A large part of the problem is that Ministers are expected to be capable managers, without any real training in management principles. Some come to it naturally, or bring experience from their previous jobs, but many do not.
Except they are not.
The Civil Service exists to do the work, including managing the staff and resources.
The Minister is there to provide policy direction.
if the Minister is actively involved in delivery, they already fucked up
Patel should never have been allowed back in the Cabinet.
Neither of those things are sexist or racist because both relate to things the individuals have said and done.
Ethnic minorities and women aren't lesser creatures to be held to a feebler standard.
Ok. Thanks. That's very relevant and definitive.
Looks like we must accept that Diane Abbott receives such a staggering amount of online abuse and sneery denigration purely because she does not have a first class brain and has been known to struggle with numbers on TV.
Plan to name the vaccine after Trump. What will that do for uptake? I may wish to take my chances rather than have a little bit of Donald in my arm. On the other hand, he is a prick.
If it guaranteed everyone was immune to the fat f*ck for the rest of their lives, it might be worth it.
Disgraceful behaviour from Patel and Johnson is a coward for keeping her on.
Imagine this was a Labour MP, how quickly Tories would cry fowl.
Yet Bercow did worse for years.
Hypocrisy is your forte today.
I think the clearer distinction is with the Mandleson resignations. Blair didn’t want him to go, but unlike Boris today Blair realised there was no one in the media or opposition party’s who really wanted him out either.
The truth in this game is the longer a story has legs the more damaging it is, opposition party’s would love to have this one dredged all over the news in a few months time as well, not an end.
I think I'd look at it from the opposite direction.
A young Asian, immigrant class, female minister takes over a department full of Oxbridge educated old white middle to upper class men. They see her as an affront to them, a threat to their domination of the establishment. They refuse to work with her and refuse to take directions from her and she, increasingly frustrated, has had enough of these old white elitists telling her how things are done and she fucks them off.
I have much more sympathy to her because I've lived this career for the last 5 years, taking over teams dominated by older white Oxbridge educated elitists who look down their noses at a working class Asian man who went to Cardiff university and state school, at least I have ways to move these people on and get a team in that doesn't rely on their societal status to get their way.
The inquiry didn't find that Patel was the victim, though. It found that she was the bully. That's a small difference compared to gender and ethnicity, but some would dare to suggest it's an important one.
The inquiry wasn't tasked with looking at elitist culture at the Home Office and wider civil service. I know these types of people, they hate people like me with all their being. They see people like me as upstarts and a threat to their cosy chumocracy at the top of big business and government departments. You clearly don't understand what that feels like in the workplace but it is why I have got more sympathy for Patel than most.
The thing is you may even be right to some extent. Maybe she is deserving of some sympathy. But historically the point about the Ministerial Code is that it has been very zero tolerance. Quite rightly. And to some extent a zero tolerance approach has helped Prime Ministers, because it has given them a cover for what would otherwise be very difficult decisions.
Because once you start straying into the area of "justifiable" breaches then you can always find justification on some level. Or even without "justification" a reason to not sack a minister (perhaps because they are too important to lose etc). Ministers have enormous powers and limited direct scrutiny over what they do with them. They simply must be held to the highest standards or the whole system falls apart.
If punishment for breaches of the ministerial code simply become a judgement call to the PM, then all a minister has to do is make themselves appear indispensible and they become untouchable. Which is a very bad route to go down.
If a PM decides that they don't believe the code has been breached then fine, although they have to be able to explain why not. But once they are determined to be in breach, the consequences should be clear. However hard done by they feel.
Furthermore once a PM decides that they don't need to sack a minister for code breaches, what is the point of the code? Given that the PM can sack a minister for any reason they want? Why bother with an investigation, why bother with the code at all, if the outcome of any investigation is going to be irrelevant?
What happens if in future a minister acts dubiously and the PM actually wants to get rid of them. But wants the cover of a breach of the code to actually do it. Not possible any more - people will always be able to refer back and say "why does this breach warrant a sacking, when the previous one didn't?"
The Code serves an incredibly valuable purpose. As long as it remains as an ornament, it can distract from how bad things are. It that sense, it has a similar role to the Supreme Soviet. It would be terrible to say that ministers and advisers can pretty much do what they please, as long as they don't upset Boris or Carrie. That can be true in practice, but must never be said out loud.
The comparison with Bercow is fatuous. Bercow was a disaster, and should have gone a long time ago, but he didn't serve at the whim of the Prime Minister. He served at the pleasure of the House of Commons. Who chose to keep him there for good or ill. And the issue here isn't actually the offence per se. It is the principle about adherence to the Ministerial code. And the consequences of breaching it.
The comparison with Bercow is fatuous. Bercow was a disaster, and should have gone a long time ago, but he didn't serve at the whim of the Prime Minister. He served at the pleasure of the House of Commons. Who chose to keep him there for good or ill. And the issue here isn't actually the offence per se. It is the principle about adherence to the Ministerial code. And the consequences of breaching it.
But the official judgement was that she did not break the code.
Mr. kinabalu, someone speaking in praise of a genocidal dictator is pretty good cause to say that criticism of what they've said can be legitimate rather than founded on racism or sexism.
Abuse that Abbott has received that is sexist or racist is wretched (as was her own comment about white people liking to divide and rule, which I'm sure also outrages you).
At no point have I condoned or expressed any sentiment about Abbott which is sexist or racist. Nor have I implied such bigotry should be accepted, despite your implicit smear to the contrary (notably lacking evidence).
Also strange how you don't seem to have a problem with my repeated condemnation of Patel, but do with Abbott...
F1's off this weekend, after which we have two races in Bahrain, albeit on differing layouts. I still can't decide whether Perez or Leclerc is likelier to be best of the rest, but I'll be annoyed if Ricciardo/Renault stage a comeback.
In other ONS news, the number of infections in previous weeks has decreased slightly. This means the apparent IFR has gone up again (as deaths have not decreased), to about 1%.
I will note that this is for infections in the community ONLY. As we know about one in six infections occur in hospitals, that implies a true IFR of around 0.8%.
Amending the projection to take into account the latest ONS infections data and using the updated effective IFR (and using the existing decrease in the most recent days, which equates to a hair over R=0.9) this projects:
As before: yellow bars are projected deaths from the effective IFR; blue bars are projected deaths from the average death rate of hospitalised people in England, extrapolated over the country; and red bars are actual UK deaths to date (I don't go any more up to date than today minus one week; even so, the last three days on the chart usually go up noticeably over time)
And if anyone thinks, looking at that, we're going to be let out again on December 2nd then they are heading for something of a disappointment. When lockdown is meant to end, it will be succeeded by either (a) more lockdown or (b) something that looks very much like lockdown, but has been tweaked around the edges so the Government can pretend it's something else. They might just let the shops try to rescue something from pre-Christmas trade, but the hospitality businesses might as well declare bankruptcy and get it over with.
Calendar for the next four-and-a-half months: now-Christmas Eve: lockdown. Christmas Day and Boxing Day: small family gatherings, if we've all been really, really good. December 27th-April 1st next year: lockdown.
The Easter long weekend starts on April 2nd, so that's the earliest date for some meaningful form of release. If the weather is shit, or if it's good but the scientists collectively throw their toys out of the pram at the prospect of anything other than lockdown continuing, like they are at the moment, then we may be waiting until all the shielders and everybody over 50 has been vaccinated.
Then I guess I'm headed for disappointment. If we've been having consistently lowering deaths for about ten days, consistently reducing rates of hospital admissions for nearly three weeks, and we've seen that Tier 3 can hold rates level, then I'd suggest putting us back to Tier 3 at worst would be pretty likely. Maybe - maybe a one week extension of this Tier 4/"lockdown" and then early break-up of schools onto holidays and then back to Tiering systems (the infection rate lifted first during half term).
Come on - with your Eeyore stuff you've been consistently overpessimistic. No vaccine on the horizon. Oh, all right, I bet it'll be ineffective. Oh, all right, the mink thing will mutate past it. And so on, and so on. We have two vaccines; soon to be three or more. They're very effective. They're being delivered within weeks. The rate of infection has peaked and started to diminish. The rate of hospitalisation may be at its peak and about to diminish. The rate of deaths will be peaking and diminishing soon. The light is on at the end of the tunnel and shining like a Silmaril.
Bullying in politics is always condemned by the people on the other side, never by those on the same side. Labour people on PB used to defend Gordon Brown. Tories used to claim he was a disgrace and unfit to hold office. Now we are seeing the exact reverse with Priti Patel. The hypocrisy is across the board.
Patel was never going to be fired by Boris Johnson. She is exactly who he needs to be home secretary in order to fight the culture war that keeps his voting coalition together. That's all there is to it.
In Michigan if any members of the state canvass board refuse to certify the results the governor can fire them and appoint someone else . Once the results are certified by the SOS these go to the governor who then confirms the state electors for Biden . Both the governor and SOS are Dems . If the state legislators tried to sent a different slate of electors the governors take precedence .
The fact some GOP members are entertaining effectively overturning the results in certain swing states highlights what utter scum they are . Trump isn’t even hiding his attempts to stage a coup . It won’t work but he is operating a scorched earth policy on democracy .
Biden’s attempts at reaching across aisle are living in la la land . He’s living in a different world where that was possible , America is beyond any chance of recovering from 4 years of Trump . Whatever problems we may have in Europe we are still able to disagree politically , and can still have friendships with those on opposing political sides .
