What happens to the SNP policy of free uni for other EU citizens and Scots but charge the English after Brexit?
They’ll no longer be *required* to offer free tuition to EU citizens, as was previously the case.
I wonder if some enterprising law student might find a way to argue that it’s racist to offer free tuition to people from Lithuania but not from Nigeria?
Your point about treatment of a student from Nigeria -- as opposed to as student from Lithuania -- is an interesting one (which I confess had not occurred to me).
I don't know the answer, but it looks as though they both have to be treated equally now.
There seem to be ~ 20,000 EU students in Scottish Universities (data from 2017), so ~ 5,000 a year (as most Scottish degrees are 4 year long).
Presumably, the Scottish Government could continue to offer ~ 5000 free tuition scholarships annually to international students, based solely on merit.
It is a great idea. It looks as though they can afford it (as it is just a continuation of what they do now).
But, I am not sure that they could now restrict these scholarships to just EU students.
Any lawyers able to comment? Perhaps I have misunderstood the legalities ?
It's very easy for the Scottish government to discriminate, if they so choose, using the same mechanism the UK government does in the allocation of points to potential immigrants. Simply, not all universities and educational institutions are rated equally.
What moral or practical argument for limiting it to EU students?
It was simply the status quo before the UK gmt pulled the plug unilaterally, and because we were then in the EU.
As I'm sure many of you are aware @SeanT was one of the first to get Covid in the UK, early in 2020. Sadly, he was afflicted in a way that is becoming all too common:
We need Boris to announce on Wed that all schools are closed until end Feb. Otherwise we are up to 100,000 cases a day soon, maybe 200,000.
And can we get on with Oxford approval please? Now???
It needs to be a 24-7 operation getting the Oxford vaccine out there. 16 hours of organised vaccinations, 8 hours between 11pm to 7.00am where you can just turn up at your local supermarket car park, stick your arms out at a drive-through. For the army of insomniacs out there, worried sick about Covid.
Yes Yes Yes let's get on with it national priority number 1 since the War. Too much faffing around so far.
What I don't get is why they feel the need, as they will surely have done enough by now to ensure they have no fear of being seriously primaried (if it was even a risk) over lack of Trump support, and probably come from districts where they are completely safe anyway.
Have you considered that the GOP is populated by absolute fuckers who believe this shit?
It would almost be better if they were just pretending to, but I fear you are right. Little else makes sense.
What happens to the SNP policy of free uni for other EU citizens and Scots but charge the English after Brexit?
They’ll no longer be *required* to offer free tuition to EU citizens, as was previously the case.
I wonder if some enterprising law student might find a way to argue that it’s racist to offer free tuition to people from Lithuania but not from Nigeria?
Your point about treatment of a student from Nigeria -- as opposed to as student from Lithuania -- is an interesting one (which I confess had not occurred to me).
I don't know the answer, but it looks as though they both have to be treated equally now.
There seem to be ~ 20,000 EU students in Scottish Universities (data from 2017), so ~ 5,000 a year (as most Scottish degrees are 4 year long).
Presumably, the Scottish Government could continue to offer ~ 5000 free tuition scholarships annually to international students, based solely on merit.
It is a great idea. It looks as though they can afford it (as it is just a continuation of what they do now).
But, I am not sure that they could now restrict these scholarships to just EU students.
Any lawyers able to comment? Perhaps I have misunderstood the legalities ?
Why can't they be discriminated against?
Parliament is sovereign. If Parliament, or in this instance the Scottish Parliament, wishes to discriminate then why can't it do so?
Whether it should is surely a different matter to whether it can?
Well, I guess I don't know the answer.
But, I think if the Scottish Government wants to offer free University tuition to ~ 5000 international students -- which I would strongly applaud for educational reasons -- then it makes sense to me to offer the scholarships on the grounds of merit or achievement.
That is certainly a positive suggestion.
Re EU only - there are for instance certain scholarships at Oxford which are restricted to e.g. Welsh students, or Wykehamists, and so on. Or were. I don't recall that they were ever declared illegal - thouigh I believe many, perhaps all, have been converted to more open schemes as a matter of educational principle.
What I don't get is why they feel the need, as they will surely have done enough by now to ensure they have no fear of being seriously primaried (if it was even a risk) over lack of Trump support, and probably come from districts where they are completely safe anyway.
Have you considered that the GOP is populated by absolute fuckers who believe this shit?
It would almost be better if they were just pretending to, but I fear you are right. Little else makes sense.
Well watching the current GOP ha certainly made me realise Hitler's rise to power was no fluke. Mercifully Trump isn't as good an orator.
What I don't get is why they feel the need, as they will surely have done enough by now to ensure they have no fear of being seriously primaried (if it was even a risk) over lack of Trump support, and probably come from districts where they are completely safe anyway.
Have you considered that the GOP is populated by absolute fuckers who believe this shit?
It would almost be better if they were just pretending to, but I fear you are right. Little else makes sense.
Well watching the current GOP ha certainly made me realise Hitler's rise to power was no fluke. Mercifully Trump isn't as good an orator.
I remember reading about Godel going to his citizenship hearing having studied the US constitution, and having to be stopped by his friend Einstein from derailing the whole thing by going on about how he'd discovered a flaw in the US constitution that could result in the installation of a dictatorship.
We need Boris to announce on Wed that all schools are closed until end Feb. Otherwise we are up to 100,000 cases a day soon, maybe 200,000.
And can we get on with Oxford approval please? Now???
200,000 a day? Herd immunity by the end of January?
5,000 dead a day by the end of Jan if we don't get a grip 😠
I think that's unlikely. Why are we going to produce 5,000 deaths a day where other countries (even America!) aren't getting close to that.
I don't say that to try to underplay the problem. But talk of 5,000 deaths a day is hyperbole.
