362. I accept that oppression as a bar to extradition requires a high threshold. I also accept that there is a strong public interest in giving effect to treaty obligations and that this is an important factor to have in mind. However, I am satisfied that, in these harsh conditions, Mr. Assange’s mental health would deteriorate causing him to commit suicide with the “single minded determination” of his autism spectrum disorder.
363. I find that the mental condition of Mr. Assange is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the United States of America.
Since the District Judge found for the USA on most of the points of law - tricky to see how they can appeal this.
So, he voluntarily imprisoned himself in a small apartment for seven years, which made him go mad. And now he’s mad, he’s unfit to be deported to stand trial?
Did I get that right?
And he's coming out of Belmarsh into Tier 5 lockdown.
I hope he gets The Vid.
Does anyone have him in the pool?
No. I made a trophy out of a broken BMW piston before I broke my wrist and it is sat on my desk awaiting a lucky winner.
Now I know what the trophy is, I so want Trump to succumb to long covid.
I think the signs are there tbh... serious mental deteriation is soon going to be followed by a complete loss of relevance.
All that he really wants is people telling him hes great and the appearance of power.
So just have a network he can watch which praises him all day, get actors in military uniforms to salute him, then set him up with a game of Democracy 4 and tell him it's real life and have someone enter the room every now and then to say good job.
Alternatively, just don't. Don't pander to the orange idiot at all. Throw the book at him. He deserves all he has coming.
I don’t think the LibDems would be too thrilled if he became an Orange Booker. They’ve got problems enough as it is.
Imagine wittering on about zoos when the border is still open to tens of thousands of people per day who we know don't quarantine and have no idea about whether they have the virus. It's mental.
Totally agree.
Thailand has done really well with the virus, for a middle income country with a massive tourist industry and long, open borders. It's not been perfect, there are outbreaks, and the economy has suffered, but it has done way better than anyone in Europe.
Why?
One reason must be their extremely strict quarantine rules. You simply can't get in unless you agree to stay in a state-mandated hotel, on arrival, for two weeks (with no booze). And you have to pay for it. And you pay for tests.
And this applies to Thai citizens as much as foreigners. A Thai woman I know has just completed her quarantine there.
Imagine if we'd done this in the UK from March. I cannot understand why we have not. And I cannot understand why the scientists seem to agree with this policy. Perhaps our new PB-er from sub-SAGE might enlighten us?
That looks voodoo to me. If Labour had lost 5, fair enough. LDs losing 5 looks like nonsense.
First rule of stats - if something looks interesting there's a good chance it's wrong - so it will be interesting to see if these numbers are true and backed up (in terms of trend) by other pollsters.
I am fully expecting a Con six point lead but not at the expense of the LDs who fall to their lowest figure for generations.
I would imagine most Remainer LDs would be furious at the deal rather than hang their hat on Johnson. Con to Labour switchers less so.
As the Liberals have ceased standing for traditional liberalism and the only policy any person in the street can remember is impossibilist Remain, 4% looks high.
A truly bizarre poll. I expected a Brexit Tory bounce, but an LD collapse? Is it soft Tory Remainers who went LD now thinking ‘sod it, it’s done, and I’m really a conservative’?
I think so, the seats the LDs gained from the Tories at the last election like St Albans and Richmond Park are full of rich Remainers who normally vote Tory but were terrified Boris would go for No Deal, now Boris has got a Brexit Deal they are returning home
No they are not
Churn? Lib Dems moving to Labour, Labour shifting to Tory?
Would explain it, but that’s a horror poll for the Oranges.
I don't believe the LDs are that low, churn or no churn.
I agree Johnson has delivered some truly awesome news with his deal, his vaccine and saving Christmas for England, and the Conservatives fully deserve to be riding high in the polls, but that should be at the expense of Labour.
It's as I feared. Johnson's political reward for hyping No Deal almost to the very end, making people here believe it was likely, before agreeing the inevitable deal at the last minute.
His Relief Dividend. Maximized to the hilt. I did try to warn people. The guy's a total player.
But the good news? Just as the No Deal talk was fluff, so is this poll bounce. The deal is a Thin Deal. These LD switchers are bright. They'll suss it out before too long.
IF Boris does not follow Scotland ASAP, this could be the end of his career as PM. Or the making of him. It's that big.
Imagine Boris decides to delay. To wait two weeks or more (as some reports suggest). Imagine if, in that time, London and the SE continues to explode with cases, deaths rocket, hospitals turn away heart attack victims, the NHS totters. Imagine, in that same time, Scotland stabilises, deaths in Scotland fall, Scottish hospitals are fine.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
"Danish firm DFDS launch new direct cargo service between Ireland & France to bypass the UK. The first ship today carried over 100 trucks & the service is already over-subscribed. Hauliers say the route is longer but avoids Brexit red-tape they would otherwise experience on the UK route."
