cut the mustard. It's less unacceptable than hundreds of thousands dying.
Encourage “social distancing”, encourage “staying at home” as much as possible. Encourage hand-washing and public hygiene. Let people be sensible and to think for themselves.
This whole thing would be massively more bearable if people could see their closest friends and family. Yes ‘R’ will increase a bit, but yet this could continue for much longer. What other option is there? Realistically there will be no second lockdown.
The critics are only looking at the numbers, and are getting angry at people for not acting like robots. Humans are not robots.
I'm massively in favour of certain relaxations. You may have seen my previous posts on the subject. "Lockdown is over," though is pointing to loads of idiots acting as though it's all over and in the past and they can do what they like. And that's the best way to screwing things back up.
And, if it runs riot again, of course there will be a second lockdown, no matter how much we all may hate the concept. No Government, especially one whose core vote demographic is amongst the older electors, can afford to let a virus like this run free. They'll not abandon the elderly any more than they'd abandon Brexiteers. Maybe they'll call it something different to save face.
And if the death toll starts mounting, yes, people will comply again. They'll focus their ire on those who relaxed it too quickly and too soon and swiftly forget that they themselves were calling for it.
I'm hoping really strongly that the R-number doesn't climb too rapidly. I'm stone-cold certain there are a number of things we can do in the relaxation way that would keep it below 1 (we're finding out more and more things like outdoor activities being comparatively far less risky, for example); it's always possible that people will keep their heads (by and large) and keep to the less risky stuff.
I bloody well hope so, anyway. I was just getting used to being able to do more stuff.
My main fear is that we land in a situation where there are too many cases for effective contact tracing and isolation, and so we end up with a long-term pseudo-lockdown anyway. People like me, who can work from home and can avoid going out much, will continue to do so. Group events like conferences, festivals, sporting events, concerts, even university lectures will remain cancelled indefinitely. Activity will resume, but only reluctantly so, and any sign of outbreaks will cause panic in the affected areas.
If we're running at 8,000 infections per day, and if the R rate stays around 1, then we'd see about 240,000 infections in a month. Very roughly this is about 1-in-200 of the adult population being infected at any moment, which seems like an awful lot of people to trace. Of course, it still makes much more sense to quarantine the 1-in-200 rather than sort-of-quarantining everyone with a lockdown, but can the system actually achieve this?
This is where lockdown timing matters a lot. Would a further week of lockdown cut infections to 4,000 per day? Is halving the number of cases you need to contact-trace going to make a substantial difference to the difficulty of the task?
I feel like we're back in the situation of mid-March, where anyone with a pocket calculator and a bit of common sense would start asking these questions, but the government doesn't seem to want to tell us what it thinks the answers are, presumably because they can't agree amongst themselves.
Where does the 8,000 infections per day come from? Government figure is 1,936 yesterday.
Where does "R rate stays around 1" come from? It is under 1.
The UK government is using deaths to calculate the R rate which means it is 2-3 weeks out of date because of the lags.
The German government uses confirmed cases which is more up to date.
I am using the German methodology on UK data (ignoring the latest five days as the numbers are incomplete) so my estimate is 5 days out of date.
England R = 0.74 (-0.05) on previous day (i.e. 25th May versus 24th May) R calculated as latest days 1-7 divided by days 8-14 i.e. 7 day moving averages to deal with weekend effects and average incubation period) London 0.58 (-0.06) Richmond 0.38 (-0.26) no reported cases in last five days.
The problem with that approach is that it is entirely dependent on the number of tests. If a significant number of people are getting it in a minor way and don't get tested reported infections are entirely a function of the testing regime.
Yes I understand that. And if the number of tests are increasing, you might assume that they will pick up more cases leading to an over-estimate of R.
There's a trade off between more accurate data (UK deaths) and more up to date data (German confirmed cases). I guess you need to monitor both. I guess they are.
At my Trust 3000 staff have had antibody testing since it was announced on Friday. They have suspended it for the remaining staff so that they can catch up in the Lab.
I bet we don't get a slide explaining that is happening, at the afternoon presser.
“These protests are about America’s failure to honor the lives of Black people. If the law means anything, if our lives mean anything, then driving a police car into a crowd of protesters is a crime. Isn’t that obvious?” de Blasio’s former deputy mayor Richard Buery said in a tweet.
Actress and activist Cynthia Nixon, a key supporter of de Blasio’s 2013 campaign who later ran unsuccessfully for governor, said she “cannot begin to understand why our ‘progressive’ Mayor selected this man for commissioner” after Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said he is “extremely proud” of how police officers have responded.
Jonathan Rosen, a longtime adviser to the mayor, reacted to de Blasio’s statements with: “What the fucking fuck?”...
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I see in the Independent that actually he wasn't blocked because of the bullying allegations but because he wasn't Labour, so the Appointments Commission felt it wasn't appropriate for the Labour leader to nominate him. That seems utterly bizarre and a really bad precedent - why shouldn't party leaders be open-minded enough to nominate people who are not party loyalists?
The leaked comments also say that they was a lot of um'ing and ah'ing over Watson, but in his case it was the paedophile claims issue, while Murphy was seen as a "slam-dunk" for unspecified reasons presumed to relate to the handling of anti-semitism allegations.
To be fair, none of this seems to have Johnson's fingerprints on it - it's all the Commission. But their decision-making criteria seem mysterious and subjective, and the willingness of a member (presumably) to gossip anonymously about them makes it even worse.
Yes whether Bercow gets a peerage or not, I couldnt care less about, but if we are going to have peerages decided by politicians, surely there is nothing wrong with them selecting someone outside their own party?
Anyone willing to argue to the contrary, because it seems a terrible rule to me?
Ashdown used one of his nominations for david Alton after he had resigned the whip and I think party membership.
Lib Dems are almost as principles and morals free as the Tories.
The nugget at the end of that piece is the most interesting.
Going for herd immunity left Sweden with a lower antibody trace than countries that.....er.....were not going for herd immunity. The later often had more people with antibodies. In some cases, lots more (London)
When the rival superpower collapsed, exhausted, the United States took the wrong lessons from the fall of communism. American policymakers convinced themselves their global dominance was due to the success of their liberal ideology rather than of their industrial might, and that the sudden, unexpected disintegration of the Soviet Union was due to the vindication of liberalism rather than of the awakened nationalism of Russia’s subject peoples.
America’s rapid rise to global hegemony and equally rapid decline is a grand historical tragedy of the highest order, and as in classical tragedy, the root cause is the protagonist’s central character flaw.
And, a key point (the same conclusion reached by Krastev & Holmes):
Trump is a morbid symptom of this chaos, rather than its cause.
"Where does the 8,000 infections per day come from? Government figure is 1,936 yesterday."
That comes from the data in the May 28th gov.uk slides (slide 8)
8,000 is the estimated number of infections, of which testing catches 2k odd, is my reading of that data.
OK. Thanks. You can't really use that figure for estimating trends in R. The subset of confirmed cases is more useful for that, but not for how prevalent the disease is.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
lockdown is almost gone in any case David, certainly in England and likely Scotland shortly.