That ships sailed in the USA .
Johnson will 100% do a replay of the Trump legal shenanigans at the next GE. Those who think otherwise are deluding themselves about what he is.
Nonsensical.
Johnson is nothing like Trump and the UK is nothing like the USA.
If the election had happened in this country instead of the USA then Biden would have kissed the Queen's hand the day after the election.
I dunno, the Tories are already going down the voter suppression route by pushing for ID requirements at polling stations, ostensibly to deal with the more or less non-existent problem of impersonation but with the effect of disenfranchising the kind of people who don't vote Tory. (there may be some voting fraud in the UK, but impersonation isn't a problem). The main advantages we have over the US is that our voting system is much simpler and there is an immediate transfer of power so no time to plan a coup. I would file this under the category of unlikely, but wouldn't totally put it past him.
Sorry, but LOL. Another evil Tory plot magicked up out of thin air.
Countries in Europe requiring ID to be presented when voting:
France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland. For a start, and that's just the Wikipedia list.
They are very well connected, those Tories - to be manipulating all those voting systems.
Funny how I have never been asked for ID when voting in Germany, nor seen or heard of anyone else being asked for it.
Carrying ID is compulsory in Germany, but people aren't usually asked for it at polling stations unless they don't bring the polling card that is automatically posted to you before the election.
Carrying ID is also compulsory in several of the other countries you list. So to be like them the UK would first have to issue photo ID to everyone in the country.
Anyway, I would be more worried about why turnout in the UK is worse than most countries in Europe.
There doesn't seem to be much difference in general Election turnout afaics. Most seem to be around 70-80%.
except the UK which has this century been been 59%-69%.
Compared to our biggest neighbours:
France 75-84 (presidential) Germany 71-79 Italy 73-84
FPTP. So many people are voting in safe seats with next to zero chance of change and very little incentive to vote.
Yes, I vote in a very safe conservative seat in the UK but it feels kind of pointless. It's very different to voting and knowing that my vote will actually count - although in Germany you can "waste" your vote on a party that neither wins a constituency nor reaches the 5% threshold
Patel should never have been allowed back in the Cabinet.
Neither of those things are sexist or racist because both relate to things the individuals have said and done.
Ethnic minorities and women aren't lesser creatures to be held to a feebler standard.
Ok. Thanks. That's very relevant and definitive.
Looks like we must accept that Diane Abbott receives such a staggering amount of online abuse and sneery denigration purely because she does not have a first class brain and has been known to struggle with numbers on TV.
What's happening in F1?
Kinabalu, I don`t mean to get at you - I think you`ve had a lot of stick lately - but you clearly think that most of the denigration of Abbott was/is due to skin colour/sex not lack of intellect. Will you consider the possibility that it IS in fact based on her lack of intellect and unsuitability as an MP and it has nothing to do (for most people) with skin colour/sex?
If you fail to consider this possibility then you show, like others on the left, that you really do see the world through the prism of your chosen victim groups.
Disgraceful behaviour from Patel and Johnson is a coward for keeping her on.
Imagine this was a Labour MP, how quickly Tories would cry fowl.
Yet Bercow did worse for years.
Hypocrisy is your forte today.
I think the clearer distinction is with the Mandleson resignations. Blair didn’t want him to go, but unlike Boris today Blair realised there was no one in the media or opposition party’s who really wanted him out either.
The truth in this game is the longer a story has legs the more damaging it is, opposition party’s would love to have this one dredged all over the news in a few months time as well, not an end.
We can all hate them for ever, as we do, but Tony was teflon because he had better advisors.
The report reads like a minister getting more and more frustrated with the CS basically blocking any reforms or changes being made to their department and eventually just blasting everyone who got in the way because it's impossible to sack these incompetents.
Once again, the senior management of the CS just seems completely crap and full of incompetents promoted well above their capacity because they know the right people.
So you’re justifying a manager taking her frustrations out on other people in the organisation? It’s okay to bully if you’re frustrated, is it?
No, she clearly bullied the roadblock out of the job. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, but I understand why given the circumstances. If I was faced with people like that in my company I'd pay them off and get rid of them, I don't think she had that option and it's basically impossible to sack anyone in the public sector, especially at that level of seniority.
But you wouldn’t bully them, would you?
In her situation or mine?
In mine I'd pay them off.
In hers I couldn't say, I'd push them to resign and push them very hard given that the pay off route isn't available. I don't know if that's bullying, I'd class it as tough management. This is also assuming that all avenues of getting people on board the new vision have been exhausted and these are the last few holdouts.
Sounds like you are/would be a terrible manager. If you have ineffective staff, you either pay them off or you deal with the resources you have available and make it work.
You don’t bully them until they have to resign.
If I have ineffective staff that refuse to "make it work" and the pay off isn't available and limited resources for new hires because of budget reasons. I'd manage them out of the job with performance targets and go through the process. I'm not sure that was available to her given the seniority of the people involved.
You've clearly never managed people and never had to deal with those who refuse to get on board with a new vision. I came into my job with entrenched management, winning people over is always the first step. Making do with incompetent workers is never in the interests of the team or the business because it causes resentment among those who do perform well. Getting rid of them is the main priority, I've managed people out of the company and paid them off. Is it bullying to ask them to perform to a minimum level and have weekly performance meetings, or setting performance targets? I'm not sure, but management need effective methods of moving people on.
Very well said. Managing people out is a tough job and sometimes an important skill. Its not easy or flippant to do.
Yes, but performance management is not bullying. Priti was found to have bullied.
Exactly. Set out the performance expected and measure and manage against that.
"I clearly asked you to do this, you didn't do it and have no convincing reason why not: warning." Followed by final warning and dismissal. (Ideally interspersed with some coaching*, offering of alternative options such as stepping down a level, sideways move etc.)
*I admit the idea of an intellectual minnow like Patel coaching anyone might be a little far-fetched.
Absolutely, a three strike method is appropriate for all but the worst gross misconduct.
So Patel would now be on strike one stage and getting coaching by following your own stated procedure would she not? Or does she not get the same opportunities you demand for everyone else?
This is not Patel's first strike, though, is it?
Seems to be. And the investigation found that after getting the issue raised with her the issue was addressed. Job done, if the issue has been addressed and there's no ongoing bullying then what exactly is the problem?
She broke the Ministerial Code. Constitutional norms therefore dictate she should be sacked.
You are the world’s biggest hypocrite. You beat Trump with a stick for breaking constitutional norms and yet when your “team” does the exact same thing, you’ll twist and twist to justify it.
The Tory spinners are now saying that the reason people want her sacked is because of misogyny and because she's from an ethic minority! Not apparently because she's a proven liar and a bully. The fact that the most popular leaders in the world are women and the most popular leader for a considerable time was from what people call an ethic minority seems to have passed the Conservative Party by.
Because no-one from Labour has ever said said that critism of, for example, Diane Abbott, was racist and sexist, rather than because she was illiterate and innumerate.
Mmm. The illiterate and innumerate woman who won a place at Cambridge as a non posh black girl from a state school back when that was almost unheard of. I guess her illiteracy and innumeracy explains why she receives almost one half of all online abuse sent to female MPs. It's all those highly literate and numerate members of the public who despite their best efforts at restraint just have to speak out when their own high standards of learning are not matched by those in public life.
C'mon.
So 10,000 new Tory police officers will cost £30,000 a year, or is it £80m a year if we recruit 25,000 of them according to our plans?
Totally innumerate, and saying so is neither racist nor sexist.
It triggered a pile of abuse - to add to the existing mountain of shit she gets as a matter of routine - when similar gaffes from others did not and do not. This is racist and sexist. It's absolutely undeniable.
It also gets raised again and again these days by people despite her no longer being prominent and it being quite some time ago. Those people are themselves almost certainly racist and sexist.
Thatcher was even longer ago yet people like you still raise things she did. Abbot has a long history of brainfarts from racism to innumeracy so no surprise people bring her failings up
Desperate stuff. The abuse Abbott gets is WAY out of proportion to any objective reasonable cause of it. Most of it is driven by racism and misogyny. This really is not a debatable matter. Just go and check it out if you have any doubts. Others get it too, she's far from alone, but she gets it the worst. Female, Black. Left. Overweight. A terrible terrible mix. And people still banging on and on these days about that "police numbers" interview, and all the sniggery faux learned remarks about her intelligence, it's all a part of it. Do not defend or try to justify this stuff, I beseech you. Call it out.
Disgraceful behaviour from Patel and Johnson is a coward for keeping her on.
Imagine this was a Labour MP, how quickly Tories would cry fowl.
Yet Bercow did worse for years.
Hypocrisy is your forte today.
I think the clearer distinction is with the Mandleson resignations. Blair didn’t want him to go, but unlike Boris today Blair realised there was no one in the media or opposition party’s who really wanted him out either.
The truth in this game is the longer a story has legs the more damaging it is, opposition party’s would love to have this one dredged all over the news in a few months time as well, not an end.
We can all hate them for ever, as we do, but Tony was teflon because he had better advisors.
Teflon Tony v Boris shitmagnet. And some people on here think “tough it out” is clever politics in the long run?
The report reads like a minister getting more and more frustrated with the CS basically blocking any reforms or changes being made to their department and eventually just blasting everyone who got in the way because it's impossible to sack these incompetents.
Once again, the senior management of the CS just seems completely crap and full of incompetents promoted well above their capacity because they know the right people.