Suppose it will keep the queues down!
Keeps the traffic down on UK roads. No issue with that.
Well absolutely. I think I made that point, but doesn't it just maybe make you think 'well maybe it has cost and competitive issues for UK companies exporting and UK customers of EU products if Irish hauliers prefer a mega sea journey.
Marginally, so be it. We already have marginal cost issues by using a different currency but the benefits outweigh the costs.
Plus of course the Irish potentially need to do the paperwork twice, whereas the Brits only need to do it once.
I agree with all of your reply Philip except one. What are these benefits? I mean actual benefits not abstract ones Iike sovereignty. I can list a whole lot of benefits I have personally lost. I can not think of a single benefit I have gained.
Sovereignty is the benefit.
Ah you say that is abstract, but so what? It will be for governments we elect to turn it into actual benefits and how it will turn into actual benefits will evolve over time depending upon which governments.
There is no right answer apart from sovereignty. We might elect a more liberal government than the EU - or a more authoritarian one. We might elect a more socialist government - or a more dry Conservative one.
The choice is ours. The future isn't written yet.
The first formal divergence was the abolition of the tampon tax, which was illegal under EU law. It won't be the last one.
Wowser. Boris has had a brilliant couple of weeks. That's incredible polling 15 months in and after 10.5 years of a Tory government.
But, if he f*cks up on the new lockdown - which it looks like he might, delaying for a week or two - this will collapse. He's taking an enormous gamble.
362. I accept that oppression as a bar to extradition requires a high threshold. I also accept that there is a strong public interest in giving effect to treaty obligations and that this is an important factor to have in mind. However, I am satisfied that, in these harsh conditions, Mr. Assange’s mental health would deteriorate causing him to commit suicide with the “single minded determination” of his autism spectrum disorder.
363. I find that the mental condition of Mr. Assange is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the United States of America.
Since the District Judge found for the USA on most of the points of law - tricky to see how they can appeal this.
So, he voluntarily imprisoned himself in a small apartment for seven years, which made him go mad. And now he’s mad, he’s unfit to be deported to stand trial?
Did I get that right?
And he's coming out of Belmarsh into Tier 5 lockdown.
I hope he gets The Vid.
Does anyone have him in the pool?
No. I made a trophy out of a broken BMW piston before I broke my wrist and it is sat on my desk awaiting a lucky winner.
Now I know what the trophy is, I so want Trump to succumb to long covid.
I think the signs are there tbh... serious mental deteriation is soon going to be followed by a complete loss of relevance.
Very strong, very clear statement from Sturgeon. The odd little dig about other parts of the country showing what happens if you dither apart, played with a very straight bat.
Boris really should be taking notes and repeating. This is going to be a horrific month. We really cannot afford to make it any worse.
She said that 100k had been vaccinated in Scotland and they expected 900k more doses by the end of the month. Assuming that is Scotland's share we really should be looking to have 10-12m vaccinated by the end of January. Anything short of that (unless we simply cannot get the vaccine) would be unacceptable.
IF Boris does not follow Scotland ASAP, this could be the end of his career as PM. Or the making of him. It's that big.
Imagine Boris decides to delay. To wait two weeks or more (as some reports suggest). Imagine if, in that time, London and the SE continues to explode with cases, deaths rocket, hospitals turn away heart attack victims, the NHS totters. Imagine, in that same time, Scotland stabilises, deaths in Scotland fall, Scottish hospitals are fine.
Can Boris survive that? Maybe not.
What if all of the above do not happen?
As I said: it will be the making of him. If he delays, and Tier 4 starts to work, and London and the SE avoid Apocalypse, and Scotland does no better, then he will look like a prescient hero.
But, I fear all the evidence and data points to him being wrong. And he isn't just gambling with his career, he's gambling with all of us down here in London and the SE
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
It's quite viable as there are surprising few border crossings.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
362. I accept that oppression as a bar to extradition requires a high threshold. I also accept that there is a strong public interest in giving effect to treaty obligations and that this is an important factor to have in mind. However, I am satisfied that, in these harsh conditions, Mr. Assange’s mental health would deteriorate causing him to commit suicide with the “single minded determination” of his autism spectrum disorder.
363. I find that the mental condition of Mr. Assange is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the United States of America.
Since the District Judge found for the USA on most of the points of law - tricky to see how they can appeal this.
So, he voluntarily imprisoned himself in a small apartment for seven years, which made him go mad. And now he’s mad, he’s unfit to be deported to stand trial?
Did I get that right?
And he's coming out of Belmarsh into Tier 5 lockdown.
I hope he gets The Vid.
Does anyone have him in the pool?
No. I made a trophy out of a broken BMW piston before I broke my wrist and it is sat on my desk awaiting a lucky winner.
