Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Truss appears to have done well with the trade agreements. However, she needs to continue that momentum (or do well in a new role) for her odds and leadership prospects to improve further.
It has come to something when maintaining the trading status quo, a status quo achieved by EU not British negotiators, with a number of countries is seen as some sort of major achievement. Still, we're in the land of the blind these days so she deserves one small cheer for doing what Liam Fox so dismally failed to do. She did not distinguish herself as Lord Chancellor and Justice Secretary, however.
Yet we were continually told on PB that replicating the EU trade deals would be impossible.
Not to mention that replicating those deals is only the first step - you can then look to build and improve upon them.
Its not as if we need to worry about the interests of olive oil producers any more for example.
[deleted - just too angry that copying exactly the same as before is aeen as a truimph after years and years of sitting on their collective thumbs]
Well I was among the first to point out the uselessness of Liam Fox.
Why his uselessness was tolerated for so long by the government and Conservative party in general is something I'm curious about.
On this Government's record we can expect very few houses to be built, FTTP coverage to be low and the economy to be in a mess.
Such is the record of a Government that under-delivers on every measure.
Giving every home and business access to FFTP is not something you can just do overnight, but there is serious investment from multiple companies now, and in most cases they are very keen to expand their footprint not just upgrade existing customers. Just today Openreach announced they are hiring another 5,000 engineers next year to deploy FTTP.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
Might be wishful thinking on my part, but I get the sense that people might be having second thoughts about Christmas. Think of it like a late swing back to the government as election day approaches.
How can anyone swing toward the government when no-one knows where it is standing and where it is standing now won’t be where it is standing tomorrow?
And that is the nature of the virus causing chaos in many nations
Mrs P's 88 year old father, who was given an appointment for his first Covid shot next Tuesday, was called by the GP practice today and told the appointment was going to be rearranged for after Christmas, date tbc. ☹️
Supply issues apparently. I hope it's not a sign of things to come.
Sorry to hear that, I did mention I had heard stuff like this before.
The government are likely to have overpromised and underdelivered once again.
The irony is that the government's approach to vaccine was genuinely world beating.
The overpromise was totally unnecessary. I don't know why they haven't learned yet, whatever somebody like PHE tell them, build in a sizeable delay / margin for error. At best, you say, wow amazing work, we smashed it. At worse, you meet your target.
Its called doing a RyanAir. Never late, because they build in a sizeable delay to every journey to the quoted travel time.
They genuinely thought every GP surgery was homogenous (on a physical building level) which is one of the logistical issues, I mean who thinks having a bunch of OAPs stood outside surgeries in the winter would be a good idea?
Tbf they do that at our surgery for the flu shot.
But the flu shot doesn't come with a 15 minute waiting period for reactions.
With flu shots it is in and out.
Is it? They've always made me wait at least 5-10 minutes.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
It's in Johnson's nature to be optimistic and upbeat. He was like that as Mayor of London and he was like that before Covid. He praises the country and the people to the skies - fair enough, most of the time a bit of inspiration doesn't go amiss. Back in July, he wanted people "cheek by jowl" at Christmas.
He understands the symbolic nature of Christmas in terms of it being an oasis of normality and hope in an ocean of bad news and anxiety. He wanted to save as much of that as possible - to give people something for which to aspire, to be hopeful, to be optimistic because that's the kind of Britain he wants to lead - upbeat, confident, optimistic.
Instead, he's got a pandemic and millions are frightened, frustrated and worried for the future. Yes, he can trumpet a vaccine all he wants but for the vast majority it's meaningless as they won't be getting it any time soon - 10 million vaccinated by Christmas anyone?
In his desire to keep spirits up, he panders - he treats us like children endlessly promising jam tomorrow if we keep the faith. He's not alone - many other leaders have played that game. Perhaps Merkel is one of the few who hasn't.
The problem is when the hope turns out to be a chimera - when he has to be "honest" and tell his audience what they don't want to hear - his limitations as a Prime Minister become painfully evident. He doesn't want to be the PM who lost Christmas - it would be a millstone round his political career. Quite apart from anything else, why would anyone believe a syllable he utters ever again?
I'll be honest - Theresa May, for all her flaws, would have done this so much better.
On this Government's record we can expect very few houses to be built, FTTP coverage to be low and the economy to be in a mess.
Such is the record of a Government that under-delivers on every measure.
Giving every home and business access to FFTP is not something you can just do overnight, but there is serious investment from multiple companies now, and in most cases they are very keen to expand their footprint not just upgrade existing customers. Just today Openreach announced they are hiring another 5,000 engineers next year to deploy FTTP.
They just cut the FTTP budget to hit the hardest to reach areas.
Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Yeah, but only a tendency. They can also go in the same direction in both dimensions.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
It's in Johnson's nature to be optimistic and upbeat. He was like that as Mayor of London and he was like that before Covid. He praises the country and the people to the skies - fair enough, most of the time a bit of inspiration doesn't go amiss. Back in July, he wanted people "cheek by jowl" at Christmas.
He understands the symbolic nature of Christmas in terms of it being an oasis of normality and hope in an ocean of bad news and anxiety. He wanted to save as much of that as possible - to give people something for which to aspire, to be hopeful, to be optimistic because that's the kind of Britain he wants to lead - upbeat, confident, optimistic.
Instead, he's got a pandemic and millions are frightened, frustrated and worried for the future. Yes, he can trumpet a vaccine all he wants but for the vast majority it's meaningless as they won't be getting it any time soon - 10 million vaccinated by Christmas anyone?
In his desire to keep spirits up, he panders - he treats us like children endlessly promising jam tomorrow if we keep the faith. He's not alone - many other leaders have played that game. Perhaps Merkel is one of the few who hasn't.