It may be tradition that he should get a peerage but I doubt it will hurt Boris politically, most Tories loathe Bercow despite the fact he was a former Tory MP. Indeed the current incumbent, Lindsay Hoyle, is far more popular with Tories despite being Labour
Because he's a better Speaker? With Hoyle in the chair it's all about the House. With Bercow in the chair it was all about Bercow.
The Grauniad version:
John Bercow will not be awarded a peerage despite being nominated by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, it has been reported.
The nomination of the former Speaker of the House of Commons will not be passed on to the Queen for approval because he is the subject of an investigation into alleged wrongdoing and will not pass a “propriety test” unless he is cleared before the nominations are sent.
So Johnson should have nominated an alleged bully?
Do you think that bullying is a complete bar on entry in the House of Lords?
I don't think someone should "automatically" get a peerage when investigations into their alleged bullying behaviour are under way.
Do you?
Do tell me which bit of that you disagree with. Just so we can understand why things are magically different for the next Conservative bully who's up for consideration.
He had a duty of care to employees. So I'm holding him to a higher standard than any random bully. Why the rush to elevate him before the report?
Gordon Brown was just as much in an employment relationship with those on the receiving end of flying implements as John Bercow. So, logic fail.
You have yet to explain why you see bullying, even if proven, as an automatic bar on ennoblement. One has to conclude that it's just your usual mindless partisanship.
Well, if the Remoaners are going to start name calling.
1) Brown isn't in the Lords - your logic fail 2) Brown's alleged bullying (which read as more temper than systematic, unlike the Bercow allegations) was in Downing Street - not the Houses of Parliament. Which is where you want to return Bercow to.
I haven't said its an "automatic bar on ennoblement" - I've said it shouldn't happen while an investigation is underway.
But to you the Remoaners hero should be elevated whatever the result of the enquiry....
So the investigation happens and John Bercow is found to have been a bully. You then conclude he should not be a member of the House of Lords?
Rather depends on the results of the enquiry - why your rush to prejudge it?
What's so terribly wrong with waiting for its outcome? A question you have assiduously failed to address.
It must be frustrating to see your hero removed from the public stage of which he was so fond.
1) He really isn't my hero. Your idea that he might be just shows how blinded by your pathological hatred you are.
2) We know the allegations. We can work on the basis of what in Scottish law I believe is known as a demurrer (ie assume the allegations are all proven). It would be ridiculous to bar him from the House of Lords now if they do not if proven amount to a reason to bar him. I have now asked you this question multiple times and you still seem to stumble over it.
It's now pretty obvious that you just don't like John Bercow and that if, hypothetically in the future, allegations of bullying are made against a Conservative candidate for a peerage (let's hypothetically call her Mitty Mattel), you will ardently argue that Ms Mattel should on no account see her peerage held up because her undoubted contribution to the upper house is one that the nation should not be deprived of.
In other words, naked hypocritical partisanship.
I'll answer that. If he's guilty of what he's accused of - systematically bullying staff to whom he had a duty of care - he shouldn't be getting a peerage. The fact that bullies may have got them in the past doesn't make it right to keep doing it. He's innocent until proven guilty of course, but given the difficulty of revoking a peerage, there's no harm in holding off.
As for Priti Patel, the wheels seem to have come off the allegations against her. But sure, if it's proven that she bullied her staff, that should call into question not just her suitability for a peerage in future but her current position.
Clear enough?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I like to think I would, but who knows. If Bercow were facing the same allegations, but had not had his (real or perceived) role in frustrating Brexit, would you be so keen on him being ennobled?
I've got a clear personal test for this, mentioned above:
1) does the person in question have a contribution to make worthy of the House of Lords? 2) does the person in question have a flaw that is disqualifying?
For me, the bullying allegations even if made out do not disqualify someone who otherwise has a substantial contribution to make. So I would admit both John Bercow and (should the circumstance ever arise) Priti Patel to the House of Lords regardless of how bullying allegations against them pan out. The allegations made are simply not serious enough to justify depriving the upper house of their undoubted experience.
On this test I suspect opinion would be divided as to whether John Bercow should be elevated. But I would say on 1) No, or not enough. 2) Yes.
It's quite a call to say that he's the first Speaker since time immemorial not to merit elevation, especially given he served such a long stint. Are you absolutely sure you're not letting your Brexit views cloud your judgement?
It may be tradition that he should get a peerage but I doubt it will hurt Boris politically, most Tories loathe Bercow despite the fact he was a former Tory MP. Indeed the current incumbent, Lindsay Hoyle, is far more popular with Tories despite being Labour
Because he's a better Speaker? With Hoyle in the chair it's all about the House. With Bercow in the chair it was all about Bercow.
The Grauniad version:
John Bercow will not be awarded a peerage despite being nominated by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, it has been reported.
The nomination of the former Speaker of the House of Commons will not be passed on to the Queen for approval because he is the subject of an investigation into alleged wrongdoing and will not pass a “propriety test” unless he is cleared before the nominations are sent.
So Johnson should have nominated an alleged bully?
Do you think that bullying is a complete bar on entry in the House of Lords?
I don't think someone should "automatically" get a peerage when investigations into their alleged bullying behaviour are under way.
Do you?
Do tell me which bit of that you disagree with. Just so we can understand why things are magically different for the next Conservative bully who's up for consideration.
He had a duty of care to employees. So I'm holding him to a higher standard than any random bully. Why the rush to elevate him before the report?
Gordon Brown was just as much in an employment relationship with those on the receiving end of flying implements as John Bercow. So, logic fail.
You have yet to explain why you see bullying, even if proven, as an automatic bar on ennoblement. One has to conclude that it's just your usual mindless partisanship.
Well, if the Remoaners are going to start name calling.
1) Brown isn't in the Lords - your logic fail 2) Brown's alleged bullying (which read as more temper than systematic, unlike the Bercow allegations) was in Downing Street - not the Houses of Parliament. Which is where you want to return Bercow to.
I haven't said its an "automatic bar on ennoblement" - I've said it shouldn't happen while an investigation is underway.
But to you the Remoaners hero should be elevated whatever the result of the enquiry....
So the investigation happens and John Bercow is found to have been a bully. You then conclude he should not be a member of the House of Lords?
Rather depends on the results of the enquiry - why your rush to prejudge it?
What's so terribly wrong with waiting for its outcome? A question you have assiduously failed to address.
It must be frustrating to see your hero removed from the public stage of which he was so fond.
1) He really isn't my hero. Your idea that he might be just shows how blinded by your pathological hatred you are.
2) We know the allegations. We can work on the basis of what in Scottish law I believe is known as a demurrer (ie assume the allegations are all proven). It would be ridiculous to bar him from the House of Lords now if they do not if proven amount to a reason to bar him. I have now asked you this question multiple times and you still seem to stumble over it.
It's now pretty obvious that you just don't like John Bercow and that if, hypothetically in the future, allegations of bullying are made against a Conservative candidate for a peerage (let's hypothetically call her Mitty Mattel), you will ardently argue that Ms Mattel should on no account see her peerage held up because her undoubted contribution to the upper house is one that the nation should not be deprived of.