Now I know what the trophy is, I so want Trump to succumb to long covid.
I think the signs are there tbh... serious mental deteriation is soon going to be followed by a complete loss of relevance.
362. I accept that oppression as a bar to extradition requires a high threshold. I also accept that there is a strong public interest in giving effect to treaty obligations and that this is an important factor to have in mind. However, I am satisfied that, in these harsh conditions, Mr. Assange’s mental health would deteriorate causing him to commit suicide with the “single minded determination” of his autism spectrum disorder.
363. I find that the mental condition of Mr. Assange is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the United States of America.
Since the District Judge found for the USA on most of the points of law - tricky to see how they can appeal this.
So, he voluntarily imprisoned himself in a small apartment for seven years, which made him go mad. And now he’s mad, he’s unfit to be deported to stand trial?
Did I get that right?
And he's coming out of Belmarsh into Tier 5 lockdown.
I hope he gets The Vid.
Does anyone have him in the pool?
No. I made a trophy out of a broken BMW piston before I broke my wrist and it is sat on my desk awaiting a lucky winner.
Now I know what the trophy is, I so want Trump to succumb to long covid.
I think the signs are there tbh... serious mental deteriation is soon going to be followed by a complete loss of relevance.
Wowser. Boris has had a brilliant couple of weeks. That's incredible polling 15 months in and after 10.5 years of a Tory government.
But, if he f*cks up on the new lockdown - which it looks like he might, delaying for a week or two - this will collapse. He's taking an enormous gamble.
Nah that doesn't matter much. If it comes tomorrow or Thursday who cares, no one will be able to determine the difference in the outcomes in a couple of weeks. The succesful Brexit deal gave him a boost but the speed of the vaccine rollout as the light at the end of the tunnel will be more important to VI than lockdown.
IF Boris does not follow Scotland ASAP, this could be the end of his career as PM. Or the making of him. It's that big.
Imagine Boris decides to delay. To wait two weeks or more (as some reports suggest). Imagine if, in that time, London and the SE continues to explode with cases, deaths rocket, hospitals turn away heart attack victims, the NHS totters. Imagine, in that same time, Scotland stabilises, deaths in Scotland fall, Scottish hospitals are fine.
Can Boris survive that? Maybe not.
What if all of the above do not happen?
As I said: it will be the making of him. If he delays, and Tier 4 starts to work, and London and the SE avoid Apocalypse, and Scotland does no better, then he will look like a prescient hero.
But, I fear all the evidence and data points to him being wrong. And he isn't just gambling with his career, he's gambling with all of us down here in London and the SE
TBH, in this pandemic the public will give you zero credit for taking the more liberal approach to restrictions. Even if the Tier system works as well as Scotland more stringent measures, lots of people will still get it and die, and the call will always be you could and should have been tougher.
Nobody will be arguing x approach was slightly better for job retention. The call will be you still allowed x,000,000 get it and x,000 die, and we could have "just" paid people furlough.
It might be a better approach (I don't think it is, given the current situation), but you definitely won't win brownie points for it.
Very strong, very clear statement from Sturgeon. The odd little dig about other parts of the country showing what happens if you dither apart, played with a very straight bat.
Boris really should be taking notes and repeating. This is going to be a horrific month. We really cannot afford to make it any worse.
She said that 100k had been vaccinated in Scotland and they expected 900k more doses by the end of the month. Assuming that is Scotland's share we really should be looking to have 10-12m vaccinated by the end of January. Anything short of that (unless we simply cannot get the vaccine) would be unacceptable.
Yes, Scotland forecasting that 20% of its entire population will be vaccinated by Burn's Night.
Wowser. Boris has had a brilliant couple of weeks. That's incredible polling 15 months in and after 10.5 years of a Tory government.
But, if he f*cks up on the new lockdown - which it looks like he might, delaying for a week or two - this will collapse. He's taking an enormous gamble.
Nah that doesn't matter much. If it comes tomorrow or Thursday who cares, no one will be able to determine the difference in the outcomes in a couple of weeks. The succesful Brexit deal gave him a boost but the speed of the vaccine rollout as the light at the end of the tunnel will be more important to VI than lockdown.
But the rumours are that he wants to delay til "the middle of the month". Ten days? Two weeks? That really DOES matter. That's possibly 20,000 lives lost, or not.
A truly bizarre poll. I expected a Brexit Tory bounce, but an LD collapse? Is it soft Tory Remainers who went LD now thinking ‘sod it, it’s done, and I’m really a conservative’?
I think so, the seats the LDs gained from the Tories at the last election like St Albans and Richmond Park are full of rich Remainers who normally vote Tory but were terrified Boris would go for No Deal, now Boris has got a Brexit Deal they are returning home
No they are not
Churn? Lib Dems moving to Labour, Labour shifting to Tory?