The problem is when the hope turns out to be a chimera - when he has to be "honest" and tell his audience what they don't want to hear - his limitations as a Prime Minister become painfully evident. He doesn't want to be the PM who lost Christmas - it would be a millstone round his political career. Quite apart from anything else, why would anyone believe a syllable he utters ever again?
I'll be honest - Theresa May, for all her flaws, would have done this so much better.
Yep. She would have followed the detail. Maybe decisions would have been slower but there would have been consistency from one day to the next.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
Might be wishful thinking on my part, but I get the sense that people might be having second thoughts about Christmas. Think of it like a late swing back to the government as election day approaches.
How can anyone swing toward the government when no-one knows where it is standing and where it is standing now won’t be where it is standing tomorrow?
It would be a shame if, after having been first off, we are shown up and overtaken by other countries for dint of their much better organisation.
It would be a great shame, considering our centrally organised top down health service model. Poor outcomes for cancer etc. is one thing - not being able to get identical jabs in arms is quite another. If it can't do that, what's it for?
Currently the issue is supply mostly. The vaccine teams are feeling the strain though too.
Johnson wanted to be PM his whole life. I wonder if he’s enjoying it? He can’t have imagined it would be anything like this. He got the job at exactly the wrong time.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
People are bored of covid.
They're going to meet whether allowed to or not.
Many will. But given how people have largely adhered to restrictions thus far, I think it strange to suggest that at least some would adhere to a law keeping restriction over the Xmas period, at least more than those who will not if there is a Xmas hall pass.
Johnson wanted to be PM his whole life. I wonder if he’s enjoying it? He can’t have imagined it would be anything like this. He got the job at exactly the wrong time.
Truss appears to have done well with the trade agreements. However, she needs to continue that momentum (or do well in a new role) for her odds and leadership prospects to improve further.
It has come to something when maintaining the trading status quo, a status quo achieved by EU not British negotiators, with a number of countries is seen as some sort of major achievement. Still, we're in the land of the blind these days so she deserves one small cheer for doing what Liam Fox so dismally failed to do. She did not distinguish herself as Lord Chancellor and Justice Secretary, however.
Yet we were continually told on PB that replicating the EU trade deals would be impossible.
Not to mention that replicating those deals is only the first step - you can then look to build and improve upon them.
Its not as if we need to worry about the interests of olive oil producers any more for example.
[deleted - just too angry that copying exactly the same as before is aeen as a truimph after years and years of sitting on their collective thumbs]
Well I was among the first to point out the uselessness of Liam Fox.
Why his uselessness was tolerated for so long by the government and Conservative party in general is something I'm curious about.
It is thought that May favoured CU and maximum integration. Perhaps he had orders from on high.
It would be a shame if, after having been first off, we are shown up and overtaken by other countries for dint of their much better organisation.
However much of a shame it would be, I'm sure some would only find glee in reporting whom they would blame.
When the Boris haters (in which I include all non tories and all against Brexit) smugly report on their perceived failings of the government on anything Covid or Brexit related, is that a kind of schadenfreude?
I should probably note that as a Gordon Brown hater I'm pretty sure I experienced schadenfreude watching him take the blame for the 2008 financial crash, even though I was aware how bad it was for the country, and me.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
Well, at least it makes a change from months of complaining that he wouldn't allow us to become Sweden.
One of the key points about Sweden is they had consistency of message. Clearly under review at the moment but throughout spring/summer/autumn its been pretty much the same.
Johnson started feeding journalists stuff about saving xmas weeks and weeks ago. It was rash and stupid.
It would be a shame if, after having been first off, we are shown up and overtaken by other countries for dint of their much better organisation.
It would be a great shame, considering our centrally organised top down health service model. Poor outcomes for cancer etc. is one thing - not being able to get identical jabs in arms is quite another. If it can't do that, what's it for?
Currently the issue is supply mostly. The vaccine teams are feeling the strain though too.
Apparently the logic is that because German, Belgian and Dutch factory boats have fished out French waters, French fishermen must continue to have access to British waters ...
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
Truss appears to have done well with the trade agreements. However, she needs to continue that momentum (or do well in a new role) for her odds and leadership prospects to improve further.
It has come to something when maintaining the trading status quo, a status quo achieved by EU not British negotiators, with a number of countries is seen as some sort of major achievement. Still, we're in the land of the blind these days so she deserves one small cheer for doing what Liam Fox so dismally failed to do. She did not distinguish herself as Lord Chancellor and Justice Secretary, however.
Yet we were continually told on PB that replicating the EU trade deals would be impossible.
Not to mention that replicating those deals is only the first step - you can then look to build and improve upon them.
Its not as if we need to worry about the interests of olive oil producers any more for example.
[deleted - just too angry that copying exactly the same as before is aeen as a truimph after years and years of sitting on their collective thumbs]
Well I was among the first to point out the uselessness of Liam Fox.
Why his uselessness was tolerated for so long by the government and Conservative party in general is something I'm curious about.
It is thought that May favoured CU and maximum integration. Perhaps he had orders from on high.
Given she could never have had CU then she was clearly just as ignorant and stupid as many of us always said.
So what's your view on Burnham, Jarvis etc wanting to reduce current restrictions in northern England ?
Just had good mates of mine on from Peterborough, talking about the horror effects of going into Tier 3 on their local pubs and restaurants. Gently pointed out that up north its been like that for months.
Its concern for that which is driving MPs as well as mayors to want a reduction. BTW you mentioned Labour mayors - here in Smoggieland its Tory MPs whining on.
On public health grounds a reduction would be bonkers. Then again with all of £3.50 made available to support business I can understand why they are protesting.
It would be a shame if, after having been first off, we are shown up and overtaken by other countries for dint of their much better organisation.
It would be a great shame, considering our centrally organised top down health service model. Poor outcomes for cancer etc. is one thing - not being able to get identical jabs in arms is quite another. If it can't do that, what's it for?