In other words, naked hypocritical partisanship.
I'll answer that. If he's guilty of what he's accused of - systematically bullying staff to whom he had a duty of care - he shouldn't be getting a peerage. The fact that bullies may have got them in the past doesn't make it right to keep doing it. He's innocent until proven guilty of course, but given the difficulty of revoking a peerage, there's no harm in holding off.
As for Priti Patel, the wheels seem to have come off the allegations against her. But sure, if it's proven that she bullied her staff, that should call into question not just her suitability for a peerage in future but her current position.
Clear enough?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I like to think I would, but who knows. If Bercow were facing the same allegations, but had not had his (real or perceived) role in frustrating Brexit, would you be so keen on him being ennobled?
I've got a clear personal test for this, mentioned above:
1) does the person in question have a contribution to make worthy of the House of Lords? 2) does the person in question have a flaw that is disqualifying?
For me, the bullying allegations even if made out do not disqualify someone who otherwise has a substantial contribution to make. So I would admit both John Bercow and (should the circumstance ever arise) Priti Patel to the House of Lords regardless of how bullying allegations against them pan out. The allegations made are simply not serious enough to justify depriving the upper house of their undoubted experience.
On this test I suspect opinion would be divided as to whether John Bercow should be elevated. But I would say on 1) No, or not enough. 2) Yes.
It's quite a call to say that he's the first Speaker since time immemorial not to merit elevation, especially given he served such a long stint. Are you absolutely sure you're not letting your Brexit views cloud your judgement?
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
lockdown is almost gone in any case David, certainly in England and likely Scotland shortly.
Until we can go to hotels and restaurants again and visit each others houses then lockdown is not over
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
Lots of possible confounding factors; the impossibility of conducting anything but retrospective tests; the reliance on the self reporting of precautions people did (or didn't) take... it's hardly surprising there isn't an answer (and likely that it's a combination of answers, anyway).
Progress can be made. We've just worked out, a century on, how anaesthesia actually works...
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
lockdown is almost gone in any case David, certainly in England and likely Scotland shortly.
That's true but what happens next? We are flying blind and hoping for the best. Maybe, like Belgium, we will get away with it. Maybe.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
lockdown is almost gone in any case David, certainly in England and likely Scotland shortly.
Until we can go to hotels and restaurants again and visit each others houses then lockdown is not over
France, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Australia and New Zealand have already eased lockdown
Because they were several weeks ahead of us?
It doesn’t matter. Lockdown is over for all intents and purposes whether you like it or not. People have had enough.
It doesn't matter whether we like it or not. It only matters if the virus likes it or not.
Well it doesn’t. We cant all cower in our homes indefinitely. The virus is not going anywhere for the time being.
We’re not going to “cower in our homes indefinitely”. We’re going to exercise certain restrictions and limitations to restrict the spread of the virus and reduce the death toll and economic damage. There’s a big difference. Deciding “fuck it, let’s just do what we want” is the best route to another full lockdown (together with a big increase in deaths and bereavements, and suffering of those who merely get very ill). Something I, for one, really don’t want to see.
“Certain restrictions and limitations”? Really? Is that how you would describe the destruction of livelihoods and the huge mental health burden?
To fight the virus, you need a sustainable method. Lockdown is not it. It goes against all of human nature.
What's your alternative "sustainable method?"
Seriously, I'd love a practical alternative. I'm having to explain the entire problem every sodding day to a distressed severely autistic boy.
Saying "Well, this is unacceptable" ain't going to cut the mustard. It's less unacceptable than hundreds of thousands dying.
Encourage “social distancing”, encourage “staying at home” as much as possible. Encourage hand-washing and public hygiene. Let people be sensible and to think for themselves.
This whole thing would be massively more bearable if people could see their closest friends and family. Yes ‘R’ will increase a bit, but yet this could continue for much longer. What other option is there? Realistically there will be no second lockdown.
The critics are only looking at the numbers, and are getting angry at people for not acting like robots. Humans are not robots.
I'm massively in favour of certain relaxations. You may have seen my previous posts on the subject. "Lockdown is over," though is pointing to loads of idiots acting as though it's all over and in the past and they can do what they like. And that's the best way to screwing things back up.
And, if it runs riot again, of course there will be a second lockdown, no matter how much we all may hate the concept. No Government, especially one whose core vote demographic is amongst the older electors, can afford to let a virus like this run free. They'll not abandon the elderly any more than they'd abandon Brexiteers. Maybe they'll call it something different to save face.
And if the death toll starts mounting, yes, people will comply again. They'll focus their ire on those who relaxed it too quickly and too soon and swiftly forget that they themselves were calling for it.
I'm hoping really strongly that the R-number doesn't climb too rapidly. I'm stone-cold certain there are a number of things we can do in the relaxation way that would keep it below 1 (we're finding out more and more things like outdoor activities being comparatively far less risky, for example); it's always possible that people will keep their heads (by and large) and keep to the less risky stuff.
I bloody well hope so, anyway. I was just getting used to being able to do more stuff.
My main fear is that we land in a situation where there are too many cases for effective contact tracing and isolation, and so we end up with a long-term pseudo-lockdown anyway. People like me, who can work from home and can avoid going out much, will continue to do so. Group events like conferences, festivals, sporting events, concerts, even university lectures will remain cancelled indefinitely. Activity will resume, but only reluctantly so, and any sign of outbreaks will cause panic in the affected areas.
If we're running at 8,000 infections per day, and if the R rate stays around 1, then we'd see about 240,000 infections in a month. Very roughly this is about 1-in-200 of the adult population being infected at any moment, which seems like an awful lot of people to trace. Of course, it still makes much more sense to quarantine the 1-in-200 rather than sort-of-quarantining everyone with a lockdown, but can the system actually achieve this?
This is where lockdown timing matters a lot. Would a further week of lockdown cut infections to 4,000 per day? Is halving the number of cases you need to contact-trace going to make a substantial difference to the difficulty of the task?
I feel like we're back in the situation of mid-March, where anyone with a pocket calculator and a bit of common sense would start asking these questions, but the government doesn't seem to want to tell us what it thinks the answers are, presumably because they can't agree amongst themselves.
Where does the 8,000 infections per day come from? Government figure is 1,936 yesterday.
Where does "R rate stays around 1" come from? It is under 1.
It's estimated at 0.7-0.9, with local variations. I presume that loosening of restrictions will raise the rate - perhaps not much, but enough to keep it fairly close.
The UK government is using deaths to calculate the R rate which means it is 2-3 weeks out of date because of the lags.
The German government uses confirmed cases which is more up to date.
I am using the German methodology on UK data (ignoring the latest five days as the numbers are incomplete) so my estimate is 5 days out of date.
England R = 0.74 (-0.05) on previous day (i.e. 25th May versus 24th May) R calculated as latest days 1-7 divided by days 8-14 i.e. 7 day moving averages to deal with weekend effects and average incubation period) London 0.58 (-0.06) Richmond 0.38 (-0.26) no reported cases in last five days.