Ballpark at the moment is about 40,000 cases a day and 400 deaths? Operation Halfassed-Attempt-To-Save-Christmas means this is going to get worse (we're about 1 doubling away from late March), but 5000 deaths is about 500,000 cases. Exponential growth is bad, but surely not even this government can mess things up that much.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
I might be changing my mind on Labour strategy here. It would perhaps be better to vote Against on the grounds that the deal is too thin.
Labour voting against could sink it, they don't have the option of luxuriating in their own self indulgence that the other opposition parties do. Abstention, or a free vote would be acceptable.
They can’t sink it. There is no sign of an ERG rebellion, for example.
So, I believe they do have the option and I wouldn’t really call taking any vote in Parliament on something of this gravity “self-indulgence”.
I'd say any vote where you know the outcome for the country would be worse if the result went your way is the definition of self indulgence. That's very clearly the case with this deal, unless you're pursuing another agenda (independence for example)
Let’s play the “What If”.
The government is defeated by a coalition of Opposition and ERG votes. Does a “No Deal” then become likely?
Not really.
Of course it becomes a likely enough reality, the EU have shown more than enough patience with our messing about. They'll kick in contingency measures that suit them and we'll have tariffs and quotas to deal with.
I don’t see that as inevitable. If my (very far-fetched) “What If”, Boris would likely have to resign and emergency continuity measures sought by Raab.
No chance. The only reason Frost and Johnson have pulled off the deal they have is because they probably actually did mean it when they said they'd be happy to leave without a deal. If the rug was pulled out from under them by parliament we'd be straight into *ahem* 'Australia style' arrangements. I would say the EU would call our bluff, but I don't think Frost/Johnson were actually bluffing.
Johnson wasn't entirely bluffing (Frost didn't get to make that call), in my opinion. Problem was he and Frost thought the brinkmanship would have an effect on the EU. It turned out the EU was bluffing less than the UK was. With the result that the deal is less good for the UK than it need to have been, even given the constraints of the parties' red lines.
How do you figure?
The EU have moved much more than the UK have.
Look at the outcomes not the movement. Let's take one outcome.
One of the regular complaints on here by Brexiteers has been that the EU has a surplus with us in goods ie that the Single Market has helped the EU far more than Britain because Britain's strength is in services.
Now look at the deal: the EU gets to continue trading in goods with us, in an area in which it is strong. Britain loses frictionless trade in goods. Britain gets nothing on services, an area in which it is strong. That trade surplus which so annoyed Brexiteers is likely to get larger not smaller.
Or take finance. The government has already admitted that its deal is not good for finance. It will need to agree something with the EU on that. The EU has already stated that it will agree whatever is in the EU's interests. Britain has lost leverage because it has already agreed the rest of the trading relationship with the EU. Finance was one of Britain's strongest cards. It was one which the government chose not to play when it mattered.
Is this news? Anyone with a brain who voted Brexit knew that we would suffer in the ensuing trade negotiations, and that it might threaten the Union
This was bloody obvious. They are bigger than us, The overriding question was, in the medium-long term, was this a price worth paying for a very definite gain in sovereignty? Was this cost worth it, if thereby we were freeing Britain from n economically solid but sluggish bloc, determined on greater Federalism, and thereby cementing bureaucratic, non-democratic rule virtually forever?
The comparisons, often made, with the Reformation, remain pertinent. You either want the Pope to rule your inner life, and much of your public life, or you don’t.
The Brexit question was quasi-religious, hence the strange and violent passions it has invoked.
But the bus ... I never saw, "Let's have quasi-religion instead"
Jesus. Fuck the Bus. I know it annoys Remainers, but... it was a bus. Get over it.
This really is boring now.
Remain lost. Leave won. Remain thereafter tried to cancel democracy, but they failed (thank God) and so we are Leaving. Some of this Leaving will be shit, and disappointing, some of it will be good, and energising. It is a major geopolitical rupture, and a new reality dawns. Expect turbulence.
Britain has been around for 2000 years, the EU has been around for 70 years. We will surely endure and we will very likely prosper, in the end. As of now, a temporary trading arrangement with evermore onerous political duties has come to a close. So be it.
It's curious how those who hail this "major geopolitical rupture" and dawn of a "new reality" seem to want to stop discussion of what this means for us all. And on a politics website of all places.
Why would that be, I wonder.
It REALLY is because it is boring. We are in the midst of a much greater crisis than anything Brexit might do. And Brexit is also a done deal. It is happening. Who cares about the small print of a trade treaty compared to the Blaclk Death?
There will be a time when we can, at leisure, discuss paragraph 4b.3 of subsection 8 of the reciprocal UK-EU health insurance schemes, but this, I feel, ain't it.
And this is not because I fear scrutiny of Brexit. Brexit was always going to be painful. We will suffer pain. There it is.
It is possible to discuss more than one thing at a time. Indeed it is possible and necessary to deal with more than one crisis at a time, as the PM's fans have recently praised him for doing.
On Covid, I agree: everything possible has to be done to get vaccinations done at the highest rate possible as urgently as possible. Is there anyone who disagrees on that? No.
Repeating it endlessly with a few Battle of Britain references thrown in - and God, these really are boring - adds nothing.
On schools I don't know. I would listen to teachers on this. If schools and universities are a source of infection then temporary closure may be what is needed. I'd defer to the likes of @ydoethur on this.
What the Brexit deal actually means matters too. Especially for those who will suffer the pain you so casually accept. And it matters on Covid too because the one thing we are short of is medical staff so trying to get as many as we can to work here would help the NHS.
Starmer's been forced into a bit of a zugzwang: abstain / vote against and piss off the Red Wall; vote for and incur the wrath of the more Remoany elements who expected him to go down in flames and glory, wrapped in blue and gold.
The latter are less significant electorally, so shunning them is the correct decision. But then good luck reviving Labour in Scotland or avoiding a leak of EU purists to the Lib Dems and Greens.
A key concern of mine would be that I think urban liberals may be more likely to hold it against him than Red Wallers. Labour's strong recovery this year, including, according to the polls, among Red Wallers, has been at a time when the party is not significantly identified with Brexit. Labour's coalition is very fragile, and if I was SKS I would just be concerned that an urban group may split off to the Liberal Democrats, whereas much of the Red Wall may already have already factored in a Labour abstention or non-commitment.