So you’re justifying a manager taking her frustrations out on other people in the organisation? It’s okay to bully if you’re frustrated, is it?
No, she clearly bullied the roadblock out of the job. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, but I understand why given the circumstances. If I was faced with people like that in my company I'd pay them off and get rid of them, I don't think she had that option and it's basically impossible to sack anyone in the public sector, especially at that level of seniority.
But you wouldn’t bully them, would you?
In her situation or mine?
In mine I'd pay them off.
In hers I couldn't say, I'd push them to resign and push them very hard given that the pay off route isn't available. I don't know if that's bullying, I'd class it as tough management. This is also assuming that all avenues of getting people on board the new vision have been exhausted and these are the last few holdouts.
Sounds like you are/would be a terrible manager. If you have ineffective staff, you either pay them off or you deal with the resources you have available and make it work.
You don’t bully them until they have to resign.
If I have ineffective staff that refuse to "make it work" and the pay off isn't available and limited resources for new hires because of budget reasons. I'd manage them out of the job with performance targets and go through the process. I'm not sure that was available to her given the seniority of the people involved.
You've clearly never managed people and never had to deal with those who refuse to get on board with a new vision. I came into my job with entrenched management, winning people over is always the first step. Making do with incompetent workers is never in the interests of the team or the business because it causes resentment among those who do perform well. Getting rid of them is the main priority, I've managed people out of the company and paid them off. Is it bullying to ask them to perform to a minimum level and have weekly performance meetings, or setting performance targets? I'm not sure, but management need effective methods of moving people on.
Very well said. Managing people out is a tough job and sometimes an important skill. Its not easy or flippant to do.
Yes, but performance management is not bullying. Priti was found to have bullied.
Exactly. Set out the performance expected and measure and manage against that.
"I clearly asked you to do this, you didn't do it and have no convincing reason why not: warning." Followed by final warning and dismissal. (Ideally interspersed with some coaching*, offering of alternative options such as stepping down a level, sideways move etc.)
*I admit the idea of an intellectual minnow like Patel coaching anyone might be a little far-fetched.
Absolutely, a three strike method is appropriate for all but the worst gross misconduct.
So Patel would now be on strike one stage and getting coaching by following your own stated procedure would she not? Or does she not get the same opportunities you demand for everyone else?
This is not Patel's first strike, though, is it?
Seems to be. And the investigation found that after getting the issue raised with her the issue was addressed. Job done, if the issue has been addressed and there's no ongoing bullying then what exactly is the problem?
She broke the Ministerial Code. Constitutional norms therefore dictate she should be sacked.
You are the world’s biggest hypocrite. You beat Trump with a stick for breaking constitutional norms and yet when your “team” does the exact same thing, you’ll twist and twist to justify it.
The Tory spinners are now saying that the reason people want her sacked is because of misogyny and because she's from an ethic minority! Not apparently because she's a proven liar and a bully. The fact that the most popular leaders in the world are women and the most popular leader for a considerable time was from what people call an ethic minority seems to have passed the Conservative Party by.
Because no-one from Labour has ever said said that critism of, for example, Diane Abbott, was racist and sexist, rather than because she was illiterate and innumerate.
Mmm. The illiterate and innumerate woman who won a place at Cambridge as a non posh black girl from a state school back when that was almost unheard of. I guess her illiteracy and innumeracy explains why she receives almost one half of all online abuse sent to female MPs. It's all those highly literate and numerate members of the public who despite their best efforts at restraint just have to speak out when their own high standards of learning are not matched by those in public life.
C'mon.
So 10,000 new Tory police officers will cost £30,000 a year, or is it £80m a year if we recruit 25,000 of them according to our plans?
Totally innumerate, and saying so is neither racist nor sexist.
It triggered a pile of abuse - to add to the existing mountain of shit she gets as a matter of routine - when similar gaffes from others did not and do not. This is racist and sexist. It's absolutely undeniable.
It also gets raised again and again these days by people despite her no longer being prominent and it being quite some time ago. Those people are themselves almost certainly racist and sexist.
Thatcher was even longer ago yet people like you still raise things she did. Abbot has a long history of brainfarts from racism to innumeracy so no surprise people bring her failings up
Desperate stuff. The abuse Abbott gets is WAY out of proportion to any objective reasonable cause of it. Most of it is driven by racism and misogyny. This really is not a debatable matter. Just go and check it out if you have any doubts. Others get it too, she's far from alone, but she gets it the worst. Female, Black. Left. Overweight. A terrible terrible mix. And people still banging on and on these days about that "police numbers" interview, and all the sniggery faux learned remarks about her intelligence, it's all a part of it. Do not defend or try to justify this stuff, I beseech you. Call it out.
Good post, I agree with it except the "Most of it" bit.
Social media has opened the floodgates to hateful specimens advertising their poisons in all sorts of ways.
Chicken and egg; if you're rude to people, then do you expect them to go the extra mile?
If a female, BAME Labour SoS was being poorly served by her officials would she be getting victim blamed for it?
If she was bullying and abusive as well?
"felt as bullying" by people who never bothered to complain that they felt they were bullied?
Poor snowflakes.
It takes a braver person than me to complain about being bullied, particularly when the strong impression is the person doing the bullying will not face consequence. That's why senior people need to say when they've been bullied to show everyone it wint be tolerated.
Except the report states that since concerns were raised they've been addressed, that's why people have policies to raise concerns.
If you raise a concern, then it is addressed, then should the person who has addressed your concern still be fired?
Yes.
That's madness.
I'm sure you wouldn't want to be fired without warning for a concern that was never brought to your attention. 🙄
If you don’t realise you’re bullying people then maybe you shouldn’t be in a management position.
Your position is laughable Philip.
One person's bullying is another person's high standards.
That's why procedures exist. 🙄
No, it isn’t. Priti’s behaviour in this instance has been found, by way of independent report, to constitute bullying.
You are trying to argue that sacking her for this would be outside the norm but this couldn’t be further from the truth. We know that this is the first time someone has NOT been fired for breaking the ministerial code.
Like I said, your position is laughable. You are in full partisan hack mode today. It’s very unedifying.
There were no complaints and the issue has been addressed. It would be ludicrous to sack her and it would set a very dangerous precedent to do so.
The next time Sir Humphrey has a Minister setting policies and standards he doesn't like then should he be able to subvert them and claim "bullying" without raising any concerns and thus get the Minister sacked?
Don't be ridiculous.
More complete tosh.
The precedent is already set. The precedent is that she should be sacked.
For having had zero complaints?
Bullshit.
Please name one previous Minister sacked for this without having any concerns raised?
Perhaps compare with the precedence set with Bercow.
You keep talking about complaints but that is not the issue here. You’re twisting and twisting again.
It’s really quite simple. She broke the ministerial code and therefore precedent is that she should be sacked.
That’s it.
She did not break the ministerial code.
That’s not what the independent report says, but of course you know better.
No, the PM knows better and its for him to determine if she broke the ministerial code and he determined she didn't. And I agree with him. It is a pathetic witch hunt by hypocrites who were OK with a blind eye being turned for Bercow for years who wasn't changing his behaviour but want to hound a woman out of her job who has no ongoing complaints and no ongoing evidence of wrongdoing.
Misogynistic and racist hypocrisy. Or partisan hypocrisy. Which is it?
Hahaha. The PM is the holy arbiter of what is right and wrong.
You are the partisan hack here. Do you have no shame?
Bercow never addressed the bullying complaints and stayed in office for years with ongoing complaints never investigated and never held to account.
Patel addressed the concerns the first time they were raised and co-operated with an inquiry that said she had changed behaviour and there was no ongoing concerns.
Which is worse in your eyes: The white man or the BAME woman?
You know you’ve won when the opposition starts bringing race and sex into the matter.
Patel should never have been allowed back in the Cabinet.
Neither of those things are sexist or racist because both relate to things the individuals have said and done.
Ethnic minorities and women aren't lesser creatures to be held to a feebler standard.
Ok. Thanks. That's very relevant and definitive.
Looks like we must accept that Diane Abbott receives such a staggering amount of online abuse and sneery denigration purely because she does not have a first class brain and has been known to struggle with numbers on TV.
What's happening in F1?
Kinabalu, I don`t mean to get at you - I think you`ve had a lot of stick lately - but you clearly think that most of the denigration of Abbott was/is due to skin colour/sex not lack of intellect. Will you consider the possibility that it IS in fact based on her lack of intellect and unsuitability as an MP and it has nothing to do (for most people) with skin colour/sex?
If you fail to consider this possibility then you show, like others on the left, that you really do see the world through the prism of your chosen victim groups.
Happy to answer that. It's a mix. X is not driven by prejudice and Y is.
The catastrophic Civil Servant who was a disaster under all Ministers has already gone and the report also says that the culture at the Home Office has already improved.
I think I'd look at it from the opposite direction.
A young Asian, immigrant class, female minister takes over a department full of Oxbridge educated old white middle to upper class men. They see her as an affront to them, a threat to their domination of the establishment. They refuse to work with her and refuse to take directions from her and she, increasingly frustrated, has had enough of these old white elitists telling her how things are done and she fucks them off.
I have much more sympathy to her because I've lived this career for the last 5 years, taking over teams dominated by older white Oxbridge educated elitists who look down their noses at a working class Asian man who went to Cardiff university and state school, at least I have ways to move these people on and get a team in that doesn't rely on their societal status to get their way.