I would obviously hope that your figures are correct. But the government's own figures, and the comments from Sir Patrick Valance, seem to indicate a stubbornly high rate of infection - declining, but not fast. The idea behind the lockdown was to hammer the numbers down to very low levels, such that contact tracing could stay on top of any subsequent outbreaks and the average person could be confident that a typical train, office, school or hospital doesn't contain any infected people, allowing normal life to resume in those places. The government's figures don't make it look like this has happened and it would be nice if the confusion could be resolved.
The nugget at the end of that piece is the most interesting.
Going for herd immunity left Sweden with a lower antibody trace than countries that.....er.....were not going for herd immunity. The later often had more people with antibodies. In some cases, lots more (London)
Well, yes. Their base R0 was lower than that here and in many other countries, thanks to their population distribution and social culture. As discussed at length here.
So the initial ramp up was harder and faster here, in France, in Belgium, in NYC, and so on, resulting in far more infections (and thus, a bit later, deaths) already baked in prior to lockdowns being instituted.
Had Sweden done a full-on lockdown at about the same time we did, they'd have rammed their infection rates down (as Norway and Denmark did), their infection rates would be far lower. And lifting to their current strategy then would have been sustainable long-term.
Surely the complaint that appears frivolous should be first on their list? They can quickly log it as closed if their investigation matches their hunch, which should be good for their own numbers - not to mention the health of those accused.
Yes, that's how I deal with emails - rapidly scan the list and deal with those that can be answered "Yes" "No" or just deleted, then come back to the others.
It may be tradition that he should get a peerage but I doubt it will hurt Boris politically, most Tories loathe Bercow despite the fact he was a former Tory MP. Indeed the current incumbent, Lindsay Hoyle, is far more popular with Tories despite being Labour
Because he's a better Speaker? With Hoyle in the chair it's all about the House. With Bercow in the chair it was all about Bercow.
The Grauniad version:
John Bercow will not be awarded a peerage despite being nominated by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, it has been reported.
The nomination of the former Speaker of the House of Commons will not be passed on to the Queen for approval because he is the subject of an investigation into alleged wrongdoing and will not pass a “propriety test” unless he is cleared before the nominations are sent.
So Johnson should have nominated an alleged bully?
Do you think that bullying is a complete bar on entry in the House of Lords?
I don't think someone should "automatically" get a peerage when investigations into their alleged bullying behaviour are under way.
Do you?
Do tell me which bit of that you disagree with. Just so we can understand why things are magically different for the next Conservative bully who's up for consideration.
He had a duty of care to employees. So I'm holding him to a higher standard than any random bully. Why the rush to elevate him before the report?
Gordon Brown was just as much in an employment relationship with those on the receiving end of flying implements as John Bercow. So, logic fail.
You have yet to explain why you see bullying, even if proven, as an automatic bar on ennoblement. One has to conclude that it's just your usual mindless partisanship.
Well, if the Remoaners are going to start name calling.
1) Brown isn't in the Lords - your logic fail 2) Brown's alleged bullying (which read as more temper than systematic, unlike the Bercow allegations) was in Downing Street - not the Houses of Parliament. Which is where you want to return Bercow to.
I haven't said its an "automatic bar on ennoblement" - I've said it shouldn't happen while an investigation is underway.
But to you the Remoaners hero should be elevated whatever the result of the enquiry....
So the investigation happens and John Bercow is found to have been a bully. You then conclude he should not be a member of the House of Lords?
Rather depends on the results of the enquiry - why your rush to prejudge it?
What's so terribly wrong with waiting for its outcome? A question you have assiduously failed to address.
It must be frustrating to see your hero removed from the public stage of which he was so fond.
1) He really isn't my hero. Your idea that he might be just shows how blinded by your pathological hatred you are.
2) We know the allegations. We can work on the basis of what in Scottish law I believe is known as a demurrer (ie assume the allegations are all proven). It would be ridiculous to bar him from the House of Lords now if they do not if proven amount to a reason to bar him. I have now asked you this question multiple times and you still seem to stumble over it.
It's now pretty obvious that you just don't like John Bercow and that if, hypothetically in the future, allegations of bullying are made against a Conservative candidate for a peerage (let's hypothetically call her Mitty Mattel), you will ardently argue that Ms Mattel should on no account see her peerage held up because her undoubted contribution to the upper house is one that the nation should not be deprived of.
In other words, naked hypocritical partisanship.
I'll answer that. If he's guilty of what he's accused of - systematically bullying staff to whom he had a duty of care - he shouldn't be getting a peerage. The fact that bullies may have got them in the past doesn't make it right to keep doing it. He's innocent until proven guilty of course, but given the difficulty of revoking a peerage, there's no harm in holding off.
As for Priti Patel, the wheels seem to have come off the allegations against her. But sure, if it's proven that she bullied her staff, that should call into question not just her suitability for a peerage in future but her current position.
Clear enough?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I like to think I would, but who knows. If Bercow were facing the same allegations, but had not had his (real or perceived) role in frustrating Brexit, would you be so keen on him being ennobled?
I've got a clear personal test for this, mentioned above:
1) does the person in question have a contribution to make worthy of the House of Lords? 2) does the person in question have a flaw that is disqualifying?
For me, the bullying allegations even if made out do not disqualify someone who otherwise has a substantial contribution to make. So I would admit both John Bercow and (should the circumstance ever arise) Priti Patel to the House of Lords regardless of how bullying allegations against them pan out. The allegations made are simply not serious enough to justify depriving the upper house of their undoubted experience.
On this test I suspect opinion would be divided as to whether John Bercow should be elevated. But I would say on 1) No, or not enough. 2) Yes.
It's quite a call to say that he's the first Speaker since time immemorial not to merit elevation, especially given he served such a long stint. Are you absolutely sure you're not letting your Brexit views cloud your judgement?
Come back to me when you have anything coherent to write and you're not simply parading your partisan idiocy for all to see. I've explained clearly what I would do and why. And you? You're still sucking your pencil trying to work out exactly why you hate John Bercow so much.
I’ve clearly explained that I’d pend any decision on elevating Bercow until the investigation into his bullying is completed. I have provided you with an explanation, I fear I cannot provide you with an understanding.
Do you think calling people names makes your argument more persuasive?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I see in the Independent that actually he wasn't blocked because of the bullying allegations but because he wasn't Labour, so the Appointments Commission felt it wasn't appropriate for the Labour leader to nominate him. That seems utterly bizarre and a really bad precedent - why shouldn't party leaders be open-minded enough to nominate people who are not party loyalists?
The leaked comments also say that they was a lot of um'ing and ah'ing over Watson, but in his case it was the paedophile claims issue, while Murphy was seen as a "slam-dunk" for unspecified reasons presumed to relate to the handling of anti-semitism allegations.
To be fair, none of this seems to have Johnson's fingerprints on it - it's all the Commission. But their decision-making criteria seem mysterious and subjective, and the willingness of a member (presumably) to gossip anonymously about them makes it even worse.