Blair was re elected in 2005 despite losing large numbers of urban voters and several urban seats to the LDs as the Red Wall stayed Labour as did many other Midlands and Northern marginal seats
But he didn't like Starmer, have this very tricky issue of an keystone identity cause that cuts both ways. A number of younger liberal voters even outside the cities identify Brexit as an touchstone issue.
Labour can win enough seats to form a government losing a few urban seats to the LDs, Labour cannot win losing Red Wall and Midlands marginal seats to the Tories
Post- Coalition Labour is at little risk in terms of losses to the LDs. Beyond that Brexit has already become a peripheral issue - and will have become much more so by 2024.People have already moved on - whatever the commentariat might care to believe.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
Short term gain for long term pain is what populists do. Because most of us aren't good at delaying gratification.
What swung the thing we-shouldn't-mention-ever-again was the idea that there was a huge pile of money that we could reallocate from foreigners to ourselves and the NHS with no downsides. Everything else was noise.
And the triumph of the "STANDING UP FOR YOURTOWN AT WESTMINSTER" model of politics really hasn't helped.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It's not a mystery at all. The economic cost of being shut down of in a higher tier is painful. If Sunak provided a generous support package there would be far less resistance.
Given the way Covid is going and the inevitable March-style lockdown then Sunak is going to to have to be a damn sight more generous than now. His refusal to provide proper support to those affected is a major obstacle to compliance with the restrictions and stopping the spread of this virus.
My mate - black British, grew up in East London - has been told to expect an OBE in the New Years Honours.
If anyone told him it was somehow “offensive”, he’d get quite rightly upset.
They should change “(E)mpire” to “(E)xcellence”, but only because the Empire no longer actually exists.
On the subject of New Year Honours (and the Blair gong-blocker story) is there a market on whether Boris will kick Theresa May upstairs?
I'd rather he gave her the Chiltern Hundreds but can't see that happening.
You can’t ‘give’ someone the Chiltern Hundreds. They have to ask for it.
Well obviously . . . I suspect you can't kick someone upstairs without their consent either?
The Chiltern Hundreds is the same principle constitutionally as going upstairs.
Off topic
The Chiltern Hundreds is a mechanism for MPs to resign, as MPs cannot resign. It has nothing to do with "going upstairs".
Its taking a job that disqualifies you from being an MP, whether it be "an office of profit under the crown" like the Chiltern Hundreds or going upstairs - either way you're immediately then disqualified from being an MP which kicks you out of the Chamber.
Off topic
It's got nothing to do with being elevated to the HoL though
From memory. If for example you have been a particularly naughty MP and you feel you want to fall on your sword, as an MP you cannot resign. A convoluted mechanism to overcome this problem is to apply to the Chiltern Hundreds, for the reasons you (and Wikipedia) have explained. It is then deemed you are thus no longer allowed to be an MP.
To be exact, if you take an office of profit from the crown, you have to check with your constituents that they are happy for you to continue as their representative.
That was why until 1911 any newly appointed minister had to have a by-election. Could cause awkwardness, as when, for example, Churchill was defeated in 1908 on his elevation to President of the Board of Trade and had to do a ratrun to Dundee.
I believe that continued to be the case until the 1920s!It also only applied to appointments as Cabinet Ministers. When Churchill became Under Secretary at the Colonial Office in 1906 he did not face a by election.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
The "why isn't Edinburgh in Tier 1" nonseslnse that made it in to my Facebook feed mere days before cases rocketed was exceedingly aggrevating.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It's not a mystery at all. The economic cost of being shut down of in a higher tier is painful. If Sunak provided a generous support package there would be far less resistance.
Given the way Covid is going and the inevitable March-style lockdown then Sunak is going to to have to be a damn sight more generous than now. His refusal to provide proper support to those affected is a major obstacle to compliance with the restrictions and stopping the spread of this virus.
But Sunak suffers from the same myopia. I get the hideous expense of doing the necessary to survive Covid, and I know that the economic fallout is one of the things that will define the coming years. It will be rubbish.
But the choices aren't on the axis Do Something to Do Nothing. They're on the axis Do Something Adequate Now to Do Something Even Bigger In Three Weeks Time. We've had enough examples to show this by now.
I can understand (just about) overexcited backbenchers not getting this. But Sunak is Chancellor of the Exchequer and supposedly the bright one, and he has repeatedly made the wrong call on this... certainly since the summer.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It's not a mystery at all. The economic cost of being shut down of in a higher tier is painful. If Sunak provided a generous support package there would be far less resistance.
Given the way Covid is going and the inevitable March-style lockdown then Sunak is going to to have to be a damn sight more generous than now. His refusal to provide proper support to those affected is a major obstacle to compliance with the restrictions and stopping the spread of this virus.
Yes it is. But the economic benefit of a short term 're opening is completely offset, and more, by the almost inevitable harder lockdown to follow. There is little evidence it is politically very popular either.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
The "why isn't Edinburgh in Tier 1" nonseslnse that made it in to my Facebook feed mere days before cases rocketed was exceedingly aggrevating.
All the tier system has really proven is that all the rules and thresholds you can come up with to define who's in what tier are irrelevant anyway and the whole thing really is just a judgement based on as much information as you can bring to bear on the matter at any one time.
What I don't get is why they feel the need, as they will surely have done enough by now to ensure they have no fear of being seriously primaried (if it was even a risk) over lack of Trump support, and probably come from districts where they are completely safe anyway.
Have you considered that the GOP is populated by absolute fuckers who believe this shit?
It would almost be better if they were just pretending to, but I fear you are right. Little else makes sense.
Well watching the current GOP ha certainly made me realise Hitler's rise to power was no fluke. Mercifully Trump isn't as good an orator.