The inquiry didn't find that Patel was the victim, though. It found that she was the bully. That's a small difference compared to gender and ethnicity, but some would dare to suggest it's an important one.
The inquiry wasn't tasked with looking at elitist culture at the Home Office and wider civil service. I know these types of people, they hate people like me with all their being. They see people like me as upstarts and a threat to their cosy chumocracy at the top of big business and government departments. You clearly don't understand what that feels like in the workplace but it is why I have got more sympathy for Patel than most.
You've had a certain negative experience You see someone as being in the same "group" as you in some way Therefore they've had the same negative experience That negative experience is also the reason for them being wrongly accused of wrongdoing
versus
They did something wrong and got caught
It's not just me though, go out and speak to any Asian or Black person in a position of seniority in big business or government who has had the displeasure of dealing with these elitists and a similar story will emerge. It's something you will probably never experience so I can understand if you just don't get it, but I have and have heard countless stories of similar issues. There is still a glass ceiling in this country and those few who manage to break through it are subjected to the worst kind of belittling and exclusion by the Oxbridge chums. Thankfully it's a problem that will soon be part of history as that generation finally fucks off and dies and their racist ways die with them.
Anyway, I've said my piece. You're free to continue your ignorance of what people actually experience if you want.
In other ONS news, the number of infections in previous weeks has decreased slightly. This means the apparent IFR has gone up again (as deaths have not decreased), to about 1%.
I will note that this is for infections in the community ONLY. As we know about one in six infections occur in hospitals, that implies a true IFR of around 0.8%.
Amending the projection to take into account the latest ONS infections data and using the updated effective IFR (and using the existing decrease in the most recent days, which equates to a hair over R=0.9) this projects:
As before: yellow bars are projected deaths from the effective IFR; blue bars are projected deaths from the average death rate of hospitalised people in England, extrapolated over the country; and red bars are actual UK deaths to date (I don't go any more up to date than today minus one week; even so, the last three days on the chart usually go up noticeably over time)
And if anyone thinks, looking at that, we're going to be let out again on December 2nd then they are heading for something of a disappointment. When lockdown is meant to end, it will be succeeded by either (a) more lockdown or (b) something that looks very much like lockdown, but has been tweaked around the edges so the Government can pretend it's something else. They might just let the shops try to rescue something from pre-Christmas trade, but the hospitality businesses might as well declare bankruptcy and get it over with.
Calendar for the next four-and-a-half months: now-Christmas Eve: lockdown. Christmas Day and Boxing Day: small family gatherings, if we've all been really, really good. December 27th-April 1st next year: lockdown.
The Easter long weekend starts on April 2nd, so that's the earliest date for some meaningful form of release. If the weather is shit, or if it's good but the scientists collectively throw their toys out of the pram at the prospect of anything other than lockdown continuing, like they are at the moment, then we may be waiting until all the shielders and everybody over 50 has been vaccinated.
Then I guess I'm headed for disappointment. If we've been having consistently lowering deaths for about ten days, consistently reducing rates of hospital admissions for nearly three weeks, and we've seen that Tier 3 can hold rates level, then I'd suggest putting us back to Tier 3 at worst would be pretty likely. Maybe - maybe a one week extension of this Tier 4/"lockdown" and then early break-up of schools onto holidays and then back to Tiering systems (the infection rate lifted first during half term).
Come on - with your Eeyore stuff you've been consistently overpessimistic. No vaccine on the horizon. Oh, all right, I bet it'll be ineffective. Oh, all right, the mink thing will mutate past it. And so on, and so on. We have two vaccines; soon to be three or more. They're very effective. They're being delivered within weeks. The rate of infection has peaked and started to diminish. The rate of hospitalisation may be at its peak and about to diminish. The rate of deaths will be peaking and diminishing soon. The light is on at the end of the tunnel and shining like a Silmaril.
Boris will be VERY keen to get the shops open 3 Dec for the Christmas shopping, he needs to help 'physical' retail otherwise it will all go to Amazon.
I remain hopeful for pubs and restaurants but only 'hopeful'. Maybe extend the lockdown for these for one week then put all of England on Tier 2, with some areas remaining on Tier 3 maybe with new ones added eg Swale hopefully not London.
Patel should never have been allowed back in the Cabinet.
Neither of those things are sexist or racist because both relate to things the individuals have said and done.
Ethnic minorities and women aren't lesser creatures to be held to a feebler standard.
Ok. Thanks. That's very relevant and definitive.
Looks like we must accept that Diane Abbott receives such a staggering amount of online abuse and sneery denigration purely because she does not have a first class brain and has been known to struggle with numbers on TV.
What's happening in F1?
Kinabalu, I don`t mean to get at you - I think you`ve had a lot of stick lately - but you clearly think that most of the denigration of Abbott was/is due to skin colour/sex not lack of intellect. Will you consider the possibility that it IS in fact based on her lack of intellect and unsuitability as an MP and it has nothing to do (for most people) with skin colour/sex?
If you fail to consider this possibility then you show, like others on the left, that you really do see the world through the prism of your chosen victim groups.
Happy to answer that. It's a mix. X is not driven by prejudice and Y is.
Mr. kinabalu, someone speaking in praise of a genocidal dictator is pretty good cause to say that criticism of what they've said can be legitimate rather than founded on racism or sexism.
Abuse that Abbott has received that is sexist or racist is wretched (as was her own comment about white people liking to divide and rule, which I'm sure also outrages you).
At no point have I condoned or expressed any sentiment about Abbott which is sexist or racist. Nor have I implied such bigotry should be accepted, despite your implicit smear to the contrary (notably lacking evidence).
Also strange how you don't seem to have a problem with my repeated condemnation of Patel, but do with Abbott...
F1's off this weekend, after which we have two races in Bahrain, albeit on differing layouts. I still can't decide whether Perez or Leclerc is likelier to be best of the rest, but I'll be annoyed if Ricciardo/Renault stage a comeback.
Why produce reams of deflecting and obscuring waffle rather than accept with good grace the clear and obvious truth that much of the mountain of abuse that Diane Abbott gets is driven by racism and misogyny?
What's striking to me is Johnson a) brought Patel back into govt and b) has shown loyalty to her c) she isn't one of his usual Oxbridge/connected gang.
Priti is a human shield. She wants out of the EU and the Cabinet is packed full of Leavers in case Boris needs to make a deal; in addition, Priti provides cover for Boris against those who accused him of racism. I do not think Boris is quite as hung up on the old school tie as David Cameron was, but that is a low bar.
She's much more than a human shield - you've misjudged her. She's ambitious for the top job - I think that's clear. She knows how to rile up the Tory base.
Being found guilty of bullying civil servants is probably a net positive with the membership. Boris needs to watch out.
Patel should never have been allowed back in the Cabinet.
Neither of those things are sexist or racist because both relate to things the individuals have said and done.
Ethnic minorities and women aren't lesser creatures to be held to a feebler standard.
Ok. Thanks. That's very relevant and definitive.
Looks like we must accept that Diane Abbott receives such a staggering amount of online abuse and sneery denigration purely because she does not have a first class brain and has been known to struggle with numbers on TV.
What's happening in F1?
Kinabalu, I don`t mean to get at you - I think you`ve had a lot of stick lately - but you clearly think that most of the denigration of Abbott was/is due to skin colour/sex not lack of intellect. Will you consider the possibility that it IS in fact based on her lack of intellect and unsuitability as an MP and it has nothing to do (for most people) with skin colour/sex?
If you fail to consider this possibility then you show, like others on the left, that you really do see the world through the prism of your chosen victim groups.
Happy to answer that. It's a mix. X is not driven by prejudice and Y is.
Patel should never have been allowed back in the Cabinet.
Neither of those things are sexist or racist because both relate to things the individuals have said and done.
Ethnic minorities and women aren't lesser creatures to be held to a feebler standard.
Ok. Thanks. That's very relevant and definitive.
Looks like we must accept that Diane Abbott receives such a staggering amount of online abuse and sneery denigration purely because she does not have a first class brain and has been known to struggle with numbers on TV.
What's happening in F1?
Kinabalu, I don`t mean to get at you - I think you`ve had a lot of stick lately - but you clearly think that most of the denigration of Abbott was/is due to skin colour/sex not lack of intellect. Will you consider the possibility that it IS in fact based on her lack of intellect and unsuitability as an MP and it has nothing to do (for most people) with skin colour/sex?
If you fail to consider this possibility then you show, like others on the left, that you really do see the world through the prism of your chosen victim groups.
Happy to answer that. It's a mix. X is not driven by prejudice and Y is.
I think I'd look at it from the opposite direction.
A young Asian, immigrant class, female minister takes over a department full of Oxbridge educated old white middle to upper class men. They see her as an affront to them, a threat to their domination of the establishment. They refuse to work with her and refuse to take directions from her and she, increasingly frustrated, has had enough of these old white elitists telling her how things are done and she fucks them off.
I have much more sympathy to her because I've lived this career for the last 5 years, taking over teams dominated by older white Oxbridge educated elitists who look down their noses at a working class Asian man who went to Cardiff university and state school, at least I have ways to move these people on and get a team in that doesn't rely on their societal status to get their way.
The inquiry didn't find that Patel was the victim, though. It found that she was the bully. That's a small difference compared to gender and ethnicity, but some would dare to suggest it's an important one.