Currently the issue is supply mostly. The vaccine teams are feeling the strain though too.
Are the vaccine team themselves vaccinated ?
They get first call at leftovers at the end of a session. It is a perk of the job.
Johnson wanted to be PM his whole life. I wonder if he’s enjoying it? He can’t have imagined it would be anything like this. He got the job at exactly the wrong time.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
People are bored of covid.
They're going to meet whether allowed to or not.
Many will. But given how people have largely adhered to restrictions thus far, I think it strange to suggest that at least some would adhere to a law keeping restriction over the Xmas period, at least more than those who will not if there is a Xmas hall pass.
Certainly but enough ?
A nightmare for government is the thought of being ignored.
And I sense that observance of covid guidelines are generally fraying.
Telegraph reckon they will have done 500k people with the jabbie jab by Sunday.
If that's true, despite the negative stories, that would be good going.
Yes absolutely. My Grandmother could have gotten it on Wednesday but since my Mum is picking her up for Christmas she wasn't going to be able to make the appointment. She's going to call back on the 29th to get an appointment for January.
Just need to hope the government is bright enough to put pretty serious restrictions in place to stop the new variant from getting loose out of kent. Doesn't seem to be the statistical evidence that it's more dangerous but a higher innate R0 is not a good thing.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Johnson wanted to be PM his whole life. I wonder if he’s enjoying it? He can’t have imagined it would be anything like this. He got the job at exactly the wrong time.
Agreed and I doubt he is
He certainly doesn't look like he's enjoying it.
Anybody enjoying being a world leader at the moment isn't right in the head. Even Putin looks like he is questioning his decision to bend the rules to allow him to return as president.
Johnson wanted to be PM his whole life. I wonder if he’s enjoying it? He can’t have imagined it would be anything like this. He got the job at exactly the wrong time.
So did Churchill (and Lloyd-George) by that definition.
To be great you have to achieve when things are hard.
I think we should set up antiCovidiot Patrols. During my 15 minute walk to the shops and back earlier I encountered 7 groups of fools. 2 groups of kids, around ten in each group, outdoors but stood about a foot between them and blocking pathways through a garden. 4 I presume family groups of 3-5 walking side by side along the pavement, filling its width without masks and shouting to each other. 1 group of I think three families stood outside the main entrance/exit shouting to each other without masks and in the way of everybody else.
I would have loved to have had some official antiCovidiot Patrol power that I could have harangued them, photographed them, and shamed them with.
People in Totnes yesterday were greeting each other in the street with a hug. No masks.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
On this Government's record we can expect very few houses to be built, FTTP coverage to be low and the economy to be in a mess.
Such is the record of a Government that under-delivers on every measure.
Giving every home and business access to FFTP is not something you can just do overnight, but there is serious investment from multiple companies now, and in most cases they are very keen to expand their footprint not just upgrade existing customers. Just today Openreach announced they are hiring another 5,000 engineers next year to deploy FTTP.
They just cut the FTTP budget to hit the hardest to reach areas.
Sure, but the private sector is investing ever more. The broadband industry as a whole is moving to "fibre first", so that anything new and anything repaired or replaced is getting fibre. Everybody knows copper just won't cut it anymore.
On this Government's record we can expect very few houses to be built, FTTP coverage to be low and the economy to be in a mess.
Such is the record of a Government that under-delivers on every measure.
Giving every home and business access to FFTP is not something you can just do overnight, but there is serious investment from multiple companies now, and in most cases they are very keen to expand their footprint not just upgrade existing customers. Just today Openreach announced they are hiring another 5,000 engineers next year to deploy FTTP.
They just cut the FTTP budget to hit the hardest to reach areas.
Sure, but the private sector is investing ever more. The broadband industry as a whole is moving to "fibre first", so that anything new and anything repaired or replaced is getting fibre. Everybody knows copper just won't cut it anymore.
The Tories promised to cover the whole country by 2024, they won't do it if they cut the funding.
Openreach should be credited with their rollout to 85% which I think they will achieve but they won't cover the remaining 15% without Gov help, which they've just cut.
I hope to have FTTP within a couple of years, after the debacle that was FTTC and G.Fast at least Openreach have got it together now.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
Well, at least it makes a change from months of complaining that he wouldn't allow us to become Sweden.
One of the key points about Sweden is they had consistency of message. Clearly under review at the moment but throughout spring/summer/autumn its been pretty much the same.
Johnson started feeding journalists stuff about saving xmas weeks and weeks ago. It was rash and stupid.
Actually, there's a thought. Imagine all this kicked off in 2019, and Boris was an ambitious backbench MP and Telegraph columnist. Everything would push him into full-on Swedish Model Fantasy, wouldn't it?
It would be a shame if, after having been first off, we are shown up and overtaken by other countries for dint of their much better organisation.
However much of a shame it would be, I'm sure some would only find glee in reporting whom they would blame.
When the Boris haters (in which I include all non tories and all against Brexit) smugly report on their perceived failings of the government on anything Covid or Brexit related, is that a kind of schadenfreude?
I should probably note that as a Gordon Brown hater I'm pretty sure I experienced schadenfreude watching him take the blame for the 2008 financial crash, even though I was aware how bad it was for the country, and me.
I dislike Boris because of his failings. If he had no failings I wouldn’t. I’d probably quite like him. He’s a good pitch man, he can sell stuff, indeed he sold me enough to give him my second preference at the 2008 Mayoral Election - the only time I have given a Tory any kind of vote. I just wish he wouldn’t keep selling the people dodgy goods and false promises. If he used his talents of persuasion to better ends I’d like him. But he doesn’t so I don’t like him.
Still no sign of my elderly (and has multiple high risk conditions) father getting his jab. Was hoping he might get done before Christmas, so could perhaps see him in the early New Year.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
But that's not what Keir wanted.