America's centrist pundits going "See! No dictatorship here, everything is perfect, absolutely no rough edges that need work" deserve a good slap right about now.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It's not a mystery at all. The economic cost of being shut down of in a higher tier is painful. If Sunak provided a generous support package there would be far less resistance.
Given the way Covid is going and the inevitable March-style lockdown then Sunak is going to to have to be a damn sight more generous than now. His refusal to provide proper support to those affected is a major obstacle to compliance with the restrictions and stopping the spread of this virus.
But Sunak suffers from the same myopia. I get the hideous expense of doing the necessary to survive Covid, and I know that the economic fallout is one of the things that will define the coming years. It will be rubbish.
But the choices aren't on the axis Do Something to Do Nothing. They're on the axis Do Something Adequate Now to Do Something Even Bigger In Three Weeks Time. We've had enough examples to show this by now.
I can understand (just about) overexcited backbenchers not getting this. But Sunak is Chancellor of the Exchequer and supposedly the bright one, and he has repeatedly made the wrong call on this... certainly since the summer.
Sunak getting Gupta (virtually) in the room with Johnson should be a career ender.
If the death penalty really is on the cards I will consider emigrating
Why? What did you do?
LOL, I mean the talk of it being reintroduced. If that did happen I would consider emigrating on principle, I really can't support a country that does it
What talk of it being introduced?
You're the first person I've seen bring it up.
Support for the death penalty is highly correlated with support for Brexit. If the Tories warned to recreate the Brexit coalition a death penalty referendum would be the obvious way to do it. I would probably emigrate too.
And it would succeed. "Let's take all the money we spend on lifers and give it to the NHS." How i loathe direct democracy.
Ah, that helps to explain your antipathy towards 5th-century Athens. It seems that the breakdown of the jury vote for Socrates' conviction was about 56% to 44% - not quite the Brexit ratio, but closer than some of us who suffered through the Platonic dialogues might have expected. After he then acted like a smartarse and suggested that as an alternative to execution he should be feasted like an Olympic victor at public expense for the rest of his life, the jurors voted overwhelmingly for the hemlock...
I would definitely have voted to execute Socrates. Indeed, I'd probably have chucked Plato on the pile with him. I would support digging up Kant's body and hanging it, just to be sure. And let's not even start on Hegel.
I have a Philosophy degree, so I know of which I speak.
Please, let's NOT haggle over Hegel! Or spout cant about Kant!! Or fling play-dough at Plato!
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It's not a mystery at all. The economic cost of being shut down of in a higher tier is painful. If Sunak provided a generous support package there would be far less resistance.
Given the way Covid is going and the inevitable March-style lockdown then Sunak is going to to have to be a damn sight more generous than now. His refusal to provide proper support to those affected is a major obstacle to compliance with the restrictions and stopping the spread of this virus.
But Sunak suffers from the same myopia. I get the hideous expense of doing the necessary to survive Covid, and I know that the economic fallout is one of the things that will define the coming years. It will be rubbish.
But the choices aren't on the axis Do Something to Do Nothing. They're on the axis Do Something Adequate Now to Do Something Even Bigger In Three Weeks Time. We've had enough examples to show this by now.
I can understand (just about) overexcited backbenchers not getting this. But Sunak is Chancellor of the Exchequer and supposedly the bright one, and he has repeatedly made the wrong call on this... certainly since the summer.
Sunak getting Gupta (virtually) in the room with Johnson should be a career ender.
We need Boris to announce on Wed that all schools are closed until end Feb. Otherwise we are up to 100,000 cases a day soon, maybe 200,000.
And can we get on with Oxford approval please? Now???
200,000 a day? Herd immunity by the end of January?
5,000 dead a day by the end of Jan if we don't get a grip 😠
I think that's unlikely. Why are we going to produce 5,000 deaths a day where other countries (even America!) aren't getting close to that.
I don't say that to try to underplay the problem. But talk of 5,000 deaths a day is hyperbole.
Ballpark at the moment is about 40,000 cases a day and 400 deaths? Operation Halfassed-Attempt-To-Save-Christmas means this is going to get worse (we're about 1 doubling away from late March), but 5000 deaths is about 500,000 cases. Exponential growth is bad, but surely not even this government can mess things up that much.
What we've seen with old covid is that, even if a government doesn't take very effective action, the fear produced when the hospitals reach breaking point is enough to modify behaviour sufficiently to bring spread under control.
Worst-case scenario is that new covid means that isn't sufficient.
While I'm an advocate of vaccinating asap, even at 4 million injections a week it will be too slow to bring the current wave under control. We need to bring hospital numbers right down more quickly than vaccination can achieve. The morale situation in hospitals sounds very poor.
My mate - black British, grew up in East London - has been told to expect an OBE in the New Years Honours.
If anyone told him it was somehow “offensive”, he’d get quite rightly upset.
They should change “(E)mpire” to “(E)xcellence”, but only because the Empire no longer actually exists.
On the subject of New Year Honours (and the Blair gong-blocker story) is there a market on whether Boris will kick Theresa May upstairs?
I'd rather he gave her the Chiltern Hundreds but can't see that happening.
You can’t ‘give’ someone the Chiltern Hundreds. They have to ask for it.
Well obviously . . . I suspect you can't kick someone upstairs without their consent either?
The Chiltern Hundreds is the same principle constitutionally as going upstairs.
Off topic
The Chiltern Hundreds is a mechanism for MPs to resign, as MPs cannot resign. It has nothing to do with "going upstairs".
Its taking a job that disqualifies you from being an MP, whether it be "an office of profit under the crown" like the Chiltern Hundreds or going upstairs - either way you're immediately then disqualified from being an MP which kicks you out of the Chamber.
Off topic
It's got nothing to do with being elevated to the HoL though
From memory. If for example you have been a particularly naughty MP and you feel you want to fall on your sword, as an MP you cannot resign. A convoluted mechanism to overcome this problem is to apply to the Chiltern Hundreds, for the reasons you (and Wikipedia) have explained. It is then deemed you are thus no longer allowed to be an MP.
