Tories love the new lockdown rules and think they're easy to follow, shocked
So which is the dreadfully complicated part of it all?
Are you allowed to mix with other households in pubs and restaurants?
Depends what tier you are in. Yes at the lowest level.
What about the other tiers?
No? Of course they are going to be dreadfully complicated if you don't actually read them.
Where does it say you can or can't? You're assuming because you don't know. As I said, complicated.
Seriously? The summary states:
The core of Tier One is the "Rule of Six" - viz only six people are allowed in a home or garden, or sitting at a pub table or restaurant table - and there is a 10pm curfew for pubs and restaurants.
It then goes on to say
Tier Two is largely Tier One minus the Rule of Six.
And remember, this is only a journalist's summary.
Home or garden, is that indoors? Outdoors only?
Your home is typically inside and your garden is outside. Now you are just trying to justify your claim that they are complicated.
They are complicated - you've assumed things that aren't there.
How does that assumption make it complicated? There are two scenarios, either you can socialise with the rule of six in pubs and restaurants in tier two, or you can't. Neither of those scenarios are complicated.
I've explained one example, the other is things that are guidance and the law.
It's needlessly complicated and the average person will just not listen
But that example isn't complicated. As for law vs. guidance, I suspect they didn't want to go down the route of making it illegal to see other people.
It is complicated.
Stay home save lives was easy.
This tier stuff is needlessly complicated for something that won't work. We need a full lockdown for everyone with the same rules.
Ah, I see. It's complicated because it isn't the policy you actually want.
I think a lot of other countries have managed with regional variations in their restrictions. There's even an element of that with the difference in approaches between the home nations.
The rules/guidance within the tiers are complicated.
The tiers themselves are complicated.
I would like to support a tier system but I can't because it won't work. We missed the boat on that months ago. A national lockdown is all that is left.
If the summary is accurate I don't see what part of it is confusing.
Tier 3 - pubs/restaurants closed, avoid non-essential travel, don't travel in/out Tier 2 - pubs/restaurants open, but limited to within househoud Tier 1 - rule of six.
It's totally confusing what is the law and what isn't, it's confusing what the tiers mean, it's confusing whether you can socialise indoors or not.
People don't even get the rule of six, Johnson did a good job making that confusing as well.
We need a simple system, or alternatively for the Government to sack Cummings and get some trust back.
Hands Face Space is the best they've done recently.
While this guidance/legality thing is important in terms of enforcement, quite why it would make it more confusing is beyond me. The government are clearly saying this is something you shouldn't be doing.
Confusing what the tiers mean? 1 is good, 3 is bad. There are only three of them, and there are only a small number of differences between the tier. I don't think they could make a multi-tiered system any easier actually.
So - serious question - if I as a Londoner am in Tier 2, how and where can I meet people from outside my very small household? Can I meet them in parks, pubs, restaurants, cafes, or not at all? Or at 2 metres distance on Hampstead High Street, or what?
We don't know. As I said above or below, in the NE we are not supposed to meet anyone outside our household to socialise either indoors or out. This is not the case in Manchester. However, both are Tier 2 apparently. All will become crystal when the PM speaks I don't doubt.
Lets maybe wait for the rules to be announced before trying to pick holes in them?
My impression is that the new levels are there to simplify - so I expect that Manchester, if put in the same Tier as the NE, would also face a household mixing prohibition.
If there is I suspect it will be because the Mayor has asked for it more than because the Government have decided it necessary.
A countrywide lockdown is needed now.
Why? To avoid you being confused?
Merseyside is at risk of having full hospitals but nowhere else seems to be yet.
No, because cases are out of control.
Barely.
R of 1 or below is under control, R over 1 is exponential growth.
In March R was about 3, hence the national lockdown.
Currently R is estimated to be about 1.2 - so it is exponentially growing but not that fast.
If the Tiers system can get R back below 1 then cases will be under control again.
Exponential growth is exponential growth. Time is basically irrelevant unless you plan to get it down.
Therefore, we need another lockdown.
This is absolute nonsense. Your argument seems to be that only full national lockdown can reduce R rate below 1. Whereas any restrictions short of full national lockdown cannot.