He bought into the 'two weeks will solve the problem' bollox.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Pedantically, they mutate randomly and those are the mutations that tend to get selected for. Substantively, lethality doesn't really matter when you have an absolutely huge supply of new hosts. Even when it does matter, speed of lethality is the key: you want your host to be milling around infecting others for as long as possible. Whether the host then dies or recovers is immaterial because a recovered and now immune victim and a corpse are of equal value to you.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
And when would Starmer have broken it to us that his 2-3 weeks circuit-breaker was nowhere long enough?
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Knocking down cases at the start of an exponential curve buys you more time than doing so as late as we eventually did. And it's worth pointing out that Johnson ignored that advice not because it wasn't strong enough, but because he was squeamish about locking down again.
Either way I happen to agree with you on repeating the March/April lockdown. If we'd done that in October and held it until today then we would be in a position to have the kind of Christmas that Johnson wanted. As it is... we really really aren't.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
But that's not what Keir wanted.
He bought into the 'two weeks will solve the problem' bollox.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
You can argue til.you are in the blue face, but he called explicitly for us to implement SAGEs advice.
And as for test / trace, nonsense demand that it could be fixed in a couple of weeks. Its like demanding somebody loses a 30 pounds of weight in 2 weeks.
I would give him credit if he had called for 6 weeks.
Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Pedantically, they mutate randomly and those are the mutations that tend to get selected for. Substantively, lethality doesn't really matter when you have an absolutely huge supply of new hosts. Even when it does matter, speed of lethality is the key: you want your host to be milling around infecting others for as long as possible. Whether the host then dies or recovers is immaterial because a recovered and now immune victim and a corpse are of equal value to you.
New varient in RSA too
"In addition, clinicians have been providing anecdotal evidence of a shift in the clinical epidemiological picture- in particular noting that they are seeing a larger proportion of younger patients with no co-morbidities presenting with critical illness. The evidence that has been collated, therefore, strongly suggests that that the current second wave we are experiencing is being driven by this new variant."
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
You can argue til.you are in the blue face, but he called explicitly for us to implement SAGEs advice.
And as for test / trace, nonsense demand that it could be fixed in a couple of weeks.
I would give him credit if he had called for 6 weeks.
Did the lockdown reduce cases? Yes.
Was it implemented as he said, no.
Therefore you can't blame him for it not working.
A responsible Government would have extended it, Keir should have called for that - he can be blamed for that.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Any lockdown shorter than the time it takes for the virus to work through everyone in a household is not worth it. Just thinking about typical UK households and the timeline of an infection it looks to me like 4 weeks is the minimum. At two weeks you would almost certainly have people infected during lockdown who are still infectious being let out.
The economy number is much, much better than I anticipated. All down to Rishi's free money.
Just 80% approval for the vaccine? To be fair to Johnson that is ingratious. Probably more by accident than design he has done well with vaccines.
There are 20% of the population like TSE and Scott_P who will never, ever be gracious enough to acknowledge that Boris could ever do anything even grudgingly worth acknowledging. Even protecting them from a killer pandemic.
Johnson delenda est.
Carthago, Carthiginis is a feminine noun. Hence, Carthago delenda est.
Johnson is not. I think you need to check the case ending of your gerundive.😀
As a proud pleb, I'll settle for the sentiment over accuracy.
But surely your rhetoric is much more potent if the listener doesn't stop dead mentally when the words don't have the same and consistent gender? It's like reading "An example is the trains on the East Coast line". The listener or reader is too busy to work out what has gone wrong to be stunned by your oratory as a tribune of the plebs. the Gracchi and C. Julius Caesar would never have disdained to get their genders straight.
It's the 21st century we can all choose whichever genders we like.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
You can argue til.you are in the blue face, but he called explicitly for us to implement SAGEs advice.
And as for test / trace, nonsense demand that it could be fixed in a couple of weeks.
I would give him credit if he had called for 6 weeks.
Did the lockdown reduce cases? Yes.
Was it implemented as he said, no.
Therefore you can't blame him for it not working.
A responsible Government would have extended it, Keir should have called for that - he can be blamed for that.
He call was even worse...it was for the crash diet of lockdowns.
I think we should set up antiCovidiot Patrols. During my 15 minute walk to the shops and back earlier I encountered 7 groups of fools. 2 groups of kids, around ten in each group, outdoors but stood about a foot between them and blocking pathways through a garden. 4 I presume family groups of 3-5 walking side by side along the pavement, filling its width without masks and shouting to each other. 1 group of I think three families stood outside the main entrance/exit shouting to each other without masks and in the way of everybody else.
I would have loved to have had some official antiCovidiot Patrol power that I could have harangued them, photographed them, and shamed them with.
People in Totnes yesterday were greeting each other in the street with a hug. No masks.
I think maybe we should have some kind of Covidiot spray that the patrols can use to identify the numbskulls so the rest can steer clear.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
You seem to imply Boris has UK wide powers which he does not
You say fhe idea of lockdown was spot on but that has spectacularly failed as implemented by Drakeford in Wales
Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Pedantically, they mutate randomly and those are the mutations that tend to get selected for. Substantively, lethality doesn't really matter when you have an absolutely huge supply of new hosts. Even when it does matter, speed of lethality is the key: you want your host to be milling around infecting others for as long as possible. Whether the host then dies or recovers is immaterial because a recovered and now immune victim and a corpse are of equal value to you.
New varient in RSA too
"In addition, clinicians have been providing anecdotal evidence of a shift in the clinical epidemiological picture- in particular noting that they are seeing a larger proportion of younger patients with no co-morbidities presenting with critical illness. The evidence that has been collated, therefore, strongly suggests that that the current second wave we are experiencing is being driven by this new variant."