To be exact, if you take an office of profit from the crown, you have to check with your constituents that they are happy for you to continue as their representative.
That was why until 1911 any newly appointed minister had to have a by-election. Could cause awkwardness, as when, for example, Churchill was defeated in 1908 on his elevation to President of the Board of Trade and had to do a ratrun to Dundee.
I believe that continued to be the case until the 1920s!It also only applied to appointments as Cabinet Ministers. When Churchill became Under Secretary at the Colonial Office in 1906 he did not face a by election.
That seems an eminently sensible system. People are supposed to be electing their MPs as their representatives, not as a stepping stone on a career path.
If the death penalty really is on the cards I will consider emigrating
Why? What did you do?
LOL, I mean the talk of it being reintroduced. If that did happen I would consider emigrating on principle, I really can't support a country that does it
What talk of it being introduced?
You're the first person I've seen bring it up.
Support for the death penalty is highly correlated with support for Brexit. If the Tories warned to recreate the Brexit coalition a death penalty referendum would be the obvious way to do it. I would probably emigrate too.
And it would succeed. "Let's take all the money we spend on lifers and give it to the NHS." How i loathe direct democracy.
Ah, that helps to explain your antipathy towards 5th-century Athens. It seems that the breakdown of the jury vote for Socrates' conviction was about 56% to 44% - not quite the Brexit ratio, but closer than some of us who suffered through the Platonic dialogues might have expected. After he then acted like a smartarse and suggested that as an alternative to execution he should be feasted like an Olympic victor at public expense for the rest of his life, the jurors voted overwhelmingly for the hemlock...
I would definitely have voted to execute Socrates. Indeed, I'd probably have chucked Plato on the pile with him. I would support digging up Kant's body and hanging it, just to be sure. And let's not even start on Hegel.
I have a Philosophy degree, so I know of which I speak.
Please, let's NOT haggle over Hegel! Or spout cant about Kant!! Or fling play-dough at Plato!
We could, but at the end of the day it will just Confucius....
Pfizer for Foxy as he's already had 1 jab. Foxy Jr is at the back of the queue - so likely AZOX
I meant if he could choose which vaccine. He said Sputnik was perfectly fine. If Sputnik is perfectly fine, then surely he wouldn't care which one he and his family were given?
Sputnik is not licensed here, so it is a pointless question, but if it was then I would be happy with it. Our Prof of Virology thinks it fine
Pfizer for Foxy as he's already had 1 jab. Foxy Jr is at the back of the queue - so likely AZOX
I meant if he could choose which vaccine. He said Sputnik was perfectly fine. If Sputnik is perfectly fine, then surely he wouldn't care which one he and his family were given?
Sputnik is not licensed here, so it is a pointless question, but if it was then I would be happy with it. Our Prof of Virology thinks it fine
Are we sure it isn't just an industrial espionaged copy of one of the others?
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It is very simple. Each and every day, they are getting a torrent of stories about what restrictions are doing to businesses and lives.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
C.Non-Gödelian Flaw #3: Article III: The Supreme Court’s Open-Ended Power of Judicial Review Despite this, the Supreme Court’s power of judicial review could still easily lead to a dictatorship. The problem is not so much judicial review as it is judicial supremacy—the unfounded and self-serving assertion that the Supreme Court has the last word in matters of constitutional interpretation.... ~ The House has just passed $2000 now - off to be killed by Mitch in the senate, and Democrat adverts running in Georgia.
What happens to the SNP policy of free uni for other EU citizens and Scots but charge the English after Brexit?
They’ll no longer be *required* to offer free tuition to EU citizens, as was previously the case.
I wonder if some enterprising law student might find a way to argue that it’s racist to offer free tuition to people from Lithuania but not from Nigeria?
Your point about treatment of a student from Nigeria -- as opposed to as student from Lithuania -- is an interesting one (which I confess had not occurred to me).
I don't know the answer, but it looks as though they both have to be treated equally now.
There seem to be ~ 20,000 EU students in Scottish Universities (data from 2017), so ~ 5,000 a year (as most Scottish degrees are 4 year long).
Presumably, the Scottish Government could continue to offer ~ 5000 free tuition scholarships annually to international students, based solely on merit.
It is a great idea. It looks as though they can afford it (as it is just a continuation of what they do now).
But, I am not sure that they could now restrict these scholarships to just EU students.
Any lawyers able to comment? Perhaps I have misunderstood the legalities ?
It's very easy for the Scottish government to discriminate, if they so choose, using the same mechanism the UK government does in the allocation of points to potential immigrants. Simply, not all universities and educational institutions are rated equally.
What moral or practical argument for limiting it to EU students?
It was simply the status quo before the UK gmt pulled the plug unilaterally, and because we were then in the EU.
But if we are designing a new system - what is wrong with students from Peru?
As an aside - many, perhaps most countries (certainly outside the 1st world) have not embraced the higher-education-for-all idea. They can't afford to. So their universities are *only* the high end institutions for egg heads. So very often you find very high standards in surprising places.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It is very simple. Each and every day, they are getting a torrent of stories about what restrictions are doing to businesses and lives.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
Indeed. Not a great advert for the way politics is done really.
The question "What the fuck has that got to do with climate change?" springs to mind. I despair.
Well if they want to be more than a single issue party more power to them I guess, but I've always thought the fundamental the Green Party has, in this country at least, is that when the public wants to go Green it can simply pressure Labour and the Tories to become more Green, and do a bunch of other, useful, things.
That is, the more people care about Green issues the greener the main parties will become, rather than more people vote Green.
So they need another hook for people to vote for them, hence why they have to find other issues the mainstream parties may not have fully gotten on board with yet, but which by definition are not mainstream issues, to differentiate themselves. Transgender issues isn't something only they will be wrestling with, but given their need to differentiate, get ahead of some issues, maybe it will hit them harder if there is resistance?
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It is very simple. Each and every day, they are getting a torrent of stories about what restrictions are doing to businesses and lives.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
Indeed.