But it's not even clear what you mean by full national lockdown. Because even the harshest viable measures have huge holes. Schools. People travelling and meeting at work. Social contact in shops. etc etc.
So if you can get R down below 1 with a "national lockdown" with holes, then by definition the issue is simply the size of the holes. Which brings into play local restrictions, varied depending on the severity of the current levels of virus spread. Your approach may speed things up. But do much more damage overall.
The only thing in this country that got R below 1 was a national lockdown. End of story.
Just to be clear - you want to shut all the schools again? Bit tricky what to do with all the University students this time though. Might not be best at this moment to send them all home.
University should have been deferred for a year in favour of online learning. I said this at the time.
I did chemistry at university, it involved going into a lab and actually running experiments. How would I have done that online?
In your case, the degree should have been deferred a year until you could use a lab.
And if I was in my final year? What I just sit around at home doing fuck all? What about medical students and nursing students? I didn't go into pharma, are you suggesting that the UK starve this most vital industry of chemistry, biochemistry, chemical engineering and biomedical science graduates?
Online makes sense for some courses. For anything practical it's a complete non-starter. I mean you may as well close Imperial for the year and most of UCL, Kings and Cambridge.
No, deferring was never an option. Letting the virus burn itself out among students was the only viable way of doing things, that's pretty much where we're at anyway. The government is completely overreacting to this and so are you.
I don't think the government is completely overreacting - though Incorrect Horse Battery certainly is.
I think the Government is trying to ensure R is contained so that it burning out through students doesn't result in an explosion elsewhere.
Plus not all the expansion is students. Merseyside hospitals are not filling up with Freshers.
3) This highest tier, Tier Three, will have four main characteristics.
a) Pubs and restaurants will be closed for all business except takeaways. That will be a legally enforceable rule.
b) Local people will be asked - as guidance rather than a legally enforceable rule - to only make essential journeys within a Tier Three area.
c) People living within a Tier Three area will be urged not to leave the area, unless it is absolutely necessary. Again that will be guidance.
d) And people living outside a Tier Three area will be asked not to travel to a Tier Three area unless essential, and they will be urged not to stay overnight. Again that will be guidance.
For the avoidance of doubt, Tier One restrictions are the baseline restrictions applying everywhere in England, unless areas are subject to Tier Two or Three restrictions.
The core of Tier One is the "Rule of Six" - viz only six people are allowed in a home or garden, or sitting at a pub table or restaurant table - and there is a 10pm curfew for pubs and restaurants.
Tier Two is largely Tier One minus the Rule of Six, so you cannot host people in your home or garden unless they are in your support or childcare bubble, or go to a home or garden outside of your support or childcare bubble.
This is dreadfully complicated
That's dreadfully complicated? No pubs and restaurants, try to avoid traveling unless essential, and try to avoid going into our out of a tier three area. How is that complicated?
If you're in Tier 2, are you allowed to mix with other households in pubs and restaurants?
Asking for a friend who wants to see me in the pub.
Sounds like its only for people in your own household.
Then that is a massive imposition, and cannot be laughed away. For people in tiny households of one or two, it means no social life. Possibly for the entire autumn and winter. This is not trivial.
This has been the case in the North East for weeks. There are no “riots” because very few people are actually obeying the law.
If there is I suspect it will be because the Mayor has asked for it more than because the Government have decided it necessary.
A countrywide lockdown is needed now.
Why? To avoid you being confused?
Merseyside is at risk of having full hospitals but nowhere else seems to be yet.
No, because cases are out of control.
Barely.
R of 1 or below is under control, R over 1 is exponential growth.
In March R was about 3, hence the national lockdown.
Currently R is estimated to be about 1.2 - so it is exponentially growing but not that fast.
If the Tiers system can get R back below 1 then cases will be under control again.
Exponential growth is exponential growth. Time is basically irrelevant unless you plan to get it down.
Therefore, we need another lockdown.
No, the rate of exponent is important. Basically, it was unavoidable that Europe would bump over 1 at some point during this autumn - we had opened up from lockdown and absolutely nobody is seriously saying that seasons have no effect any more.