The government messgaing needs to be super strong on this, as most young people have decided Covid isn't really a risk to them personally. It will be like an oil tanker to try and turn that, not totally incorrect, perception around
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
Well fixing test and trace in two weeks is even more absurd than the two week lockdown. You wouldn't even want to mess with the existing system, realistically you'd want a second system to operate in parallel and replace test and trace as it scales up. I doubt that could be done in less than a few months.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Wales had a lockdown which reduced rates. It was too short, which was a huge error. At the end of the two weeks there were no significant precautions put into place. That was a fiasco.
The fire break would have worked had the Welsh Government not made such monumental errors.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Wales had a lockdown which reduced rates. It was too short, which was a huge error. At the end of the two weeks there were no significant precautions put into place. That was a fiasco.
The fire break would have worked had the Welsh Government not made such monumental errors.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
But that's not what Keir wanted.
He bought into the 'two weeks will solve the problem' bollox.
He never said two weeks would solve it.
That what was the bollox that was advocated.
If Keir wanted a six week lockdown he should have said so.
But either he didn't or he didn't have the courage to advocate it.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
Well fixing test and trace in two weeks is even more absurd than the two week lockdown. You wouldn't even want to mess with the existing system, realistically you'd want a second system to operate in parallel and replace test and trace as it scales up. I doubt that could be done in less than a few months.
It like shouting from the sidelines at weight watchers, oi fatties just don't eat for the 2 weeks, that will lose you your spare tyre. Doesn't realistically fix the problem at all.
It would be a shame if, after having been first off, we are shown up and overtaken by other countries for dint of their much better organisation.
However much of a shame it would be, I'm sure some would only find glee in reporting whom they would blame.
When the Boris haters (in which I include all non tories and all against Brexit) smugly report on their perceived failings of the government on anything Covid or Brexit related, is that a kind of schadenfreude?
I should probably note that as a Gordon Brown hater I'm pretty sure I experienced schadenfreude watching him take the blame for the 2008 financial crash, even though I was aware how bad it was for the country, and me.
I dislike Boris because of his failings. If he had no failings I wouldn’t. I’d probably quite like him. He’s a good pitch man, he can sell stuff, indeed he sold me enough to give him my second preference at the 2008 Mayoral Election - the only time I have given a Tory any kind of vote. I just wish he wouldn’t keep selling the people dodgy goods and false promises. If he used his talents of persuasion to better ends I’d like him. But he doesn’t so I don’t like him.
I don't doubt that there are plenty of good reasons to dislike Boris. But I'm pretty sure that the haters, I think a distinct group, are enjoying his struggles.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
You seem to imply Boris has UK wide powers which he does not
You say fhe idea of lockdown was spot on but that has spectacularly failed as implemented by Drakeford in Wales
By recategorising the issue as a national security one he could impose a UK lockdown. Politically that would provoke Armageddon but legally it’s sound.
Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Pedantically, they mutate randomly and those are the mutations that tend to get selected for. Substantively, lethality doesn't really matter when you have an absolutely huge supply of new hosts. Even when it does matter, speed of lethality is the key: you want your host to be milling around infecting others for as long as possible. Whether the host then dies or recovers is immaterial because a recovered and now immune victim and a corpse are of equal value to you.
But, in the real world, it tends to matter because viruses that kill more people tend to produce more serious symptoms earlier and have fewer cases with mild or no symptoms at all. Therefore a virus that is more fatal tends to spread more slowly, whereas a virus that is more benign has its carriers leading their normal lives while spreading it about.
AIDS was so dangerous because it remained invisible for so long and yet, originally, was usually a death sentence. But that’s very unusual.
Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Pedantically, they mutate randomly and those are the mutations that tend to get selected for. Substantively, lethality doesn't really matter when you have an absolutely huge supply of new hosts. Even when it does matter, speed of lethality is the key: you want your host to be milling around infecting others for as long as possible. Whether the host then dies or recovers is immaterial because a recovered and now immune victim and a corpse are of equal value to you.
New varient in RSA too
"In addition, clinicians have been providing anecdotal evidence of a shift in the clinical epidemiological picture- in particular noting that they are seeing a larger proportion of younger patients with no co-morbidities presenting with critical illness. The evidence that has been collated, therefore, strongly suggests that that the current second wave we are experiencing is being driven by this new variant."
The government messgaing needs to be super strong on this, as most young people have decided Covid isn't really a risk to them personally. It will be like an oil tanker to try and turn that, not totally incorrect, perception around
are we still allowing travel between here and rsa?
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
It's in Johnson's nature to be optimistic and upbeat. He was like that as Mayor of London and he was like that before Covid. He praises the country and the people to the skies - fair enough, most of the time a bit of inspiration doesn't go amiss. Back in July, he wanted people "cheek by jowl" at Christmas.
He understands the symbolic nature of Christmas in terms of it being an oasis of normality and hope in an ocean of bad news and anxiety. He wanted to save as much of that as possible - to give people something for which to aspire, to be hopeful, to be optimistic because that's the kind of Britain he wants to lead - upbeat, confident, optimistic.
Instead, he's got a pandemic and millions are frightened, frustrated and worried for the future. Yes, he can trumpet a vaccine all he wants but for the vast majority it's meaningless as they won't be getting it any time soon - 10 million vaccinated by Christmas anyone?
In his desire to keep spirits up, he panders - he treats us like children endlessly promising jam tomorrow if we keep the faith. He's not alone - many other leaders have played that game. Perhaps Merkel is one of the few who hasn't.
The problem is when the hope turns out to be a chimera - when he has to be "honest" and tell his audience what they don't want to hear - his limitations as a Prime Minister become painfully evident. He doesn't want to be the PM who lost Christmas - it would be a millstone round his political career. Quite apart from anything else, why would anyone believe a syllable he utters ever again?