The inquiry wasn't tasked with looking at elitist culture at the Home Office and wider civil service. I know these types of people, they hate people like me with all their being. They see people like me as upstarts and a threat to their cosy chumocracy at the top of big business and government departments. You clearly don't understand what that feels like in the workplace but it is why I have got more sympathy for Patel than most.
You've had a certain negative experience You see someone as being in the same "group" as you in some way Therefore they've had the same negative experience That negative experience is also the reason for them being wrongly accused of wrongdoing
versus
They did something wrong and got caught
It's not just me though, go out and speak to any Asian or Black person in a position of seniority in big business or government who has had the displeasure of dealing with these elitists and a similar story will emerge. It's something you will probably never experience so I can understand if you just don't get it, but I have and have heard countless stories of similar issues. There is still a glass ceiling in this country and those few who manage to break through it are subjected to the worst kind of belittling and exclusion by the Oxbridge chums. Thankfully it's a problem that will soon be part of history as that generation finally fucks off and dies and their racist ways die with them.
Anyway, I've said my piece. You're free to continue your ignorance of what people actually experience if you want.
I don't really need lectures from you about discrimination because it's my lived experience too. But there's a difference. I don't automatically just think someone who has been found to have been up to no good is excused because they may have experienced similar. It's really not fair on the victims to excuse the perpetrator in that way. And you are certainly doing it for political reasons, which is sadder still.
The report reads like a minister getting more and more frustrated with the CS basically blocking any reforms or changes being made to their department and eventually just blasting everyone who got in the way because it's impossible to sack these incompetents.
Once again, the senior management of the CS just seems completely crap and full of incompetents promoted well above their capacity because they know the right people.
So you’re justifying a manager taking her frustrations out on other people in the organisation? It’s okay to bully if you’re frustrated, is it?
No, she clearly bullied the roadblock out of the job. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, but I understand why given the circumstances. If I was faced with people like that in my company I'd pay them off and get rid of them, I don't think she had that option and it's basically impossible to sack anyone in the public sector, especially at that level of seniority.
But you wouldn’t bully them, would you?
In her situation or mine?
In mine I'd pay them off.
In hers I couldn't say, I'd push them to resign and push them very hard given that the pay off route isn't available. I don't know if that's bullying, I'd class it as tough management. This is also assuming that all avenues of getting people on board the new vision have been exhausted and these are the last few holdouts.
Sounds like you are/would be a terrible manager. If you have ineffective staff, you either pay them off or you deal with the resources you have available and make it work.
You don’t bully them until they have to resign.
If I have ineffective staff that refuse to "make it work" and the pay off isn't available and limited resources for new hires because of budget reasons. I'd manage them out of the job with performance targets and go through the process. I'm not sure that was available to her given the seniority of the people involved.
You've clearly never managed people and never had to deal with those who refuse to get on board with a new vision. I came into my job with entrenched management, winning people over is always the first step. Making do with incompetent workers is never in the interests of the team or the business because it causes resentment among those who do perform well. Getting rid of them is the main priority, I've managed people out of the company and paid them off. Is it bullying to ask them to perform to a minimum level and have weekly performance meetings, or setting performance targets? I'm not sure, but management need effective methods of moving people on.
Very well said. Managing people out is a tough job and sometimes an important skill. Its not easy or flippant to do.
Yes, but performance management is not bullying. Priti was found to have bullied.
Exactly. Set out the performance expected and measure and manage against that.
"I clearly asked you to do this, you didn't do it and have no convincing reason why not: warning." Followed by final warning and dismissal. (Ideally interspersed with some coaching*, offering of alternative options such as stepping down a level, sideways move etc.)
*I admit the idea of an intellectual minnow like Patel coaching anyone might be a little far-fetched.
Absolutely, a three strike method is appropriate for all but the worst gross misconduct.
So Patel would now be on strike one stage and getting coaching by following your own stated procedure would she not? Or does she not get the same opportunities you demand for everyone else?
This is not Patel's first strike, though, is it?
Seems to be. And the investigation found that after getting the issue raised with her the issue was addressed. Job done, if the issue has been addressed and there's no ongoing bullying then what exactly is the problem?
She broke the Ministerial Code. Constitutional norms therefore dictate she should be sacked.
You are the world’s biggest hypocrite. You beat Trump with a stick for breaking constitutional norms and yet when your “team” does the exact same thing, you’ll twist and twist to justify it.
The Tory spinners are now saying that the reason people want her sacked is because of misogyny and because she's from an ethic minority! Not apparently because she's a proven liar and a bully. The fact that the most popular leaders in the world are women and the most popular leader for a considerable time was from what people call an ethic minority seems to have passed the Conservative Party by.
Because no-one from Labour has ever said said that critism of, for example, Diane Abbott, was racist and sexist, rather than because she was illiterate and innumerate.
Mmm. The illiterate and innumerate woman who won a place at Cambridge as a non posh black girl from a state school back when that was almost unheard of. I guess her illiteracy and innumeracy explains why she receives almost one half of all online abuse sent to female MPs. It's all those highly literate and numerate members of the public who despite their best efforts at restraint just have to speak out when their own high standards of learning are not matched by those in public life.
C'mon.
So 10,000 new Tory police officers will cost £30,000 a year, or is it £80m a year if we recruit 25,000 of them according to our plans?
Totally innumerate, and saying so is neither racist nor sexist.
It triggered a pile of abuse - to add to the existing mountain of shit she gets as a matter of routine - when similar gaffes from others did not and do not. This is racist and sexist. It's absolutely undeniable.
It also gets raised again and again these days by people despite her no longer being prominent and it being quite some time ago. Those people are themselves almost certainly racist and sexist.
Thatcher was even longer ago yet people like you still raise things she did. Abbot has a long history of brainfarts from racism to innumeracy so no surprise people bring her failings up
Desperate stuff. The abuse Abbott gets is WAY out of proportion to any objective reasonable cause of it. Most of it is driven by racism and misogyny. This really is not a debatable matter. Just go and check it out if you have any doubts. Others get it too, she's far from alone, but she gets it the worst. Female, Black. Left. Overweight. A terrible terrible mix. And people still banging on and on these days about that "police numbers" interview, and all the sniggery faux learned remarks about her intelligence, it's all a part of it. Do not defend or try to justify this stuff, I beseech you. Call it out.
Good post, I agree with it except the "Most of it" bit.
Social media has opened the floodgates to hateful specimens advertising their poisons in all sorts of ways.
Yes, for sure. But on the proportions, the total volume of abuse is so great that unless one concludes that she is some uniquely appalling specimen of an MP - which she isn't - it must be the case that most of it is of the racist, misogynist type. And if you take a dive into it, that is rather confirmed.
Mr. kinabalu, why imply I condone bigotry when I have not, and have explicitly condemned it?
You're happy to do that yet remarkably reluctant to acknowledge you're asserting something that not only hasn't happened but that I've directly said that abuse Abbott has received that's bigoted is wretched.
My last post may have been longer than usual but it turns out I get annoyed when people accuse me of bigotry, particularly when the object of my scorn has overtly made pro-genocidal dictator comments that are on the record.
Still, easier to throw an accusation of racism than it is to actually engage with what people say, I suppose.
And then you to bleat about good grace. Take a look at that beam in your eye, and argue against what I say, or agree with it, but don't smear me and then whine when I have to gall to point out you don't have a leg to stand on.
Anyway, I grow tired of your one-note gong. I'm off. Good day, everyone.
I think I'd look at it from the opposite direction.
A young Asian, immigrant class, female minister takes over a department full of Oxbridge educated old white middle to upper class men. They see her as an affront to them, a threat to their domination of the establishment. They refuse to work with her and refuse to take directions from her and she, increasingly frustrated, has had enough of these old white elitists telling her how things are done and she fucks them off.
I have much more sympathy to her because I've lived this career for the last 5 years, taking over teams dominated by older white Oxbridge educated elitists who look down their noses at a working class Asian man who went to Cardiff university and state school, at least I have ways to move these people on and get a team in that doesn't rely on their societal status to get their way.
The inquiry didn't find that Patel was the victim, though. It found that she was the bully. That's a small difference compared to gender and ethnicity, but some would dare to suggest it's an important one.
The inquiry wasn't tasked with looking at elitist culture at the Home Office and wider civil service. I know these types of people, they hate people like me with all their being. They see people like me as upstarts and a threat to their cosy chumocracy at the top of big business and government departments. You clearly don't understand what that feels like in the workplace but it is why I have got more sympathy for Patel than most.
You've had a certain negative experience You see someone as being in the same "group" as you in some way Therefore they've had the same negative experience That negative experience is also the reason for them being wrongly accused of wrongdoing
versus
They did something wrong and got caught
It's not just me though, go out and speak to any Asian or Black person in a position of seniority in big business or government who has had the displeasure of dealing with these elitists and a similar story will emerge. It's something you will probably never experience so I can understand if you just don't get it, but I have and have heard countless stories of similar issues. There is still a glass ceiling in this country and those few who manage to break through it are subjected to the worst kind of belittling and exclusion by the Oxbridge chums. Thankfully it's a problem that will soon be part of history as that generation finally fucks off and dies and their racist ways die with them.
Anyway, I've said my piece. You're free to continue your ignorance of what people actually experience if you want.
I have seen this second hand and I believe you. To be honest I have mixed feelings about the case against Patel. I suspect that she is a wrong un but I wonder why she has been singled out, I doubt she is the worst offender.