We are very much now on that pushing out the curve idea that was much vaunted in March, but which was totally overtaken by the speed of the outbreak back then. The quality of rapid track and trace, isolation, restrictions targeting the correct contacts, adherence all interplay and the difference between averaging out R at 1.1 from a low base Vs averaging out R at 1.3 from a higher base is vast (a 45 fold increase before spring and a 36000 fold increase before spring - or, in reality for this scenario, a brutally high peak and slow recovery). All the time R is moving, as the weather changes for better or worse, as different outbreaks burn up and dry out - if the rapid student outbreak subsides it will drive R down for a week or until the next flare up elsewhere approaches peak - R is a naturally undulating firedance value.
If we can get below 1.0, which weeks of 1.2-1.3 has now made necessary, it may only give us a few weeks till the South flares, but that will be a few weeks closer to the end of winter.
It is a long game, it will flare up almost everywhere with a recognisable winter and that is not in itself failure, controlling the extent is the game - full lockdown everywhere from now until February-March was always untenable - we need to up our game on every element to maximise the slivers of normality we will be able to have.
By late winter / early spring 2021, if we have not, by our failure, laid waste to everything, it will be a glorious time - the promise of a COVID free stretch till far further into next Autumn, some vaccine for sure ahead of that which will take much of the sting, at least, out if any further waves - it may not be perfect, we may not do the best vaccination program, but it will be a lot and much normality will return and, however well.or badly we do, we will have extended by years many lives, be that by prevented deaths or by avoided long term health consequences.
Amid all this talk of hospitals full to capacity, have we given up on the idea of the Nightingale hospitals relieving the strain. Or were they all just for show and never to be used?
3) This highest tier, Tier Three, will have four main characteristics.
a) Pubs and restaurants will be closed for all business except takeaways. That will be a legally enforceable rule.
b) Local people will be asked - as guidance rather than a legally enforceable rule - to only make essential journeys within a Tier Three area.
c) People living within a Tier Three area will be urged not to leave the area, unless it is absolutely necessary. Again that will be guidance.
d) And people living outside a Tier Three area will be asked not to travel to a Tier Three area unless essential, and they will be urged not to stay overnight. Again that will be guidance.
For the avoidance of doubt, Tier One restrictions are the baseline restrictions applying everywhere in England, unless areas are subject to Tier Two or Three restrictions.
The core of Tier One is the "Rule of Six" - viz only six people are allowed in a home or garden, or sitting at a pub table or restaurant table - and there is a 10pm curfew for pubs and restaurants.
Tier Two is largely Tier One minus the Rule of Six, so you cannot host people in your home or garden unless they are in your support or childcare bubble, or go to a home or garden outside of your support or childcare bubble.
This is dreadfully complicated
That's dreadfully complicated? No pubs and restaurants, try to avoid traveling unless essential, and try to avoid going into our out of a tier three area. How is that complicated?
If you're in Tier 2, are you allowed to mix with other households in pubs and restaurants?
Asking for a friend who wants to see me in the pub.
Sounds like its only for people in your own household.
Then that is a massive imposition, and cannot be laughed away. For people in tiny households of one or two, it means no social life. Possibly for the entire autumn and winter. This is not trivial.
This has been the case in the North East for weeks. There are no “riots” because very few people are actually obeying the law.
I dispute that. Actually I don't. People are being more or less blatant and selective in their ignoring of them, according to their attitude.
Are you the same person as you were six years ago? 100% unchanged.
Since this encounter Patel has come out against death penalty because Hislop convinced her. That makes me respect her more, that someone can have strong opinions, but be shown the error of their ways and then rather than digging in can acknowledge that and move on.
But instead people still act as if she hasn't changed since then.
But how thick do you have to be, not to have thought of Hislop's points before having them put to you on QT by Hislop? The only way round the miscarriage argument is to concede they will happen, and say tough, collateral damage, omelettes and eggs, net benefit, and sometimes the victim had it coming anyway (Christie and Evans).
For avoidance of doubt i am outlining, not endorsing, that line of argument.
Because 99% of the time people don't debate that point so it is simple to overlook.