I'll be honest - Theresa May, for all her flaws, would have done this so much better.
I think Cameron would have been very good. His personal history with Ivan would have allowed him to project to people having to deal with family members in ICU - and do all he could to prevent that. I don't think he would have been at all squeamish about calling lockdowns.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Wales had a lockdown which reduced rates. It was too short, which was a huge error. At the end of the two weeks there were no significant precautions put into place. That was a fiasco.
The fire break would have worked had the Welsh Government not made such monumental errors.
No it wouldn't...they didn't get the rates down anywhere near enough in several.key areas...but they made it worse...next...
The circuit breaker crash diet policy was a key part of the problem. It was an attempt to do a quick lockdown, which is flawed thinking from the start.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
But that's not what Keir wanted.
He bought into the 'two weeks will solve the problem' bollox.
He never said two weeks would solve it.
Drakeford backed by Starmer said that a single 2 week firebreak would halt the spread and the fool just let everyone return as if covid had gone
Wales are losing more lives due to his disastrous decisions
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
It's in Johnson's nature to be optimistic and upbeat. He was like that as Mayor of London and he was like that before Covid. He praises the country and the people to the skies - fair enough, most of the time a bit of inspiration doesn't go amiss. Back in July, he wanted people "cheek by jowl" at Christmas.
He understands the symbolic nature of Christmas in terms of it being an oasis of normality and hope in an ocean of bad news and anxiety. He wanted to save as much of that as possible - to give people something for which to aspire, to be hopeful, to be optimistic because that's the kind of Britain he wants to lead - upbeat, confident, optimistic.
Instead, he's got a pandemic and millions are frightened, frustrated and worried for the future. Yes, he can trumpet a vaccine all he wants but for the vast majority it's meaningless as they won't be getting it any time soon - 10 million vaccinated by Christmas anyone?
In his desire to keep spirits up, he panders - he treats us like children endlessly promising jam tomorrow if we keep the faith. He's not alone - many other leaders have played that game. Perhaps Merkel is one of the few who hasn't.
The problem is when the hope turns out to be a chimera - when he has to be "honest" and tell his audience what they don't want to hear - his limitations as a Prime Minister become painfully evident. He doesn't want to be the PM who lost Christmas - it would be a millstone round his political career. Quite apart from anything else, why would anyone believe a syllable he utters ever again?
I'll be honest - Theresa May, for all her flaws, would have done this so much better.
I think Cameron would have been very good. His personal history with Ivan would have allowed him to project to people having to deal with family members in ICU - and do all he could to prevent that. I don't think he would have been at all squeamish about calling lockdowns.
Telegraph reckon they will have done 500k people with the jabbie jab by Sunday.
If that's true, despite the negative stories, that would be good going.
It would.
I would like to see the stats on vaccination progress published as soon as possible. It would either be good for morale or provide incentive for improvement. Without measurement we cannot know whether the UK is doing well or badly.
Keir Starmer will be Captain Foresight again if Johnson ignores him.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
What do you mean again....the one time he has looked forward he proposed a circuit breaker...that approach that failed massively twice in NI and also in Wales.
The mistake wasn't the lockdown itself, it was it being too short. If we had locked down when Keir said we'd be in a better position, that is unarguable. Wales made the same mistake, should have kept it in place.
Not letting you have that. Circuit breaker was a specific policy put forward by SAGE, and Starmer explicitly said he wanted us to follow that. People like me and Max pointed out at the time, the modelling it was based on was.bollocks. It was not a call to repeat the lockdown of March / April, which is what we needed.
Keir said the two week lockdown should have been over half term - it wasn't - and a working test + trace system with tiers needed to be put into place. They weren't.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
You can argue til.you are in the blue face, but he called explicitly for us to implement SAGEs advice.
And as for test / trace, nonsense demand that it could be fixed in a couple of weeks.
I would give him credit if he had called for 6 weeks.
Did the lockdown reduce cases? Yes.
Was it implemented as he said, no.
Therefore you can't blame him for it not working.
A responsible Government would have extended it, Keir should have called for that - he can be blamed for that.
He call was even worse...it was for the crash diet of lockdowns.
It was the crash diet with the opportunity to stuff your face before and after.
Telegraph reckon they will have done 500k people with the jabbie jab by Sunday.
If that's true, despite the negative stories, that would be good going.
Yes absolutely. My Grandmother could have gotten it on Wednesday but since my Mum is picking her up for Christmas she wasn't going to be able to make the appointment. She's going to call back on the 29th to get an appointment for January.
Just need to hope the government is bright enough to put pretty serious restrictions in place to stop the new variant from getting loose out of kent. Doesn't seem to be the statistical evidence that it's more dangerous but a higher innate R0 is not a good thing.
Way too late. The pattern of infection rates suggests it's already spread along the Thames Estuary, infiltrated London, and is now expanding outwards into the Home Counties.
The best that can be done now - *IF* the news about the Oxford vaccine and about the extreme contagiousness of the new Covid variant is all true - is to cancel the Christmas plan and impose a regime broadly similar to the first lockdown immediately and until further notice, and not even consider easing up until we've got as far as vaccinating everyone in the first four or five segments of the JCVI scheme. The schools shouldn't reopen in January, save for the previous key worker exemptions, and the universities most certainly shouldn't, either. Everything has to be focussed on inoculation now. It's the only way we're going to get out of this without an absolutely bloody massacre happening.
Bad news, but almost convenient for him politically in giving him cover with the backbenchers and headlines he seems terrified of, without saying it is all the public's fault for being irresponsible.
More infectious is a better way of describing this than more virulent imho.
More infectious but less dangerous wouldn't be a bad combination.
Though the vulnerable would have to be told to shield while its spreading.
iirc virus have a tendency to mutate to more infectious but less fatal.