It's hard - everyone kind of knows and accepts that complainers, valid or not, are likely to be louder, yet you still have to deal with it, pointing to the silent majority will be appropriate for some things but consent cannot simply be assumed for others, so you often, at all levels of politics, see politicians in favour of things, then fold or try to play both sides as the letters roll in.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It is very simple. Each and every day, they are getting a torrent of stories about what restrictions are doing to businesses and lives.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
Indeed. Not a great advert for the way politics is done really.
It's humans being human.
You have to understand that nearly no-one is a scientist by mentality.
I still remember my first intersection with the "must appear caring" thing. I said (back in the 80s) that
- I was in favour of sanctions against South Africa. - This would cause suffering and death in the black population.*
Apparently, it was evil to comprehend the consequences of an action, weigh it and accept it. Somehow this made me a bad person....
Pfizer for Foxy as he's already had 1 jab. Foxy Jr is at the back of the queue - so likely AZOX
I meant if he could choose which vaccine. He said Sputnik was perfectly fine. If Sputnik is perfectly fine, then surely he wouldn't care which one he and his family were given?
Sputnik is not licensed here, so it is a pointless question, but if it was then I would be happy with it. Our Prof of Virology thinks it fine
Are we sure it isn't just an industrial espionaged copy of one of the others?
It is a different inactivated virus, so cannot be.
Russians and Chinese are both pretty good with vaccines.
As I'm sure many of you are aware @SeanT was one of the first to get Covid in the UK, early in 2020. Sadly, he was afflicted in a way that is becoming all too common:
Third worst? Does that include the real figure from China?
According to the official Chinese figures, not a single person has died of Covid-19 for about 7 months, in a country with a population of 1.3 billion.
Given that the Chinese lock up journalists who say otherwise - and would probably also lock up anyone else reporting something different to the outside world - how reliable is such information?
Impossible to say.
Equally, it would be pretty well impossible for the Chinese to hide any really large scale outbreaks. However much we might disapprove of the fascistic regime, they do appear to have the disease under control.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It is very simple. Each and every day, they are getting a torrent of stories about what restrictions are doing to businesses and lives.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
Indeed. Not a great advert for the way politics is done really.
It's humans being human.
You have to understand that nearly no-one is a scientist by mentality.
I still remember my first intersection with the "must appear caring" thing. I said (back in the 80s) that
- I was in favour of sanctions against South Africa. - This would cause suffering and death in the black population.*
Apparently, it was evil to comprehend the consequences of an action, weigh it and accept it. Somehow this made me a bad person....
*It did - the effects of this are still with us.
You know that Brecht line about the East German Government dissolving the population and electing a new one?
It's often used as a sneery knockdown by people who say "The public want X, JFDI." And at the moment, we are going through a time of wanting politicians who JFDI over those who say "yes, but it's more complicated than that, and if we do X it's likely to have bad effec.." "PROJECT FEAR. JFDI."
To be clear- I don't want to live in East Germany, either the real one or the Brechtian one. But pure JFDI-ery doesn't seem to be doing well, or poised to end well.
And I don't know what the answer is. Maybe there isn't one.
Estimated transmissibility and severity of novel SARS-CoV-2 Variant of Concern 202012/01 in England https://cmmid.github.io/topics/covid19/reports/uk-novel-variant/2020_12_23_Transmissibility_and_severity_of_VOC_202012_01_in_England.pdf ... We estimate that VOC 202012/01 is 56% more transmissible (95% credible interval across three regions 50-74%) than preexisting variants of SARS-CoV-2. We were unable to find clear evidence that VOC 202012/01 results in greater or lesser severity of disease than preexisting variants. Nevertheless, the increase in transmissibility is likely to lead to a large increase in incidence, with COVID-19 hospitalisations and deaths projected to reach higher levels in 2021 than were observed in 2020, even if regional tiered restrictions implemented before 19 December are maintained. Our estimates suggest that control measures of a similar stringency to the national lockdown implemented in England in November 2020 are unlikely to reduce the effective reproduction number Rt to less than 1, unless primary schools, secondary schools, and universities are also closed. We project that large resurgences of the virus are likely to occur following easing of control measures. It may be necessary to greatly accelerate vaccine roll-out to have an appreciable impact in suppressing the resulting disease burden...
As I'm sure many of you are aware @SeanT was one of the first to get Covid in the UK, early in 2020. Sadly, he was afflicted in a way that is becoming all too common:
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It is very simple. Each and every day, they are getting a torrent of stories about what restrictions are doing to businesses and lives.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
Indeed. Not a great advert for the way politics is done really.
It's humans being human.
You have to understand that nearly no-one is a scientist by mentality.
I still remember my first intersection with the "must appear caring" thing. I said (back in the 80s) that
- I was in favour of sanctions against South Africa. - This would cause suffering and death in the black population.*
Apparently, it was evil to comprehend the consequences of an action, weigh it and accept it. Somehow this made me a bad person....
*It did - the effects of this are still with us.
You know that Brecht line about the East German Government dissolving the population and electing a new one?
It's often used as a sneery knockdown by people who say "The public want X, JFDI." And at the moment, we are going through a time of wanting politicians who JFDI over those who say "yes, but it's more complicated than that, and if we do X it's likely to have bad effec.." "PROJECT FEAR. JFDI."
To be clear- I don't want to live in East Germany, either the real one or the Brechtian one. But pure JFDI-ery doesn't seem to be doing well, or poised to end well.
And I don't know what the answer is. Maybe there isn't one.
I like it myself - for those who bang on about democracy. When they don't actually want it.
Brecht managed to notice, past his own Stalin worship, what such thinking actually is.
I have encountered many, many people who, to be frank, would be happier with Cromwell's point of view from the Putney Debates.
We need Boris to announce on Wed that all schools are closed until end Feb. Otherwise we are up to 100,000 cases a day soon, maybe 200,000.
And can we get on with Oxford approval please? Now???
200,000 a day? Herd immunity by the end of January?