Most of the argument is about whether it is appropriate to execute killers or not, whether it is acceptable for the state to kill the worst crimininals or not. The miscarriage argument doesn't actually come up that often, but it is the reason I oppose the death penalty.
Interesting that you implicitly accept that the State - if it could guarantee to avoid miscarriages - has the right to put people to death
In my view, the State’s authority is delegated from the people and therefore it has no right to execute one of them
Are you the same person as you were six years ago? 100% unchanged.
Since this encounter Patel has come out against death penalty because Hislop convinced her. That makes me respect her more, that someone can have strong opinions, but be shown the error of their ways and then rather than digging in can acknowledge that and move on.
But instead people still act as if she hasn't changed since then.
But how thick do you have to be, not to have thought of Hislop's points before having them put to you on QT by Hislop? The only way round the miscarriage argument is to concede they will happen, and say tough, collateral damage, omelettes and eggs, net benefit, and sometimes the victim had it coming anyway (Christie and Evans).
For avoidance of doubt i am outlining, not endorsing, that line of argument.
Because 99% of the time people don't debate that point so it is simple to overlook.
Most of the argument is about whether it is appropriate to execute killers or not, whether it is acceptable for the state to kill the worst crimininals or not. The miscarriage argument doesn't actually come up that often, but it is the reason I oppose the death penalty.
Interesting that you implicitly accept that the State - if it could guarantee to avoid miscarriages - has the right to put people to death
In my view, the State’s authority is delegated from the people and therefore it has no right to execute one of them
If you could guarantee to avoid miscarriages, then if someone is put to death for a heinous crime then it will be done because the people want that not because the State wants that.
If the State's authority is delegated from the people and the people want to execute heinous murderers and if you can guarantee no miscarriages* then what is the problem?
* You can't, so it is moot.
PS this is why in America when they try a criminal the case is called eg "The people versus Jane Doe". Because the prosecution is on behalf of the people.
If there is I suspect it will be because the Mayor has asked for it more than because the Government have decided it necessary.
A countrywide lockdown is needed now.
Why? To avoid you being confused?
Merseyside is at risk of having full hospitals but nowhere else seems to be yet.
No, because cases are out of control.
Barely.
R of 1 or below is under control, R over 1 is exponential growth.
In March R was about 3, hence the national lockdown.
Currently R is estimated to be about 1.2 - so it is exponentially growing but not that fast.
If the Tiers system can get R back below 1 then cases will be under control again.
Exponential growth is exponential growth. Time is basically irrelevant unless you plan to get it down.
Therefore, we need another lockdown.
This is absolute nonsense. Your argument seems to be that only full national lockdown can reduce R rate below 1. Whereas any restrictions short of full national lockdown cannot.
But it's not even clear what you mean by full national lockdown. Because even the harshest viable measures have huge holes. Schools. People travelling and meeting at work. Social contact in shops. etc etc.
So if you can get R down below 1 with a "national lockdown" with holes, then by definition the issue is simply the size of the holes. Which brings into play local restrictions, varied depending on the severity of the current levels of virus spread. Your approach may speed things up. But do much more damage overall.
The only thing in this country that got R below 1 was a national lockdown. End of story.
Just to be clear - you want to shut all the schools again? Bit tricky what to do with all the University students this time though. Might not be best at this moment to send them all home.
University should have been deferred for a year in favour of online learning. I said this at the time.
I did chemistry at university, it involved going into a lab and actually running experiments. How would I have done that online?
In your case, the degree should have been deferred a year until you could use a lab.
And if I was in my final year? What I just sit around at home doing fuck all? What about medical students and nursing students? I didn't go into pharma, are you suggesting that the UK starve this most vital industry of chemistry, biochemistry, chemical engineering and biomedical science graduates?
Online makes sense for some courses. For anything practical it's a complete non-starter. I mean you may as well close Imperial for the year and most of UCL, Kings and Cambridge.
No, deferring was never an option. Letting the virus burn itself out among students was the only viable way of doing things, that's pretty much where we're at anyway. The government is completely overreacting to this and so are you.
Deferring is not an option, but 100% online teaching is an option, which the universities in Berlin and much of Germany have chosen. Not an ideal option, but one that definitely hugely reduces contact between students.