Mr. kinabalu, why imply I condone bigotry when I have not, and have explicitly condemned it?
You're happy to do that yet remarkably reluctant to acknowledge you're asserting something that not only hasn't happened but that I've directly said that abuse Abbott has received that's bigoted is wretched.
My last post may have been longer than usual but it turns out I get annoyed when people accuse me of bigotry, particularly when the object of my scorn has overtly made pro-genocidal dictator comments that are on the record.
Still, easier to throw an accusation of racism than it is to actually engage with what people say, I suppose.
And then you to bleat about good grace. Take a look at that beam in your eye, and argue against what I say, or agree with it, but don't smear me and then whine when I have to gall to point out you don't have a leg to stand on.
Anyway, I grow tired of your one-note gong. I'm off. Good day, everyone.
Still dissembling rather than addressing the point.
The report reads like a minister getting more and more frustrated with the CS basically blocking any reforms or changes being made to their department and eventually just blasting everyone who got in the way because it's impossible to sack these incompetents.
Once again, the senior management of the CS just seems completely crap and full of incompetents promoted well above their capacity because they know the right people.
So you’re justifying a manager taking her frustrations out on other people in the organisation? It’s okay to bully if you’re frustrated, is it?
No, she clearly bullied the roadblock out of the job. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, but I understand why given the circumstances. If I was faced with people like that in my company I'd pay them off and get rid of them, I don't think she had that option and it's basically impossible to sack anyone in the public sector, especially at that level of seniority.
But you wouldn’t bully them, would you?
In her situation or mine?
In mine I'd pay them off.
In hers I couldn't say, I'd push them to resign and push them very hard given that the pay off route isn't available. I don't know if that's bullying, I'd class it as tough management. This is also assuming that all avenues of getting people on board the new vision have been exhausted and these are the last few holdouts.
Sounds like you are/would be a terrible manager. If you have ineffective staff, you either pay them off or you deal with the resources you have available and make it work.
You don’t bully them until they have to resign.
If I have ineffective staff that refuse to "make it work" and the pay off isn't available and limited resources for new hires because of budget reasons. I'd manage them out of the job with performance targets and go through the process. I'm not sure that was available to her given the seniority of the people involved.
You've clearly never managed people and never had to deal with those who refuse to get on board with a new vision. I came into my job with entrenched management, winning people over is always the first step. Making do with incompetent workers is never in the interests of the team or the business because it causes resentment among those who do perform well. Getting rid of them is the main priority, I've managed people out of the company and paid them off. Is it bullying to ask them to perform to a minimum level and have weekly performance meetings, or setting performance targets? I'm not sure, but management need effective methods of moving people on.
Very well said. Managing people out is a tough job and sometimes an important skill. Its not easy or flippant to do.
Yes, but performance management is not bullying. Priti was found to have bullied.
Exactly. Set out the performance expected and measure and manage against that.
"I clearly asked you to do this, you didn't do it and have no convincing reason why not: warning." Followed by final warning and dismissal. (Ideally interspersed with some coaching*, offering of alternative options such as stepping down a level, sideways move etc.)
*I admit the idea of an intellectual minnow like Patel coaching anyone might be a little far-fetched.
Absolutely, a three strike method is appropriate for all but the worst gross misconduct.
So Patel would now be on strike one stage and getting coaching by following your own stated procedure would she not? Or does she not get the same opportunities you demand for everyone else?
This is not Patel's first strike, though, is it?
Seems to be. And the investigation found that after getting the issue raised with her the issue was addressed. Job done, if the issue has been addressed and there's no ongoing bullying then what exactly is the problem?
She broke the Ministerial Code. Constitutional norms therefore dictate she should be sacked.
You are the world’s biggest hypocrite. You beat Trump with a stick for breaking constitutional norms and yet when your “team” does the exact same thing, you’ll twist and twist to justify it.
The Tory spinners are now saying that the reason people want her sacked is because of misogyny and because she's from an ethic minority! Not apparently because she's a proven liar and a bully. The fact that the most popular leaders in the world are women and the most popular leader for a considerable time was from what people call an ethic minority seems to have passed the Conservative Party by.
Because no-one from Labour has ever said said that critism of, for example, Diane Abbott, was racist and sexist, rather than because she was illiterate and innumerate.
Mmm. The illiterate and innumerate woman who won a place at Cambridge as a non posh black girl from a state school back when that was almost unheard of. I guess her illiteracy and innumeracy explains why she receives almost one half of all online abuse sent to female MPs. It's all those highly literate and numerate members of the public who despite their best efforts at restraint just have to speak out when their own high standards of learning are not matched by those in public life.
C'mon.
So 10,000 new Tory police officers will cost £30,000 a year, or is it £80m a year if we recruit 25,000 of them according to our plans?
Totally innumerate, and saying so is neither racist nor sexist.
It triggered a pile of abuse - to add to the existing mountain of shit she gets as a matter of routine - when similar gaffes from others did not and do not. This is racist and sexist. It's absolutely undeniable.
It also gets raised again and again these days by people despite her no longer being prominent and it being quite some time ago. Those people are themselves almost certainly racist and sexist.
Thatcher was even longer ago yet people like you still raise things she did. Abbot has a long history of brainfarts from racism to innumeracy so no surprise people bring her failings up
Desperate stuff. The abuse Abbott gets is WAY out of proportion to any objective reasonable cause of it. Most of it is driven by racism and misogyny. This really is not a debatable matter. Just go and check it out if you have any doubts. Others get it too, she's far from alone, but she gets it the worst. Female, Black. Left. Overweight. A terrible terrible mix. And people still banging on and on these days about that "police numbers" interview, and all the sniggery faux learned remarks about her intelligence, it's all a part of it. Do not defend or try to justify this stuff, I beseech you. Call it out.
Good post, I agree with it except the "Most of it" bit.
Social media has opened the floodgates to hateful specimens advertising their poisons in all sorts of ways.
Sorry - anyone who even begins to defend Mao needs to read some of the Frank Dikotter's works - 'Mao's great famine', or 'The tragedy of liberation'. The left seems have a real issue with apologising for mass murder, as presumably their heart's were in the right place. Just despicable.
I think I'd look at it from the opposite direction.
A young Asian, immigrant class, female minister takes over a department full of Oxbridge educated old white middle to upper class men. They see her as an affront to them, a threat to their domination of the establishment. They refuse to work with her and refuse to take directions from her and she, increasingly frustrated, has had enough of these old white elitists telling her how things are done and she fucks them off.
I have much more sympathy to her because I've lived this career for the last 5 years, taking over teams dominated by older white Oxbridge educated elitists who look down their noses at a working class Asian man who went to Cardiff university and state school, at least I have ways to move these people on and get a team in that doesn't rely on their societal status to get their way.
The inquiry didn't find that Patel was the victim, though. It found that she was the bully. That's a small difference compared to gender and ethnicity, but some would dare to suggest it's an important one.
The inquiry wasn't tasked with looking at elitist culture at the Home Office and wider civil service. I know these types of people, they hate people like me with all their being. They see people like me as upstarts and a threat to their cosy chumocracy at the top of big business and government departments. You clearly don't understand what that feels like in the workplace but it is why I have got more sympathy for Patel than most.
You've had a certain negative experience You see someone as being in the same "group" as you in some way Therefore they've had the same negative experience That negative experience is also the reason for them being wrongly accused of wrongdoing
versus
They did something wrong and got caught
It's not just me though, go out and speak to any Asian or Black person in a position of seniority in big business or government who has had the displeasure of dealing with these elitists and a similar story will emerge. It's something you will probably never experience so I can understand if you just don't get it, but I have and have heard countless stories of similar issues. There is still a glass ceiling in this country and those few who manage to break through it are subjected to the worst kind of belittling and exclusion by the Oxbridge chums. Thankfully it's a problem that will soon be part of history as that generation finally fucks off and dies and their racist ways die with them.
Anyway, I've said my piece. You're free to continue your ignorance of what people actually experience if you want.
I have seen this second hand and I believe you. To be honest I have mixed feelings about the case against Patel. I suspect that she is a wrong un but I wonder why she has been singled out, I doubt she is the worst offender.
The good thing is, you don't need to suspect any more. Nobody needs to think about her gender or ethnicity to know that she is a bully. She's even apologised -- in a manner of speaking -- for her behaviour.
The report reads like a minister getting more and more frustrated with the CS basically blocking any reforms or changes being made to their department and eventually just blasting everyone who got in the way because it's impossible to sack these incompetents.
Once again, the senior management of the CS just seems completely crap and full of incompetents promoted well above their capacity because they know the right people.
So you’re justifying a manager taking her frustrations out on other people in the organisation? It’s okay to bully if you’re frustrated, is it?
No, she clearly bullied the roadblock out of the job. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, but I understand why given the circumstances. If I was faced with people like that in my company I'd pay them off and get rid of them, I don't think she had that option and it's basically impossible to sack anyone in the public sector, especially at that level of seniority.
But you wouldn’t bully them, would you?
In her situation or mine?
In mine I'd pay them off.
In hers I couldn't say, I'd push them to resign and push them very hard given that the pay off route isn't available. I don't know if that's bullying, I'd class it as tough management. This is also assuming that all avenues of getting people on board the new vision have been exhausted and these are the last few holdouts.
Sounds like you are/would be a terrible manager. If you have ineffective staff, you either pay them off or you deal with the resources you have available and make it work.