5,000 dead a day by the end of Jan if we don't get a grip 😠
I think that's unlikely. Why are we going to produce 5,000 deaths a day where other countries (even America!) aren't getting close to that.
I don't say that to try to underplay the problem. But talk of 5,000 deaths a day is hyperbole.
Ballpark at the moment is about 40,000 cases a day and 400 deaths? Operation Halfassed-Attempt-To-Save-Christmas means this is going to get worse (we're about 1 doubling away from late March), but 5000 deaths is about 500,000 cases. Exponential growth is bad, but surely not even this government can mess things up that much.
What we've seen with old covid is that, even if a government doesn't take very effective action, the fear produced when the hospitals reach breaking point is enough to modify behaviour sufficiently to bring spread under control.
Worst-case scenario is that new covid means that isn't sufficient.
While I'm an advocate of vaccinating asap, even at 4 million injections a week it will be too slow to bring the current wave under control. We need to bring hospital numbers right down more quickly than vaccination can achieve. The morale situation in hospitals sounds very poor.
4m vaccinations a week would start to bring this under control pretty quickly, I'd have thought.
We need Boris to announce on Wed that all schools are closed until end Feb. Otherwise we are up to 100,000 cases a day soon, maybe 200,000.
And can we get on with Oxford approval please? Now???
200,000 a day? Herd immunity by the end of January?
5,000 dead a day by the end of Jan if we don't get a grip 😠
I think that's unlikely. Why are we going to produce 5,000 deaths a day where other countries (even America!) aren't getting close to that.
I don't say that to try to underplay the problem. But talk of 5,000 deaths a day is hyperbole.
Ballpark at the moment is about 40,000 cases a day and 400 deaths? Operation Halfassed-Attempt-To-Save-Christmas means this is going to get worse (we're about 1 doubling away from late March), but 5000 deaths is about 500,000 cases. Exponential growth is bad, but surely not even this government can mess things up that much.
What we've seen with old covid is that, even if a government doesn't take very effective action, the fear produced when the hospitals reach breaking point is enough to modify behaviour sufficiently to bring spread under control.
Worst-case scenario is that new covid means that isn't sufficient.
While I'm an advocate of vaccinating asap, even at 4 million injections a week it will be too slow to bring the current wave under control. We need to bring hospital numbers right down more quickly than vaccination can achieve. The morale situation in hospitals sounds very poor.
4m vaccinations a week would start to bring this under control pretty quickly, I'd have thought.
- 3.2 million over 80s - over 80s made up 54% of the fatalities from COVID. - vaccination on the 20th December was exceeding 75K shots per day. - 75% of the 75K shot were over 80 - So 56K over 80s per day, assuming no acceleration.
Covid rates in York now higher than Leeds or Bradford. And they are still in Tier 2.
Visited York back in February. MPs wanted it to move it into tier 1 recently !
The continued attempts of MP's to force their constituencies down tiers remains one of the virus' great unsolved mysteries. Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded. Short term gain for long term pain.
It is very simple. Each and every day, they are getting a torrent of stories about what restrictions are doing to businesses and lives.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
Indeed. Not a great advert for the way politics is done really.
It's humans being human.
You have to understand that nearly no-one is a scientist by mentality.
I still remember my first intersection with the "must appear caring" thing. I said (back in the 80s) that
- I was in favour of sanctions against South Africa. - This would cause suffering and death in the black population.*
Apparently, it was evil to comprehend the consequences of an action, weigh it and accept it. Somehow this made me a bad person....
*It did - the effects of this are still with us.
You know that Brecht line about the East German Government dissolving the population and electing a new one?
It's often used as a sneery knockdown by people who say "The public want X, JFDI." And at the moment, we are going through a time of wanting politicians who JFDI over those who say "yes, but it's more complicated than that, and if we do X it's likely to have bad effec.." "PROJECT FEAR. JFDI."
To be clear- I don't want to live in East Germany, either the real one or the Brechtian one. But pure JFDI-ery doesn't seem to be doing well, or poised to end well.
And I don't know what the answer is. Maybe there isn't one.
I like it myself - for those who bang on about democracy. When they don't actually want it.
Brecht managed to notice, past his own Stalin worship, what such thinking actually is.
I have encountered many, many people who, to be frank, would be happier with Cromwell's point of view from the Putney Debates.
What, votes for landowners only? I think it is a great idea, but would like it delayed until I acquire some land.
As I'm sure many of you are aware @SeanT was one of the first to get Covid in the UK, early in 2020. Sadly, he was afflicted in a way that is becoming all too common:
As I'm sure many of you are aware @SeanT was one of the first to get Covid in the UK, early in 2020. Sadly, he was afflicted in a way that is becoming all too common:
As I'm sure many of you are aware @SeanT was one of the first to get Covid in the UK, early in 2020. Sadly, he was afflicted in a way that is becoming all too common:
Comments
It's bloody obvious to all, isn't it?
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/28/health/covid-psychosis-mental.html
Re EU only - there are for instance certain scholarships at Oxford which are restricted to e.g. Welsh students, or Wykehamists, and so on. Or were. I don't recall that they were ever declared illegal - thouigh I believe many, perhaps all, have been converted to more open schemes as a matter of educational principle.
Special plead. Downgrading. Visitors flock in. Cases rise. Upgraded.
Short term gain for long term pain.
On Covid, I agree: everything possible has to be done to get vaccinations done at the highest rate possible as urgently as possible. Is there anyone who disagrees on that? No.
Repeating it endlessly with a few Battle of Britain references thrown in - and God, these really are boring - adds nothing.
On schools I don't know. I would listen to teachers on this. If schools and universities are a source of infection then temporary closure may be what is needed. I'd defer to the likes of @ydoethur on this.
What the Brexit deal actually means matters too. Especially for those who will suffer the pain you so casually accept. And it matters on Covid too because the one thing we are short of is medical staff so trying to get as many as we can to work here would help the NHS.