Once again aggressively (and inappropriately in my view) bending the rules.
But very different from changing the landscape permanently.
And here it is a bunch of senators mouthing off vs the Presidential candidate refuses to repudiate a position.
I welcome @SouthamObserver mournful accusation that I am biased. It makes him feel superior and that’s nice for him. I am biased: biased towards the rules and democratic fairness.
Grassly and Cotton literally introduced Bills to change the number of justices in the DC Court rather than let Obama fill the positions.
And did you miss the tweets about Republican governors increasing the size of their state supreme courts so they could pack them?
I didn’t see those tweets, but they shouldn’t be doing that in my view.
I have seldom observed a senior politician so clearly lying
Is blinking the new polygraph test for lying? Priti Patel can reintroduce hanging tomorrow! Now we've found this infallible test, there can be no more miscarriages of justice.
Well, yes. It's a known psychological fact that rapid blinking is a tell-tale sign of lying.
"Liars tend to blink more because lying is stressful. Under stress, eye blink rate increases (Mann, 2013)"
Yes but the trouble is there are other causes of stress than lying. If there were not then polygraphs would be reliable.
Do you honestly believe Sturgeon is telling the truth? Consider just one of her claims, about a meeting with a Salmond aide in 2019
"She said: "I had forgotten that this encounter had taken place until I was reminded of it in, I think, late January/early February 2019.
"For context, I think the meeting took place not long after the weekly session of FMQs and in the midst of a busy day in which I would have been dealing with a multitude of other matters.
"However, from what I recall, the discussion covered the fact that Alex Salmond wanted to see me urgently about a serious matter, and I think it did cover the suggestion that the matter might relate to allegations of a sexual nature.""
She is literally claiming she "forgot" a meeting where she was first told that her ex boss, the ex First Minister, her 30 year mentor, Alex Salmond, was accused of serious allegations of a sexual nature.
Yes, that's exactly the kind of meeting you would *forget*. Oh, the previous prime minister is an alleged rapist? Just another tiny detail that gets missed in a busy day
I don't know if she is lying. My complaint was about taking blinking as proof, especially in a thread that had already dealt with miscarriages of justice in capital cases.
I have seldom observed a senior politician so clearly lying
Is blinking the new polygraph test for lying? Priti Patel can reintroduce hanging tomorrow! Now we've found this infallible test, there can be no more miscarriages of justice.
Well, yes. It's a known psychological fact that rapid blinking is a tell-tale sign of lying.
"Liars tend to blink more because lying is stressful. Under stress, eye blink rate increases (Mann, 2013)"
Yes but the trouble is there are other causes of stress than lying. If there were not then polygraphs would be reliable.
Do you honestly believe Sturgeon is telling the truth? Consider just one of her claims, about a meeting with a Salmond aide in 2019
"She said: "I had forgotten that this encounter had taken place until I was reminded of it in, I think, late January/early February 2019.
"For context, I think the meeting took place not long after the weekly session of FMQs and in the midst of a busy day in which I would have been dealing with a multitude of other matters.
"However, from what I recall, the discussion covered the fact that Alex Salmond wanted to see me urgently about a serious matter, and I think it did cover the suggestion that the matter might relate to allegations of a sexual nature.""
She is literally claiming she "forgot" a meeting where she was first told that her ex boss, the ex First Minister, her 30 year mentor, Alex Salmond, was accused of serious allegations of a sexual nature.
Yes, that's exactly the kind of meeting you would *forget*. Oh, the previous prime minister is an alleged rapist? Just another tiny detail that gets missed in a busy day
Did she first learn about the allegation on the 2nd of April or eons before on the... checks notes... 29th of March?
Truly it changes everything.
She is claiming she forgot the first meeting when she was told Alex Salmond was a bit rapey, and faced actual allegations to that end. It's utterly ludicrous.
Come on, you're smarter than this, as are we. She's lying, everyone can see she is lying, the question for sophisticated PBers is whether she can survive the lie.
She is a canny and durable politician, and she has the advantage of Covid as a huge diversion. She's got a good chance. She is one of Napoleon's "lucky generals".