Yes whether Bercow gets a peerage or not, I couldnt care less about, but if we are going to have peerages decided by politicians, surely there is nothing wrong with them selecting someone outside their own party?
Anyone willing to argue to the contrary, because it seems a terrible rule to me?
Ashdown used one of his nominations for david Alton after he had resigned the whip and I think party membership.
Lib Dems are almost as principles and morals free as the Tories.
Well I remain, in my mind, principled and attempt to live to my idea of a moral code.
"Where does the 8,000 infections per day come from? Government figure is 1,936 yesterday."
That comes from the data in the May 28th gov.uk slides (slide 8)
8,000 is the estimated number of infections, of which testing catches 2k odd, is my reading of that data.
OK. Thanks. You can't really use that figure for estimating trends in R. The subset of confirmed cases is more useful for that, but not for how prevalent the disease is.
The survey also gives an estimate of the overall prevalence, but I think so far the statistical uncertainty is too large to be confident about whether infection is increasing or decreasing. I hope that uncertainty will decrease as the survey goes on (preferably not through an increase in the percentage infected).
The English are finally finding out what it's like to be governed by the English.
They don't look like Covidiots. Just idiots.
It’s a sign of the times that most people just stand around filming it rather than doing anything to help break it up.
To be fair, I have seen more than enough clips of people trying to do exactly that and then an even bigger fight breaks out, as in the chaos people decide that those trying to assist are part of it.
From the US, there is a clip from yesterday where a guy goes to help a woman who has been pushed off her bike and being robbed by a couple of people. Then it escalates as the mob decide he must have been assaulting the robbers, so 10s of them beat him up.
In another clip from the other day in the UK on a beach, a fight break out, some people try to calm it and one particular evil thug uses the fact people are distracted to sucker punch 2 or 3 of those who didn't even start it.
Come back to me when you have anything coherent to write and you're not simply parading your partisan idiocy for all to see. I've explained clearly what I would do and why. And you? You're still sucking your pencil trying to work out exactly why you hate John Bercow so much.
I’ve clearly explained that I’d pend any decision on elevating Bercow until the investigation into his bullying is completed. I have provided you with an explanation, I fear I cannot provide you with an understanding.
Do you think calling people names makes your argument more persuasive?
You have given no reason for your view despite me asking repeatedly whether believe the allegations are serious enough to justify withholding a peerage even if proven, and your test. All you have offered is partisan bilge. If you don't like this being pointed out, offer something other than partisan bilge.
The nugget at the end of that piece is the most interesting.
Going for herd immunity left Sweden with a lower antibody trace than countries that.....er.....were not going for herd immunity. The later often had more people with antibodies. In some cases, lots more (London)
Well, yes. Their base R0 was lower than that here and in many other countries, thanks to their population distribution and social culture. As discussed at length here.
So the initial ramp up was harder and faster here, in France, in Belgium, in NYC, and so on, resulting in far more infections (and thus, a bit later, deaths) already baked in prior to lockdowns being instituted.
Had Sweden done a full-on lockdown at about the same time we did, they'd have rammed their infection rates down (as Norway and Denmark did), their infection rates would be far lower. And lifting to their current strategy then would have been sustainable long-term.
Missed opportunity.
How do we know ?
CV19 is a marathon not a sprint. In all likelihood we wont know what's best for another three years or so when the final body count has been done. Sweden could be following the right strategy or it could be a complete disaster. .None of us can claim to know what is best as its still too early to say.
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
Lots of possible confounding factors; the impossibility of conducting anything but retrospective tests; the reliance on the self reporting of precautions people did (or didn't) take... it's hardly surprising there isn't an answer (and likely that it's a combination of answers, anyway).
Progress can be made. We've just worked out, a century on, how anaesthesia actually works...
If it has really been like this for 3 weeks a good deal of encouragement can be taken from those figures.
The example of Belgium really is quite interesting - the death rate skyrocketed, peaked astonishingly high in mid April, dramatically worse than anywhere else (Peru perhaps?), but then fell away equally rapidly also.
The bullying allegations should be sufficient to merit at least a pause in the process. If they're found to be groundless or exaggerated then there's no reason why a peerage couldn't be awarded later - and I do think that in general, it's a good thing for former Speakers to be appointed to the Lords.
However, that should be a general rule and not a guarantee. Having overseen the expenses scandal and having almost been forced out in consequence of it, Michael Martin should not have received a peerage either. To deny two Speakers in a row would be unfortunate but these things have to be considered case-by-case.
I can remember years ago, when discussing the merits of Britain becoming a republic, and the obvious questions around who would then become head of state, the writer Edward Pearce, saying: "Easy". The obvious answer to him was the Speaker of the House of Commons who would easily act the part. At the time I think the Speaker was Bernard Weatherill. Michael Martin and John Bercow have well and truly smashed that scenario between them!
If you saw “This House” from the NT (on YouTube until Thursday) Weatherill is the Tory Deputy Chief Whip. His actions on the night of the no confidence vote at the end (which are apparently true) were those of a very decent man, prepared to do the right thing at the potential cost of his career.
When the rival superpower collapsed, exhausted, the United States took the wrong lessons from the fall of communism. American policymakers convinced themselves their global dominance was due to the success of their liberal ideology rather than of their industrial might, and that the sudden, unexpected disintegration of the Soviet Union was due to the vindication of liberalism rather than of the awakened nationalism of Russia’s subject peoples.
America’s rapid rise to global hegemony and equally rapid decline is a grand historical tragedy of the highest order, and as in classical tragedy, the root cause is the protagonist’s central character flaw.
And, a key point (the same conclusion reached by Krastev & Holmes):
Trump is a morbid symptom of this chaos, rather than its cause.
The election of Donald Trump in 2016 was a symptom of a sick country and since then he has been instrumental in the deterioration of the patient. For a cure to even be contemplated the necessary first step is his removal from office. This is how I look at it.
I fail to see how people meeting in a garden vs a park will make much difference, especially as people have been doing this for a couple of week already. And schools were already planned to go back before the Cummings business.
The reality is a bit like the lockdown, where the government followed the public (IMO too slow to enforce it), the lifting, the government are again following it, as many people have decided they can't take it anymore.
Scotland are basically following the same approach and Sturgeon doesn't have any of the Cummings baggage.
I think a bigger problem for the government is when we have to lockdown again at some point, Cummings incident has made that message much harder.
I always thought our lockdown was looser than other countries with the collolary that it would also last longer or be eased less than elsewhere. Non essential manufacturing has been allowed right throughout ours for instance, it hasn't elsewhere.
America -- any twitter geeks know what #dcblackout is all about? Talk of a media blackout in Washington, no phones and, well, the sort of thing we normally accuse the Kremlin of. Anything in it or just overloaded infrastructure?
If it has really been like this for 3 weeks a good deal of encouragement can be taken from those figures.
The example of Belgium really is quite interesting - the death rate skyrocketed, peaked astonishingly high in mid April, dramatically worse than anywhere else (Peru perhaps?), but then fell away equally rapidly also.