What swung the thing we-shouldn't-mention-ever-again was the idea that there was a huge pile of money that we could reallocate from foreigners to ourselves and the NHS with no downsides. Everything else was noise.
And the triumph of the "STANDING UP FOR YOURTOWN AT WESTMINSTER" model of politics really hasn't helped.
https://twitter.com/JakeSherman/status/1343681516392615938?s=19
I am sure suppliers in Furtwangel and Middelfart will be glad to make up the slack.
Given the way Covid is going and the inevitable March-style lockdown then Sunak is going to to have to be a damn sight more generous than now. His refusal to provide proper support to those affected is a major obstacle to compliance with the restrictions and stopping the spread of this virus.
https://twitter.com/d_libris/status/1343648991561592834?s=21
But the choices aren't on the axis Do Something to Do Nothing. They're on the axis Do Something Adequate Now to Do Something Even Bigger In Three Weeks Time. We've had enough examples to show this by now.
I can understand (just about) overexcited backbenchers not getting this. But Sunak is Chancellor of the Exchequer and supposedly the bright one, and he has repeatedly made the wrong call on this... certainly since the summer.
There is little evidence it is politically very popular either.
Alan Bennett's 2020 diary.
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/n01/alan-bennett/diary
Worst-case scenario is that new covid means that isn't sufficient.
While I'm an advocate of vaccinating asap, even at 4 million injections a week it will be too slow to bring the current wave under control. We need to bring hospital numbers right down more quickly than vaccination can achieve. The morale situation in hospitals sounds very poor.
Cyclefree's daughter * 1000s
It is quite probable that the number of emails/phone calls etc that they are getting *in favour of* restrictions is less - probably orders of magnitude.
People rarely contact their MPs to say "That thing the government is doing - keep doing it"
https://brianmlucey.files.wordpress.com/2016/11/8-guerra-pujol-1.pdf
C.Non-Gödelian Flaw #3: Article III: The Supreme Court’s Open-Ended Power of Judicial Review
Despite this, the Supreme Court’s power of judicial review could still easily lead to a dictatorship. The problem is not so much judicial review as it is judicial supremacy—the unfounded and self-serving assertion that the Supreme Court has the last word in matters of constitutional interpretation....
~
The House has just passed $2000 now - off to be killed by Mitch in the senate, and Democrat adverts running in Georgia.
As an aside - many, perhaps most countries (certainly outside the 1st world) have not embraced the higher-education-for-all idea. They can't afford to. So their universities are *only* the high end institutions for egg heads. So very often you find very high standards in surprising places.
Not a great advert for the way politics is done really.
That is, the more people care about Green issues the greener the main parties will become, rather than more people vote Green.
So they need another hook for people to vote for them, hence why they have to find other issues the mainstream parties may not have fully gotten on board with yet, but which by definition are not mainstream issues, to differentiate themselves. Transgender issues isn't something only they will be wrestling with, but given their need to differentiate, get ahead of some issues, maybe it will hit them harder if there is resistance?
It's hard - everyone kind of knows and accepts that complainers, valid or not, are likely to be louder, yet you still have to deal with it, pointing to the silent majority will be appropriate for some things but consent cannot simply be assumed for others, so you often, at all levels of politics, see politicians in favour of things, then fold or try to play both sides as the letters roll in.
You have to understand that nearly no-one is a scientist by mentality.
I still remember my first intersection with the "must appear caring" thing. I said (back in the 80s) that
- I was in favour of sanctions against South Africa.
- This would cause suffering and death in the black population.*
Apparently, it was evil to comprehend the consequences of an action, weigh it and accept it. Somehow this made me a bad person....
*It did - the effects of this are still with us.
Russians and Chinese are both pretty good with vaccines.
Equally, it would be pretty well impossible for the Chinese to hide any really large scale outbreaks. However much we might disapprove of the fascistic regime, they do appear to have the disease under control.
https://twitter.com/bellacaledonia/status/1343644978086612995?s=20
It's often used as a sneery knockdown by people who say "The public want X, JFDI." And at the moment, we are going through a time of wanting politicians who JFDI over those who say "yes, but it's more complicated than that, and if we do X it's likely to have bad effec.." "PROJECT FEAR. JFDI."
To be clear- I don't want to live in East Germany, either the real one or the Brechtian one. But pure JFDI-ery doesn't seem to be doing well, or poised to end well.
And I don't know what the answer is. Maybe there isn't one.
https://cmmid.github.io/topics/covid19/reports/uk-novel-variant/2020_12_23_Transmissibility_and_severity_of_VOC_202012_01_in_England.pdf
... We estimate that VOC 202012/01 is 56% more transmissible (95% credible interval across three regions 50-74%) than preexisting variants of SARS-CoV-2. We were unable to find clear evidence that VOC 202012/01 results in greater or lesser severity of disease than preexisting variants. Nevertheless, the increase in transmissibility is likely to lead to a large increase in incidence, with COVID-19 hospitalisations and deaths projected to reach higher levels in 2021 than were observed in 2020, even if regional tiered restrictions implemented before 19 December are maintained. Our estimates suggest that control measures of a similar stringency to the national lockdown implemented in England in November 2020 are unlikely to reduce the effective reproduction number Rt to less than 1, unless primary schools, secondary schools, and universities are also closed. We project that large resurgences of the virus are likely to occur following easing of control measures. It may be necessary to greatly accelerate vaccine roll-out to have an appreciable impact in suppressing the resulting disease burden...
Brecht managed to notice, past his own Stalin worship, what such thinking actually is.
I have encountered many, many people who, to be frank, would be happier with Cromwell's point of view from the Putney Debates.
...
https://twitter.com/angie_rasmussen/status/1343632840810844161
https://twitter.com/sarahrainsford/status/1343614470988431360
- over 80s made up 54% of the fatalities from COVID.
- vaccination on the 20th December was exceeding 75K shots per day.
- 75% of the 75K shot were over 80
- So 56K over 80s per day, assuming no acceleration.
Not a state my mind has ever approached, even cautiously from a distance.