There is also the very murky role her husband has played in Salmondgate. I reckon there's a lot more still to come out on this issue. Sturgeon looked impregnable a month or so ago but the mood has changed.
Agreed. And she has a formidable adversary in Salmond, who is clearly out for blood (and you can see why he is blisteringly angry even if he is a lecherous old git).
It's an excellent fight. The Sturgeon vs the Salmon. The former is bigger but the latter is iconic. A lot of Scot Nats will be Salmondites by instinct
Agreed. Sturgeon may have been respected and even admired whilst she appeared competent, trustworthy and honest. I doubt many Nats really love her though. Salmond and I think Cherry are hoping to undermine her reputation and then take advantage.
Yes, Salmond gets the love. He's the amazing guy who took the SNP from the fringe to indyref 1, in a single career, and very nearly won a truly remarkable prize. Sturgeon is efficient, and decent, but actually quite boring.
A horrible split beckons. Should be entertaining.
The inexhaustible supply of PB Scotch experts is truly remarkable.
'Poll finds Alex Salmond now almost as unpopular as Boris Johnson among Scots
Even among SNP supporters, Mr Salmond had an approval rating of -14, with 49% of the party’s voters having a negative view of him compared to 35% who thought favourably of him.'
I am well aware Mr Salmond is not popular and will not be back in politics, I know a bit about Scotland. Sturgeon is done for , her pathetic insecurity that Salmond might have made a comeback and megalomania / dodgy partner / pet interests have seen to that. She is not the least interested in independence and so the sooner she goes the better. I care NOT a jot for SNP politicians, I want independence.
Comments
My impression is that the new levels are there to simplify - so I expect that Manchester, if put in the same Tier as the NE, would also face a household mixing prohibition.
I can see this working well with Blue Wall Voters
I think the Government is trying to ensure R is contained so that it burning out through students doesn't result in an explosion elsewhere.
Plus not all the expansion is students. Merseyside hospitals are not filling up with Freshers.
We are very much now on that pushing out the curve idea that was much vaunted in March, but which was totally overtaken by the speed of the outbreak back then. The quality of rapid track and trace, isolation, restrictions targeting the correct contacts, adherence all interplay and the difference between averaging out R at 1.1 from a low base Vs averaging out R at 1.3 from a higher base is vast (a 45 fold increase before spring and a 36000 fold increase before spring - or, in reality for this scenario, a brutally high peak and slow recovery). All the time R is moving, as the weather changes for better or worse, as different outbreaks burn up and dry out - if the rapid student outbreak subsides it will drive R down for a week or until the next flare up elsewhere approaches peak - R is a naturally undulating firedance value.
If we can get below 1.0, which weeks of 1.2-1.3 has now made necessary, it may only give us a few weeks till the South flares, but that will be a few weeks closer to the end of winter.
It is a long game, it will flare up almost everywhere with a recognisable winter and that is not in itself failure, controlling the extent is the game - full lockdown everywhere from now until February-March was always untenable - we need to up our game on every element to maximise the slivers of normality we will be able to have.
By late winter / early spring 2021, if we have not, by our failure, laid waste to everything, it will be a glorious time - the promise of a COVID free stretch till far further into next Autumn, some vaccine for sure ahead of that which will take much of the sting, at least, out if any further waves - it may not be perfect, we may not do the best vaccination program, but it will be a lot and much normality will return and, however well.or badly we do, we will have extended by years many lives, be that by prevented deaths or by avoided long term health consequences.
People are being more or less blatant and selective in their ignoring of them, according to their attitude.
In my view, the State’s authority is delegated from the people and therefore it has no right to execute one of them
If the State's authority is delegated from the people and the people want to execute heinous murderers and if you can guarantee no miscarriages* then what is the problem?
* You can't, so it is moot.
PS this is why in America when they try a criminal the case is called eg "The people versus Jane Doe". Because the prosecution is on behalf of the people.
I am well aware Mr Salmond is not popular and will not be back in politics, I know a bit about Scotland. Sturgeon is done for , her pathetic insecurity that Salmond might have made a comeback and megalomania / dodgy partner / pet interests have seen to that. She is not the least interested in independence and so the sooner she goes the better.
I care NOT a jot for SNP politicians, I want independence.