You don’t bully them until they have to resign.
If I have ineffective staff that refuse to "make it work" and the pay off isn't available and limited resources for new hires because of budget reasons. I'd manage them out of the job with performance targets and go through the process. I'm not sure that was available to her given the seniority of the people involved.
You've clearly never managed people and never had to deal with those who refuse to get on board with a new vision. I came into my job with entrenched management, winning people over is always the first step. Making do with incompetent workers is never in the interests of the team or the business because it causes resentment among those who do perform well. Getting rid of them is the main priority, I've managed people out of the company and paid them off. Is it bullying to ask them to perform to a minimum level and have weekly performance meetings, or setting performance targets? I'm not sure, but management need effective methods of moving people on.
Very well said. Managing people out is a tough job and sometimes an important skill. Its not easy or flippant to do.
Yes, but performance management is not bullying. Priti was found to have bullied.
Exactly. Set out the performance expected and measure and manage against that.
"I clearly asked you to do this, you didn't do it and have no convincing reason why not: warning." Followed by final warning and dismissal. (Ideally interspersed with some coaching*, offering of alternative options such as stepping down a level, sideways move etc.)
*I admit the idea of an intellectual minnow like Patel coaching anyone might be a little far-fetched.
Absolutely, a three strike method is appropriate for all but the worst gross misconduct.
So Patel would now be on strike one stage and getting coaching by following your own stated procedure would she not? Or does she not get the same opportunities you demand for everyone else?
This is not Patel's first strike, though, is it?
Seems to be. And the investigation found that after getting the issue raised with her the issue was addressed. Job done, if the issue has been addressed and there's no ongoing bullying then what exactly is the problem?
She broke the Ministerial Code. Constitutional norms therefore dictate she should be sacked.
You are the world’s biggest hypocrite. You beat Trump with a stick for breaking constitutional norms and yet when your “team” does the exact same thing, you’ll twist and twist to justify it.
The Tory spinners are now saying that the reason people want her sacked is because of misogyny and because she's from an ethic minority! Not apparently because she's a proven liar and a bully. The fact that the most popular leaders in the world are women and the most popular leader for a considerable time was from what people call an ethic minority seems to have passed the Conservative Party by.
Because no-one from Labour has ever said said that critism of, for example, Diane Abbott, was racist and sexist, rather than because she was illiterate and innumerate.
Mmm. The illiterate and innumerate woman who won a place at Cambridge as a non posh black girl from a state school back when that was almost unheard of. I guess her illiteracy and innumeracy explains why she receives almost one half of all online abuse sent to female MPs. It's all those highly literate and numerate members of the public who despite their best efforts at restraint just have to speak out when their own high standards of learning are not matched by those in public life.
C'mon.
So 10,000 new Tory police officers will cost £30,000 a year, or is it £80m a year if we recruit 25,000 of them according to our plans?
Totally innumerate, and saying so is neither racist nor sexist.
It triggered a pile of abuse - to add to the existing mountain of shit she gets as a matter of routine - when similar gaffes from others did not and do not. This is racist and sexist. It's absolutely undeniable.
It also gets raised again and again these days by people despite her no longer being prominent and it being quite some time ago. Those people are themselves almost certainly racist and sexist.
Thatcher was even longer ago yet people like you still raise things she did. Abbot has a long history of brainfarts from racism to innumeracy so no surprise people bring her failings up
Desperate stuff. The abuse Abbott gets is WAY out of proportion to any objective reasonable cause of it. Most of it is driven by racism and misogyny. This really is not a debatable matter. Just go and check it out if you have any doubts. Others get it too, she's far from alone, but she gets it the worst. Female, Black. Left. Overweight. A terrible terrible mix. And people still banging on and on these days about that "police numbers" interview, and all the sniggery faux learned remarks about her intelligence, it's all a part of it. Do not defend or try to justify this stuff, I beseech you. Call it out.
Good post, I agree with it except the "Most of it" bit.
Social media has opened the floodgates to hateful specimens advertising their poisons in all sorts of ways.
Sorry - anyone who even begins to defend Mao needs to read some of the Frank Dikotter's works - 'Mao's great famine', or 'The tragedy of liberation'. The left seems have a real issue with apologising for mass murder, as presumably their heart's were in the right place. Just despicable.
Indeed.
Abbott deserves all the stick she gets. Just as Corbyn does too. She doesn't get a 'hall pass' for being a minority, nor does anyone else.
If someone were willing to criticise Abbott but not Corbyn then that would certainly get a raised eyebrow from me.
I think I'd look at it from the opposite direction.
A young Asian, immigrant class, female minister takes over a department full of Oxbridge educated old white middle to upper class men. They see her as an affront to them, a threat to their domination of the establishment. They refuse to work with her and refuse to take directions from her and she, increasingly frustrated, has had enough of these old white elitists telling her how things are done and she fucks them off.
I have much more sympathy to her because I've lived this career for the last 5 years, taking over teams dominated by older white Oxbridge educated elitists who look down their noses at a working class Asian man who went to Cardiff university and state school, at least I have ways to move these people on and get a team in that doesn't rely on their societal status to get their way.
The inquiry didn't find that Patel was the victim, though. It found that she was the bully. That's a small difference compared to gender and ethnicity, but some would dare to suggest it's an important one.
The inquiry wasn't tasked with looking at elitist culture at the Home Office and wider civil service. I know these types of people, they hate people like me with all their being. They see people like me as upstarts and a threat to their cosy chumocracy at the top of big business and government departments. You clearly don't understand what that feels like in the workplace but it is why I have got more sympathy for Patel than most.
You've had a certain negative experience You see someone as being in the same "group" as you in some way Therefore they've had the same negative experience That negative experience is also the reason for them being wrongly accused of wrongdoing
versus
They did something wrong and got caught
It's not just me though, go out and speak to any Asian or Black person in a position of seniority in big business or government who has had the displeasure of dealing with these elitists and a similar story will emerge. It's something you will probably never experience so I can understand if you just don't get it, but I have and have heard countless stories of similar issues. There is still a glass ceiling in this country and those few who manage to break through it are subjected to the worst kind of belittling and exclusion by the Oxbridge chums. Thankfully it's a problem that will soon be part of history as that generation finally fucks off and dies and their racist ways die with them.
Anyway, I've said my piece. You're free to continue your ignorance of what people actually experience if you want.
I have seen this second hand and I believe you. To be honest I have mixed feelings about the case against Patel. I suspect that she is a wrong un but I wonder why she has been singled out, I doubt she is the worst offender.
The good thing is, you don't need to suspect any more. Nobody needs to think about her gender or ethnicity to know that she is a bully. She's even apologised -- in a manner of speaking -- for her behaviour.
Indeed which is to her credit, not that you see many here giving her any credit. If only more people were so open and willing to learn from their mistakes the world would be a better place. Kudos to her.
In Michigan if any members of the state canvass board refuse to certify the results the governor can fire them and appoint someone else . Once the results are certified by the SOS these go to the governor who then confirms the state electors for Biden . Both the governor and SOS are Dems . If the state legislators tried to sent a different slate of electors the governors take precedence .
The fact some GOP members are entertaining effectively overturning the results in certain swing states highlights what utter scum they are . Trump isn’t even hiding his attempts to stage a coup . It won’t work but he is operating a scorched earth policy on democracy .
Biden’s attempts at reaching across aisle are living in la la land . He’s living in a different world where that was possible , America is beyond any chance of recovering from 4 years of Trump . Whatever problems we may have in Europe we are still able to disagree politically , and can still have friendships with those on opposing political sides .
That ships sailed in the USA .
Johnson will 100% do a replay of the Trump legal shenanigans at the next GE. Those who think otherwise are deluding themselves about what he is.
Nonsensical.
Johnson is nothing like Trump and the UK is nothing like the USA.
If the election had happened in this country instead of the USA then Biden would have kissed the Queen's hand the day after the election.
Don't see how it could happen with the UK electoral system anyway. Flawed as it may be in some areas, it's nothing like as terrible as the US system.
The report reads like a minister getting more and more frustrated with the CS basically blocking any reforms or changes being made to their department and eventually just blasting everyone who got in the way because it's impossible to sack these incompetents.
Once again, the senior management of the CS just seems completely crap and full of incompetents promoted well above their capacity because they know the right people.
So you’re justifying a manager taking her frustrations out on other people in the organisation? It’s okay to bully if you’re frustrated, is it?
No, she clearly bullied the roadblock out of the job. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, but I understand why given the circumstances. If I was faced with people like that in my company I'd pay them off and get rid of them, I don't think she had that option and it's basically impossible to sack anyone in the public sector, especially at that level of seniority.
But you wouldn’t bully them, would you?
In her situation or mine?
In mine I'd pay them off.
In hers I couldn't say, I'd push them to resign and push them very hard given that the pay off route isn't available. I don't know if that's bullying, I'd class it as tough management. This is also assuming that all avenues of getting people on board the new vision have been exhausted and these are the last few holdouts.
Sounds like you are/would be a terrible manager. If you have ineffective staff, you either pay them off or you deal with the resources you have available and make it work.
You don’t bully them until they have to resign.
If I have ineffective staff that refuse to "make it work" and the pay off isn't available and limited resources for new hires because of budget reasons. I'd manage them out of the job with performance targets and go through the process. I'm not sure that was available to her given the seniority of the people involved.