Pedantically, they mutate randomly and those are the mutations that tend to get selected for. Substantively, lethality doesn't really matter when you have an absolutely huge supply of new hosts. Even when it does matter, speed of lethality is the key: you want your host to be milling around infecting others for as long as possible. Whether the host then dies or recovers is immaterial because a recovered and now immune victim and a corpse are of equal value to you.
New varient in RSA too
"In addition, clinicians have been providing anecdotal evidence of a shift in the clinical epidemiological picture- in particular noting that they are seeing a larger proportion of younger patients with no co-morbidities presenting with critical illness. The evidence that has been collated, therefore, strongly suggests that that the current second wave we are experiencing is being driven by this new variant."
I'm sure you could have arranged it far faster. And I'm sure you would be saying exactly the same thing if the same group of civil servants had arranged the vaccine rollout in exactly the same time under your preferred government.
Telegraph reckon they will have done 500k people with the jabbie jab by Sunday.
If that's true, despite the negative stories, that would be good going.
Yes absolutely. My Grandmother could have gotten it on Wednesday but since my Mum is picking her up for Christmas she wasn't going to be able to make the appointment. She's going to call back on the 29th to get an appointment for January.
Just need to hope the government is bright enough to put pretty serious restrictions in place to stop the new variant from getting loose out of kent. Doesn't seem to be the statistical evidence that it's more dangerous but a higher innate R0 is not a good thing.
Way too late. The pattern of infection rates suggests it's already spread along the Thames Estuary, infiltrated London, and is now expanding outwards into the Home Counties.
The best that can be done now - *IF* the news about the Oxford vaccine and about the extreme contagiousness of the new Covid variant is all true - is to cancel the Christmas plan and impose a regime broadly similar to the first lockdown immediately and until further notice, and not even consider easing up until we've got as far as vaccinating everyone in the first four or five segments of the JCVI scheme. The schools shouldn't reopen in January, save for the previous key worker exemptions, and the universities most certainly shouldn't, either. Everything has to be focussed on inoculation now. It's the only way we're going to get out of this without an absolutely bloody massacre happening.
Honestly, yeah it's looking that way. We really should be back in lockdown now with travel restrictions. Waiting till after Christmas isn't a good idea.
The economy number is much, much better than I anticipated. All down to Rishi's free money.
Just 80% approval for the vaccine? To be fair to Johnson that is ingratious. Probably more by accident than design he has done well with vaccines.
There are 20% of the population like TSE and Scott_P who will never, ever be gracious enough to acknowledge that Boris could ever do anything even grudgingly worth acknowledging. Even protecting them from a killer pandemic.
Johnson delenda est.
Carthago, Carthiginis is a feminine noun. Hence, Carthago delenda est.
Johnson is not. I think you need to check the case ending of your gerundive.😀
As a proud pleb, I'll settle for the sentiment over accuracy.
But surely your rhetoric is much more potent if the listener doesn't stop dead mentally when the words don't have the same and consistent gender? It's like reading "An example is the trains on the East Coast line". The listener or reader is too busy to work out what has gone wrong to be stunned by your oratory as a tribune of the plebs. the Gracchi and C. Julius Caesar would never have disdained to get their genders straight.
It's the 21st century we can all choose whichever genders we like.
I think it is pretty hard to make a judgement on what a reasonable rate is. It may be slower than initially predicted, slower than others, yet still be a very impressive response. Or it may be faster than predicted, but still not as fast as might be possible. I have no idea.
Time to cancel this 5 day free pass. It's going to result in so many unnecessary hospitalisations and deaths.
What an f*ing mess. Yet again Johnson and co have made an epic balls up.
It's in Johnson's nature to be optimistic and upbeat. He was like that as Mayor of London and he was like that before Covid. He praises the country and the people to the skies - fair enough, most of the time a bit of inspiration doesn't go amiss. Back in July, he wanted people "cheek by jowl" at Christmas.
He understands the symbolic nature of Christmas in terms of it being an oasis of normality and hope in an ocean of bad news and anxiety. He wanted to save as much of that as possible - to give people something for which to aspire, to be hopeful, to be optimistic because that's the kind of Britain he wants to lead - upbeat, confident, optimistic.
Instead, he's got a pandemic and millions are frightened, frustrated and worried for the future. Yes, he can trumpet a vaccine all he wants but for the vast majority it's meaningless as they won't be getting it any time soon - 10 million vaccinated by Christmas anyone?
In his desire to keep spirits up, he panders - he treats us like children endlessly promising jam tomorrow if we keep the faith. He's not alone - many other leaders have played that game. Perhaps Merkel is one of the few who hasn't.
The problem is when the hope turns out to be a chimera - when he has to be "honest" and tell his audience what they don't want to hear - his limitations as a Prime Minister become painfully evident. He doesn't want to be the PM who lost Christmas - it would be a millstone round his political career. Quite apart from anything else, why would anyone believe a syllable he utters ever again?
I'll be honest - Theresa May, for all her flaws, would have done this so much better.
I think Cameron would have been very good. His personal history with Ivan would have allowed him to project to people having to deal with family members in ICU - and do all he could to prevent that. I don't think he would have been at all squeamish about calling lockdowns.
I would have Cameron back in a heartbeat.
It was a double act though: what about Osborne back in as COE? Not sure he would have spent the billions that Rishi has spent on keeping people afloat.
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Why his uselessness was tolerated for so long by the government and Conservative party in general is something I'm curious about.
He understands the symbolic nature of Christmas in terms of it being an oasis of normality and hope in an ocean of bad news and anxiety. He wanted to save as much of that as possible - to give people something for which to aspire, to be hopeful, to be optimistic because that's the kind of Britain he wants to lead - upbeat, confident, optimistic.