IANA scientist but it does give some support to the super spreader thesis. Once those most likely to pass on the disease have gained immunity the virus struggles to spread. I just find it remarkable that how (not why as @Beibheirli_C points out) viruses seem to peter out has not been the subject of far more detailed investigation prior to now.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
lockdown is almost gone in any case David, certainly in England and likely Scotland shortly.
That's true but what happens next? We are flying blind and hoping for the best. Maybe, like Belgium, we will get away with it. Maybe.
Yes , I am still locked away for the forseeable, I would imagine will be a few months yet before I venture out.
It's that bloody pb again! Asking what was the point in going back just in time for the summer holidays? Still it got that weirdo off the front pages for a day.
I'm not saying Antifa should or shouldn't be designated a terrorist org but that they shouldn't simply because of their name falls at the first hurdle, as the USA has designated the "party of God"* a terrorist organisation, so on that logic the USA is 'pro fascist' because Antifa are designated terrorists, Trump must also be 'against God'.
I fail to see how people meeting in a garden vs a park will make much difference, especially as people have been doing this for a couple of week already. And schools were already planned to go back before the Cummings business.
The reality is a bit like the lockdown, where the government followed the public (IMO too slow to enforce it), the lifting, the government are again following it, as many people have decided they can't take it anymore.
Scotland are basically following the same approach and Sturgeon doesn't have any of the Cummings baggage.
I think a bigger problem for the government is when we have to lockdown again at some point, Cummings incident has made that message much harder.
Is the UK capable of isolating a city and locking it down if for example a large spike appeared in say Liverpool?
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I see in the Independent that actually he wasn't blocked because of the bullying allegations but because he wasn't Labour, so the Appointments Commission felt it wasn't appropriate for the Labour leader to nominate him. That seems utterly bizarre and a really bad precedent - why shouldn't party leaders be open-minded enough to nominate people who are not party loyalists?
The leaked comments also say that they was a lot of um'ing and ah'ing over Watson, but in his case it was the paedophile claims issue, while Murphy was seen as a "slam-dunk" for unspecified reasons presumed to relate to the handling of anti-semitism allegations.
To be fair, none of this seems to have Johnson's fingerprints on it - it's all the Commission. But their decision-making criteria seem mysterious and subjective, and the willingness of a member (presumably) to gossip anonymously about them makes it even worse.
Yes whether Bercow gets a peerage or not, I couldnt care less about, but if we are going to have peerages decided by politicians, surely there is nothing wrong with them selecting someone outside their own party?
Anyone willing to argue to the contrary, because it seems a terrible rule to me?
Ashdown used one of his nominations for david Alton after he had resigned the whip and I think party membership.
Lib Dems are almost as principles and morals free as the Tories.
Well I remain, in my mind, principled and attempt to live to my idea of a moral code.
Nichomar , was not personal, I was looking at current party people, MP's etc, not many shining lights there and even fewer in Scotland.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
lockdown is almost gone in any case David, certainly in England and likely Scotland shortly.
Until we can go to hotels and restaurants again and visit each others houses then lockdown is not over
People are already doing the latter.
Peoples' gardens yes, not going inside peoples' houses which remains illegal unless using the toilet
OT shopping. Sainsbury's back to almost normal, and their security staff have snazzy new hi-vis jackets. No queue for Aldi. Long queue for B&Q. Massive queues outside all the banks.
"Where does "R rate stays around 1" come from? It is under 1".
It's estimated at 0.7-0.9, with local variations. I presume that loosening of restrictions will raise the rate - perhaps not much, but enough to keep it fairly close.
The UK government is using deaths to calculate the R rate which means it is 2-3 weeks out of date because of the lags.
The German government uses confirmed cases which is more up to date.
I am using the German methodology on UK data (ignoring the latest five days as the numbers are incomplete) so my estimate is 5 days out of date.
England R = 0.74 (-0.05) on previous day (i.e. 25th May versus 24th May) R calculated as latest days 1-7 divided by days 8-14 i.e. 7 day moving averages to deal with weekend effects and average incubation period) London 0.58 (-0.06) Richmond 0.38 (-0.26) no reported cases in last five days.
I would obviously hope that your figures are correct. But the government's own figures, and the comments from Sir Patrick Valance, seem to indicate a stubbornly high rate of infection - declining, but not fast. The idea behind the lockdown was to hammer the numbers down to very low levels, such that contact tracing could stay on top of any subsequent outbreaks and the average person could be confident that a typical train, office, school or hospital doesn't contain any infected people, allowing normal life to resume in those places. The government's figures don't make it look like this has happened and it would be nice if the confusion could be resolved.
Thanks for the clarifications. I'm struggling to understand what is actually going on.
EDIT: My estimate for England of 0.74 is in line with your broad estimate of 0.7-0.9. I'm trying to track it daily for England, London and Richmond where I live.
If it has really been like this for 3 weeks a good deal of encouragement can be taken from those figures.
The example of Belgium really is quite interesting - the death rate skyrocketed, peaked astonishingly high in mid April, dramatically worse than anywhere else (Peru perhaps?), but then fell away equally rapidly also.
IANA scientist but it does give some support to the super spreader thesis. Once those most likely to pass on the disease have gained immunity the virus struggles to spread. I just find it remarkable that how (not why as @Beibheirli_C points out) viruses seem to peter out has not been the subject of far more detailed investigation prior to now.
You require an epidemic/pandemic to give more than small number statistics, which are not THAT common, and you need the resources and will power of funding bodies.
There's a reason much of our knowledge comes from studies of commercially-important agriculture.
When the rival superpower collapsed, exhausted, the United States took the wrong lessons from the fall of communism. American policymakers convinced themselves their global dominance was due to the success of their liberal ideology rather than of their industrial might, and that the sudden, unexpected disintegration of the Soviet Union was due to the vindication of liberalism rather than of the awakened nationalism of Russia’s subject peoples.
America’s rapid rise to global hegemony and equally rapid decline is a grand historical tragedy of the highest order, and as in classical tragedy, the root cause is the protagonist’s central character flaw.
And, a key point (the same conclusion reached by Krastev & Holmes):
Trump is a morbid symptom of this chaos, rather than its cause.
The election of Donald Trump in 2016 was a symptom of a sick country and since then he has been instrumental in the deterioration of the patient. For a cure to even be contemplated the necessary first step is his removal from office. This is how I look at it.
The worrying thing is that Trump could win again (all the rioting plays into his hands), and even if Biden wins, he won't be able to make it better.
All while China rubs its hands, HK off the front pages, and will all the economic hit from both coronavirus and sustained rioting / looting, they will be in prime position to buy up companies at rock bottom prices.
Surely the complaint that appears frivolous should be first on their list? They can quickly log it as closed if their investigation matches their hunch, which should be good for their own numbers - not to mention the health of those accused.
Yes, that's how I deal with emails - rapidly scan the list and deal with those that can be answered "Yes" "No" or just deleted, then come back to the others.
That’s fine for dealing with emails. In a properly run investigation system, absolutely not.