You've clearly never managed people and never had to deal with those who refuse to get on board with a new vision. I came into my job with entrenched management, winning people over is always the first step. Making do with incompetent workers is never in the interests of the team or the business because it causes resentment among those who do perform well. Getting rid of them is the main priority, I've managed people out of the company and paid them off. Is it bullying to ask them to perform to a minimum level and have weekly performance meetings, or setting performance targets? I'm not sure, but management need effective methods of moving people on.
Very well said. Managing people out is a tough job and sometimes an important skill. Its not easy or flippant to do.
Yes, but performance management is not bullying. Priti was found to have bullied.
Exactly. Set out the performance expected and measure and manage against that.
"I clearly asked you to do this, you didn't do it and have no convincing reason why not: warning." Followed by final warning and dismissal. (Ideally interspersed with some coaching*, offering of alternative options such as stepping down a level, sideways move etc.)
*I admit the idea of an intellectual minnow like Patel coaching anyone might be a little far-fetched.
Absolutely, a three strike method is appropriate for all but the worst gross misconduct.
So Patel would now be on strike one stage and getting coaching by following your own stated procedure would she not? Or does she not get the same opportunities you demand for everyone else?
This is not Patel's first strike, though, is it?
Seems to be. And the investigation found that after getting the issue raised with her the issue was addressed. Job done, if the issue has been addressed and there's no ongoing bullying then what exactly is the problem?
She broke the Ministerial Code. Constitutional norms therefore dictate she should be sacked.
You are the world’s biggest hypocrite. You beat Trump with a stick for breaking constitutional norms and yet when your “team” does the exact same thing, you’ll twist and twist to justify it.
The Tory spinners are now saying that the reason people want her sacked is because of misogyny and because she's from an ethic minority! Not apparently because she's a proven liar and a bully. The fact that the most popular leaders in the world are women and the most popular leader for a considerable time was from what people call an ethic minority seems to have passed the Conservative Party by.
Because no-one from Labour has ever said said that critism of, for example, Diane Abbott, was racist and sexist, rather than because she was illiterate and innumerate.
Mmm. The illiterate and innumerate woman who won a place at Cambridge as a non posh black girl from a state school back when that was almost unheard of. I guess her illiteracy and innumeracy explains why she receives almost one half of all online abuse sent to female MPs. It's all those highly literate and numerate members of the public who despite their best efforts at restraint just have to speak out when their own high standards of learning are not matched by those in public life.
C'mon.
So 10,000 new Tory police officers will cost £30,000 a year, or is it £80m a year if we recruit 25,000 of them according to our plans?
Totally innumerate, and saying so is neither racist nor sexist.
It triggered a pile of abuse - to add to the existing mountain of shit she gets as a matter of routine - when similar gaffes from others did not and do not. This is racist and sexist. It's absolutely undeniable.
It also gets raised again and again these days by people despite her no longer being prominent and it being quite some time ago. Those people are themselves almost certainly racist and sexist.
Thatcher was even longer ago yet people like you still raise things she did. Abbot has a long history of brainfarts from racism to innumeracy so no surprise people bring her failings up
Desperate stuff. The abuse Abbott gets is WAY out of proportion to any objective reasonable cause of it. Most of it is driven by racism and misogyny. This really is not a debatable matter. Just go and check it out if you have any doubts. Others get it too, she's far from alone, but she gets it the worst. Female, Black. Left. Overweight. A terrible terrible mix. And people still banging on and on these days about that "police numbers" interview, and all the sniggery faux learned remarks about her intelligence, it's all a part of it. Do not defend or try to justify this stuff, I beseech you. Call it out.
Good post, I agree with it except the "Most of it" bit.
Social media has opened the floodgates to hateful specimens advertising their poisons in all sorts of ways.
Sorry - anyone who even begins to defend Mao needs to read some of the Frank Dikotter's works - 'Mao's great famine', or 'The tragedy of liberation'. The left seems have a real issue with apologising for mass murder, as presumably their heart's were in the right place. Just despicable.
Indeed.
Abbott deserves all the stick she gets. Just as Corbyn does too. She doesn't get a 'hall pass' for being a minority, nor does anyone else.
If someone were willing to criticise Abbott but not Corbyn then that would certainly get a raised eyebrow from me.
Really? Even though much of it is along the lines of "fat black cow can't even add up".
I know for a fact you don't mean this. If I thought you did I wouldn't give you the time of day.
The media using the word 'lie' about anyone isn't progress, it's just reductive. It's being used because lazy journalists who are less literate than their forebears, can't be bothered to argue their case elegantly, and aren't fussed with softening their appearance of bias using established conventions. Awful as Trump has been, that looks bad for the journalists, not him.
The media using the word 'lie' about anyone isn't progress, it's just reductive. It's being used because lazy journalists who are less literate than their forebears, can't be bothered to argue their case elegantly, and aren't fussed with softening their appearance of bias using established conventions. Awful as Trump has been, that looks bad for the journalists, not him.
Trump: "I won the election!" Journalist: "Trump lies about the election." You: "The journalist looks bad."
Comments
https://twitter.com/oliverdarcy/status/1329595108078063619
The Civil Service exists to do the work, including managing the staff and resources.
The Minister is there to provide policy direction.
if the Minister is actively involved in delivery, they already fucked up
Looks like we must accept that Diane Abbott receives such a staggering amount of online abuse and sneery denigration purely because she does not have a first class brain and has been known to struggle with numbers on TV.
What's happening in F1?
The truth in this game is the longer a story has legs the more damaging it is, opposition party’s would love to have this one dredged all over the news in a few months time as well, not an end.
It's a knavish trick.
Abuse that Abbott has received that is sexist or racist is wretched (as was her own comment about white people liking to divide and rule, which I'm sure also outrages you).
At no point have I condoned or expressed any sentiment about Abbott which is sexist or racist. Nor have I implied such bigotry should be accepted, despite your implicit smear to the contrary (notably lacking evidence).
Also strange how you don't seem to have a problem with my repeated condemnation of Patel, but do with Abbott...
F1's off this weekend, after which we have two races in Bahrain, albeit on differing layouts. I still can't decide whether Perez or Leclerc is likelier to be best of the rest, but I'll be annoyed if Ricciardo/Renault stage a comeback.
Or at least consider prosecuting.
Lindsey Graham’s Alleged Attempt to Toss Georgia Ballots Is Felony Election Fraud
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/11/lindsey-graham-brad-raffensperger-georgia-election-fraud.html
Come on - with your Eeyore stuff you've been consistently overpessimistic. No vaccine on the horizon. Oh, all right, I bet it'll be ineffective. Oh, all right, the mink thing will mutate past it. And so on, and so on.
We have two vaccines; soon to be three or more. They're very effective. They're being delivered within weeks. The rate of infection has peaked and started to diminish. The rate of hospitalisation may be at its peak and about to diminish. The rate of deaths will be peaking and diminishing soon. The light is on at the end of the tunnel and shining like a Silmaril.
Patel was never going to be fired by Boris Johnson. She is exactly who he needs to be home secretary in order to fight the culture war that keeps his voting coalition together. That's all there is to it.
If you fail to consider this possibility then you show, like others on the left, that you really do see the world through the prism of your chosen victim groups.
Social media has opened the floodgates to hateful specimens advertising their poisons in all sorts of ways.
But X + Y = BIG.
And Y is much bigger than X.
The catastrophic Civil Servant who was a disaster under all Ministers has already gone and the report also says that the culture at the Home Office has already improved.
One might wonder if that's a coincidence or not?
Anyway, I've said my piece. You're free to continue your ignorance of what people actually experience if you want.
I remain hopeful for pubs and restaurants but only 'hopeful'. Maybe extend the lockdown for these for one week then put all of England on Tier 2, with some areas remaining on Tier 3 maybe with new ones added eg Swale hopefully not London.
She knows how to rile up the Tory base.
Being found guilty of bullying civil servants is probably a net positive with the membership.
Boris needs to watch out.
But there's a difference. I don't automatically just think someone who has been found to have been up to no good is excused because they may have experienced similar. It's really not fair on the victims to excuse the perpetrator in that way. And you are certainly doing it for political reasons, which is sadder still.
You're happy to do that yet remarkably reluctant to acknowledge you're asserting something that not only hasn't happened but that I've directly said that abuse Abbott has received that's bigoted is wretched.
My last post may have been longer than usual but it turns out I get annoyed when people accuse me of bigotry, particularly when the object of my scorn has overtly made pro-genocidal dictator comments that are on the record.
Still, easier to throw an accusation of racism than it is to actually engage with what people say, I suppose.
And then you to bleat about good grace. Take a look at that beam in your eye, and argue against what I say, or agree with it, but don't smear me and then whine when I have to gall to point out you don't have a leg to stand on.
Anyway, I grow tired of your one-note gong. I'm off. Good day, everyone.
Nobody needs to think about her gender or ethnicity to know that she is a bully. She's even apologised -- in a manner of speaking -- for her behaviour.
Abbott deserves all the stick she gets. Just as Corbyn does too. She doesn't get a 'hall pass' for being a minority, nor does anyone else.
If someone were willing to criticise Abbott but not Corbyn then that would certainly get a raised eyebrow from me.
I know for a fact you don't mean this. If I thought you did I wouldn't give you the time of day.
Please please think before blurting out things.
Journalist: "Trump lies about the election."
You: "The journalist looks bad."
You utter turnip.