Instead, he's got a pandemic and millions are frightened, frustrated and worried for the future. Yes, he can trumpet a vaccine all he wants but for the vast majority it's meaningless as they won't be getting it any time soon - 10 million vaccinated by Christmas anyone?
In his desire to keep spirits up, he panders - he treats us like children endlessly promising jam tomorrow if we keep the faith. He's not alone - many other leaders have played that game. Perhaps Merkel is one of the few who hasn't.
The problem is when the hope turns out to be a chimera - when he has to be "honest" and tell his audience what they don't want to hear - his limitations as a Prime Minister become painfully evident. He doesn't want to be the PM who lost Christmas - it would be a millstone round his political career. Quite apart from anything else, why would anyone believe a syllable he utters ever again?
I'll be honest - Theresa May, for all her flaws, would have done this so much better.
Time to get Wales, Scotland, England, NI around the table, cancel this Christmas easing as a unified decision and then implement a unified nationwide lockdown from this weekend.
If that's true, despite the negative stories, that would be good going.
Johnson started feeding journalists stuff about saving xmas weeks and weeks ago. It was rash and stupid.
https://www.francetvinfo.fr/replay-radio/le-choix-franceinfo/brexit-qu-est-qu-on-va-faire-apres-il-n-y-plus-rien-dans-les-eaux-francaises-le-desespoir-des-pecheurs-de-boulogne-sur-mer-en-cas-de-no-deal_4206495.html
Apparently the logic is that because German, Belgian and Dutch factory boats have fished out French waters, French fishermen must continue to have access to British waters ...
Its concern for that which is driving MPs as well as mayors to want a reduction. BTW you mentioned Labour mayors - here in Smoggieland its Tory MPs whining on.
On public health grounds a reduction would be bonkers. Then again with all of £3.50 made available to support business I can understand why they are protesting.
A nightmare for government is the thought of being ignored.
And I sense that observance of covid guidelines are generally fraying.
Just need to hope the government is bright enough to put pretty serious restrictions in place to stop the new variant from getting loose out of kent. Doesn't seem to be the statistical evidence that it's more dangerous but a higher innate R0 is not a good thing.
To be great you have to achieve when things are hard.
Vaccination is certainly going better than the doomsters predicted.
Openreach should be credited with their rollout to 85% which I think they will achieve but they won't cover the remaining 15% without Gov help, which they've just cut.
I hope to have FTTP within a couple of years, after the debacle that was FTTC and G.Fast at least Openreach have got it together now.
He bought into the 'two weeks will solve the problem' bollox.
What he asked for wasn't done - but the idea of locking down he was spot on about. Because of Government incompetence we cocked that up.
And I asked for the lockdown to be extended. It was wrong to open up, that was a mistake both Tories and Labour made.
Either way I happen to agree with you on repeating the March/April lockdown. If we'd done that in October and held it until today then we would be in a position to have the kind of Christmas that Johnson wanted. As it is... we really really aren't.
And as for test / trace, nonsense demand that it could be fixed in a couple of weeks. Its like demanding somebody loses a 30 pounds of weight in 2 weeks.
I would give him credit if he had called for 6 weeks.
"In addition, clinicians have been providing anecdotal evidence of a shift in the clinical epidemiological picture- in particular noting that they are seeing a larger proportion of younger patients with no co-morbidities presenting with critical illness. The evidence that has been collated, therefore, strongly suggests that that the current second wave we are experiencing is being driven by this new variant."
https://sacoronavirus.co.za/2020/12/18/new-covid-19-variant-identified-in-sa
Was it implemented as he said, no.
Therefore you can't blame him for it not working.
A responsible Government would have extended it, Keir should have called for that - he can be blamed for that.
The Tories are useless.
Might be good, or not.
You say fhe idea of lockdown was spot on but that has spectacularly failed as implemented by Drakeford in Wales
The government messgaing needs to be super strong on this, as most young people have decided Covid isn't really a risk to them personally. It will be like an oil tanker to try and turn that, not totally incorrect, perception around
The Tiers don't work. Lockdown now!
The fire break would have worked had the Welsh Government not made such monumental errors.
Absolutely the right approach. Labour must neutralise Brexit.
If Keir wanted a six week lockdown he should have said so.
But either he didn't or he didn't have the courage to advocate it.
AIDS was so dangerous because it remained invisible for so long and yet, originally, was usually a death sentence. But that’s very unusual.
The circuit breaker crash diet policy was a key part of the problem. It was an attempt to do a quick lockdown, which is flawed thinking from the start.
Wales are losing more lives due to his disastrous decisions
I would like to see the stats on vaccination progress published as soon as possible. It would either be good for morale or provide incentive for improvement. Without measurement we cannot know whether the UK is doing well or badly.
The best that can be done now - *IF* the news about the Oxford vaccine and about the extreme contagiousness of the new Covid variant is all true - is to cancel the Christmas plan and impose a regime broadly similar to the first lockdown immediately and until further notice, and not even consider easing up until we've got as far as vaccinating everyone in the first four or five segments of the JCVI scheme. The schools shouldn't reopen in January, save for the previous key worker exemptions, and the universities most certainly shouldn't, either. Everything has to be focussed on inoculation now. It's the only way we're going to get out of this without an absolutely bloody massacre happening.
It is just a pity that all the Labour brilliance did not manifest itself in running a competent COVID response in Wales.
Looking at England and Wales, it doesn't look like a choice between useless and brilliant.
It looks like a choice between a crap bloke with blonde hair and a crap bloke with a personality bypass.
Labour are in a better position than year ago, but a long way is still to go.
I think Keir would have handled it better than Johnson, that's all.
He really is a top campaigner.
Scant evidence to support that notion.
Looks like a U-turn is on the cards, thank God for that. Well done Johnson, if it is done.
https://twitter.com/straits_times/status/1340045828266856450?s=19