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
Lots of possible confounding factors; the impossibility of conducting anything but retrospective tests; the reliance on the self reporting of precautions people did (or didn't) take... it's hardly surprising there isn't an answer (and likely that it's a combination of answers, anyway).
Progress can be made. We've just worked out, a century on, how anaesthesia actually works...
Crumbs. I've used the lack of any convincing explanation for anaesthetics as an example of the limitations of a purely mechanistic view of the universe. I'll have to think of another. Any ideas?
The English are finally finding out what it's like to be governed by the English.
They don't look like Covidiots. Just idiots.
It’s a sign of the times that most people just stand around filming it rather than doing anything to help break it up.
To be fair, I have seen more than enough clips of people trying to do exactly that and then an even bigger fight breaks out, as in the chaos people decide that those trying to assist are part of it.
From the US, there is a clip from yesterday where a guy goes to help a woman who has been pushed off her bike and being robbed by a couple of people. Then it escalates as the mob decide he must have been assaulting the robbers, so 10s of them beat him up.
In another clip from the other day in the UK on a beach, a fight break out, some people try to calm it and one particular evil thug uses the fact people are distracted to sucker punch 2 or 3 of those who didn't even start it.
I’ve broken up a fight before just by being calm and even handed such that both protagonists were embarrassed to continue.
Of course that’s far riskier in a riot/mob situation.
I hope that data on who the new cases are and where the infections are coming from is being collected and analysed. it's certainly not being put in the public domain, as far as I can tell. if I had to guess I'd suggest mainly it is among NHS staff, care workers and possibly supermarket staff, but that would be a guess.
Whilst I agree the fact that these are guesses is a disgrace. Social workers, public transport workers and emergency services must also be at some considerable risk.
You'd hope there's serious egghead analysis of who is getting the virus going on. But I'm not sure there is. Has anyone with a positive test been asked which is their predominant mode of transport for instance ?
I just don't understand why people are not focusing on this. It is just so bloody obvious, even a lawyer can see it.
My understanding, via my friend at Imperial, is that a number of studies have/are being run on WhoWhatWhereWhyWhen - trying to get detailed information on how the infection spreads. Essentially they are contact tracing - but with great detail. Even using the virus genetics to try and build transmission trees...
Apparently the interesting thing is that the results seem to be all over the place - some seem to find a very low transmission rate, with people in close contact not catching it. Others find transmission between people with the briefest of contacts...
This is the super spreader thesis I keep wittering on about and it is undoubtedly a serious complication. Again, why do we have no idea what makes a "super spreader"? A test for that would be very helpful.
As the studies are being done by scientists, I find it hard to imagine, their first thought on the differing results, is not WHY?
You'd assume so but several months on we seem to have no clear idea and the result is a blunderbuss response when we need a rapier.
Science can be hard - it is worth noting that the same issue appears in studies around the world. Various theories have been put forward, but I have not seen an actual claim for the answer.
I am not saying its easy. I am saying that these are the priorities to which all available resources should be directed because they are the key to a successful lifting of the lockdown.
lockdown is almost gone in any case David, certainly in England and likely Scotland shortly.
Until we can go to hotels and restaurants again and visit each others houses then lockdown is not over
People are already doing the latter.
Peoples' gardens yes, not going inside peoples' houses which remains illegal unless using the toilet
This is being widely ignored and flaunted.
Kids, parents and grandchildren are all visiting each other’s houses at the moment - and staying over. I even know some police officers who did so over the weekend.
The guidance should now be that two healthy family households up to 6-8 people can mix, provided they are sensible with social distancing and contact.
Since the government has chosen not to say this people are taking matters into their own hands.
If it has really been like this for 3 weeks a good deal of encouragement can be taken from those figures.
The example of Belgium really is quite interesting - the death rate skyrocketed, peaked astonishingly high in mid April, dramatically worse than anywhere else (Peru perhaps?), but then fell away equally rapidly also.
IANA scientist but it does give some support to the super spreader thesis. Once those most likely to pass on the disease have gained immunity the virus struggles to spread. I just find it remarkable that how (not why as @Beibheirli_C points out) viruses seem to peter out has not been the subject of far more detailed investigation prior to now.
You require an epidemic/pandemic to give more than small number statistics, which are not THAT common, and you need the resources and will power of funding bodies.
There's a reason much of our knowledge comes from studies of commercially-important agriculture.
But we give hundreds of millions to the WHO. It might have been worth a look. How did SARS end, for example? That might have given us some clue. Most of our thinking has been influenced by studies in the 1930s after Spanish flu and the infamous "second wave" of Hong Kong flu in 1970. Are these the exceptions or the norm? I really wish we knew.
I look forward to you applying that just as stringently in the future when it's Conservative appointees in the frame (spoiler: you won't).
I see in the Independent that actually he wasn't blocked because of the bullying allegations but because he wasn't Labour, so the Appointments Commission felt it wasn't appropriate for the Labour leader to nominate him. That seems utterly bizarre and a really bad precedent - why shouldn't party leaders be open-minded enough to nominate people who are not party loyalists?
The leaked comments also say that they was a lot of um'ing and ah'ing over Watson, but in his case it was the paedophile claims issue, while Murphy was seen as a "slam-dunk" for unspecified reasons presumed to relate to the handling of anti-semitism allegations.
To be fair, none of this seems to have Johnson's fingerprints on it - it's all the Commission. But their decision-making criteria seem mysterious and subjective, and the willingness of a member (presumably) to gossip anonymously about them makes it even worse.
Yes whether Bercow gets a peerage or not, I couldnt care less about, but if we are going to have peerages decided by politicians, surely there is nothing wrong with them selecting someone outside their own party?
Anyone willing to argue to the contrary, because it seems a terrible rule to me?
Ashdown used one of his nominations for david Alton after he had resigned the whip and I think party membership.
Lib Dems are almost as principles and morals free as the Tories.
Well I remain, in my mind, principled and attempt to live to my idea of a moral code.
Nichomar , was not personal, I was looking at current party people, MP's etc, not many shining lights there and even fewer in Scotland.
Actually I’m very tired of party politics the last four years both politically and personally have made me think seriously about the effectiveness of the party political system. When excellent MP’s and councilors can be ousted off the back of national swing and replaced by party puppets you have to question the system. As a Lib Dem member I will stay within the ‘family’ but probably will not actively promote party policy anymore.
Come back to me when you have anything coherent to write and you're not simply parading your partisan idiocy for all to see. I've explained clearly what I would do and why. And you? You're still sucking your pencil trying to work out exactly why you hate John Bercow so much.
I’ve clearly explained that I’d pend any decision on elevating Bercow until the investigation into his bullying is completed. I have provided you with an explanation, I fear I cannot provide you with an understanding.
Do you think calling people names makes your argument more persuasive?
You have given no reason for your view despite me asking repeatedly whether believe the allegations are serious enough to justify withholding a peerage even if proven, and your test. All you have offered is partisan bilge. If you don't like this being pointed out, offer something other than partisan bilge.
And you’ve provided no reason for proceeding ahead of the inquiry results other than “Bercow knows politics”. A lot of people know politics. Not a lot of heads of organisations are under investigation for bullying their staff and you are advocating his re-entry to that organisation.
Not your finest hour Mr Meeks. On this subject the BDS has clearly overwhelmed your reason or sense of proportion. Why the rush?
Comments
To be fair, no-one has, to my knowledge, ever claimed for catching 'flu at a meeting.
Where does "R rate stays around 1" come from? It is under 1.
The UK government is using deaths to calculate the R rate which means it is 2-3 weeks out of date because of the lags.
The German government uses confirmed cases which is more up to date.
I am using the German methodology on UK data (ignoring the latest five days as the numbers are incomplete) so my estimate is 5 days out of date.
England R = 0.74 (-0.05) on previous day (i.e. 25th May versus 24th May)
R calculated as latest days 1-7 divided by days 8-14 i.e. 7 day moving averages to deal with weekend effects and average incubation period)
London 0.58 (-0.06)
Richmond 0.38 (-0.26) no reported cases in last five days.
It's the ONS infection survey, 54k/week average between 26/apr and 24/may, but for private households only.
8k is ballpark similar to what a lot of models produce too.
Edit: found it, https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19roundup/2020-03-26#infectionstudy
Hopefully one good thing to come out of all this, might be a bunch of teenagers getting inspired to be scientists.
"Where does the 8,000 infections per day come from? Government figure is 1,936 yesterday."
That comes from the data in the May 28th gov.uk slides (slide 8)
8,000 is the estimated number of infections, of which testing catches 2k odd, is my reading of that data.
If he joins Labour is he then eligible next year?
Surely this sort of thing leaves the door open to a shock defeat against a working majority?
Speed is essential - especially when the evidence (what someone said etc) is likely to fade over time. Anything involving harassment / bullying needs dealing with promptly - for pretty obvious reasons.
Should I make myself available to the House authorities on how to do investigations? It certainly sounds as if they need some help.
https://twitter.com/luckyma_man/status/1267147274808950795
And, frankly, insurers have a nerve: they flog business interruption insurance and then refuse to pay out on it.
https://twitter.com/JXB101/status/1267415033111351299?s=20
There's a trade off between more accurate data (UK deaths) and more up to date data (German confirmed cases). I guess you need to monitor both. I guess they are.
https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/city-hall/story/2020/05/31/longtime-supporters-dismayed-at-de-blasios-shift-from-police-reformer-to-defender-1289640
...many of his own former staffers and allies were dumbfounded by his position.
“These protests are about America’s failure to honor the lives of Black people. If the law means anything, if our lives mean anything, then driving a police car into a crowd of protesters is a crime. Isn’t that obvious?” de Blasio’s former deputy mayor Richard Buery said in a tweet.
Actress and activist Cynthia Nixon, a key supporter of de Blasio’s 2013 campaign who later ran unsuccessfully for governor, said she “cannot begin to understand why our ‘progressive’ Mayor selected this man for commissioner” after Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said he is “extremely proud” of how police officers have responded.
Jonathan Rosen, a longtime adviser to the mayor, reacted to de Blasio’s statements with: “What the fucking fuck?”...
Going for herd immunity left Sweden with a lower antibody trace than countries that.....er.....were not going for herd immunity. The later often had more people with antibodies. In some cases, lots more (London)
https://unherd.com/2020/06/covid-has-exposed-america-as-a-failed-state/?tl_inbound=1&tl_groups[0]=18743&tl_period_type=3
When the rival superpower collapsed, exhausted, the United States took the wrong lessons from the fall of communism. American policymakers convinced themselves their global dominance was due to the success of their liberal ideology rather than of their industrial might, and that the sudden, unexpected disintegration of the Soviet Union was due to the vindication of liberalism rather than of the awakened nationalism of Russia’s subject peoples.
America’s rapid rise to global hegemony and equally rapid decline is a grand historical tragedy of the highest order, and as in classical tragedy, the root cause is the protagonist’s central character flaw.
And, a key point (the same conclusion reached by Krastev & Holmes):
Trump is a morbid symptom of this chaos, rather than its cause.
If it has really been like this for 3 weeks a good deal of encouragement can be taken from those figures.
Thanks Chris!
Progress can be made.
We've just worked out, a century on, how anaesthesia actually works...
Studies on the mechanism of general anesthesia
https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2020/05/27/2004259117
So the initial ramp up was harder and faster here, in France, in Belgium, in NYC, and so on, resulting in far more infections (and thus, a bit later, deaths) already baked in prior to lockdowns being instituted.
Had Sweden done a full-on lockdown at about the same time we did, they'd have rammed their infection rates down (as Norway and Denmark did), their infection rates would be far lower. And lifting to their current strategy then would have been sustainable long-term.
Missed opportunity.
Do you think calling people names makes your argument more persuasive?
From the US, there is a clip from yesterday where a guy goes to help a woman who has been pushed off her bike and being robbed by a couple of people. Then it escalates as the mob decide he must have been assaulting the robbers, so 10s of them beat him up.
In another clip from the other day in the UK on a beach, a fight break out, some people try to calm it and one particular evil thug uses the fact people are distracted to sucker punch 2 or 3 of those who didn't even start it.
https://twitter.com/SamCoatesSky/status/1267430454900264962
CV19 is a marathon not a sprint. In all likelihood we wont know what's best for another three years or so when the final body count has been done. Sweden could be following the right strategy or it could be a complete disaster. .None of us can claim to know what is best as its still too early to say.
https://twitter.com/SamCoatesSky/status/1267430450856964097
The example of Belgium really is quite interesting - the death rate skyrocketed, peaked astonishingly high in mid April, dramatically worse than anywhere else (Peru perhaps?), but then fell away equally rapidly also.
The reality is a bit like the lockdown, where the government followed the public (IMO too slow to enforce it), the lifting, the government are again following it, as many people have decided they can't take it anymore.
Scotland are basically following the same approach and Sturgeon doesn't have any of the Cummings baggage.
I think a bigger problem for the government is when we have to lockdown again at some point, Cummings incident has made that message much harder.
* A literal translation
EDIT: My estimate for England of 0.74 is in line with your broad estimate of 0.7-0.9. I'm trying to track it daily for England, London and Richmond where I live.
There's a reason much of our knowledge comes from studies of commercially-important agriculture.
All while China rubs its hands, HK off the front pages, and will all the economic hit from both coronavirus and sustained rioting / looting, they will be in prime position to buy up companies at rock bottom prices.
I'll have to think of another. Any ideas?
Of course that’s far riskier in a riot/mob situation.
https://twitter.com/GoodwinMJ/status/1267214380497862657?s=20
Kids, parents and grandchildren are all visiting each other’s houses at the moment - and staying over. I even know some police officers who did so over the weekend.
The guidance should now be that two healthy family households up to 6-8 people can mix, provided they are sensible with social distancing and contact.
Since the government has chosen not to say this people are taking matters into their own hands.
Not your finest hour Mr Meeks. On this subject the BDS has clearly overwhelmed your reason or sense of proportion. Why the rush?