Would explain it, but that’s a horror poll for the Oranges.
I don't believe the LDs are that low, churn or no churn.
I agree Johnson has delivered some truly awesome news with his deal, his vaccine and saving Christmas for England, and the Conservatives fully deserve to be riding high in the polls, but that should be at the expense of Labour.
So that's Germany and the US previously critical of the policy probably set to introduce it. Good to see them make the same u turn I did, the maths is absolutely undeniable having done it this morning. Single jabs give 30-40% more coverage at 70% efficacy for a single jab, if it's as high as 90% as is being investigated then it really is a no brainer.
We will genuinely be world leading on this policy innovation for better or worse.
Pfizer one appears to be 52% efficacy after first dose... so probably pretty debatable for that one whether there is much benefit to single jab approach https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m4826
Eek. I think that's a definite no given the additional mutation chances you give the virus with the partial protection.
Even assuming a delayed booster 'gives the virus additional mutation chances' (which is not proven), why would that necessarily give the virus greater mutation chances than not having the vaccine at all ?
Also, the 52%, as I pointed out above, is a somewhat misleading figure for 'efficacy'.
I really don't know what the government are waiting for re a new lockdown.
They have loads of political cover in terms of Cockey Covid and now SA Covid, to brush off claims of but but but you said no new national lockdown ever. And also the polling shows repeatedly that the majority of the public urge on the side of caution when it comes to further restrictions.
Maybe they should explain why none of their previous lockdowns have worked as expected before imposing another one.
What are you on about - lockdowns have worked.
People who trot this one out mean that Lockdowns have not eradicated the virus. Which is true but is rather like saying that some bloke's heart transplant has not worked because his dick is still the same size.
Well it isn't, not really, but we're short of anagrams today.
I think people who say lockdowns don`t work are doubtful that there is sufficient justification for them over and above similar social distancing that could be achieved via government advice rather than by more authoritarian measures. This is, of course, an arguable claim.
If someone is arguing that additional social distancing doesn`t reduce virus transmission then they are bonkers.
As I`ve said before, arguing against lockdown measures based on philosophical principle is one thing, resorting to pseudo-science is another.
Excellent post.
For example, I am instinctively against restricting humans in this way – I consider the entire process hateful and its consequences even more so (mental health, moralising and curtain-twitching, the invasion of government into private lives, the grim trade off between protecting old lives vs ruining young ones).
Yet I accept they are necessary, on some occasions and to some degree. Although it is possible we are at the stage where voluntary messaging is as if not more effective than closing down whatever is left open (e.g. outdoor zoos).
And clearly reducing social contact is key in reducing spread, although there is a philosophical question as to whether a life without social contact is worthy of the name. And several other philosophical questions about where the risk tolerance for each demographic group should lie.
I do not have the answers, but simply venture that they are valid questions.
And I believe that that was where the government was at the start of all this (and still is to some extent).
A factor often overlooked is the pressure to adopt similar measures to our European neighbours. I believe this to be crucial (and will also determine when the government meaningfully restores liberties).
If France, Germany, Italy etc, didn`t lock down as they did would we have followed? Or would we have at least kept to the "lockdown only to protect the health service" rational which was originally given, but long departed from - instead favouring a policy of giving the public the information and trusting them to manage their risk and living with the virus as they saw fit?
362. I accept that oppression as a bar to extradition requires a high threshold. I also accept that there is a strong public interest in giving effect to treaty obligations and that this is an important factor to have in mind. However, I am satisfied that, in these harsh conditions, Mr. Assange’s mental health would deteriorate causing him to commit suicide with the “single minded determination” of his autism spectrum disorder.
363. I find that the mental condition of Mr. Assange is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the United States of America.
Since the District Judge found for the USA on most of the points of law - tricky to see how they can appeal this.
So, he voluntarily imprisoned himself in a small apartment for seven years, which made him go mad. And now he’s mad, he’s unfit to be deported to stand trial?
Did I get that right?
And he's coming out of Belmarsh into Tier 5 lockdown.
I hope he gets The Vid.
Does anyone have him in the pool?
No. I made a trophy out of a broken BMW piston before I broke my wrist and it is sat on my desk awaiting a lucky winner.
Now I know what the trophy is, I so want Trump to succumb to long covid.
I think the signs are there tbh... serious mental deteriation is soon going to be followed by a complete loss of relevance.
Can you die of irrelevance?
Fair point, maybe I'm getting carried away (like Trump on 20 January!)
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Travel between England and Scotland is now by and large illegal. Only key workers are going to be exempt. I would expect the police to make some efforts to enforce this. Airports, my god, airports, they have been an open wound to infection since March and we are still mucking about.
That looks voodoo to me. If Labour had lost 5, fair enough. LDs losing 5 looks like nonsense.
First rule of stats - if something looks interesting there's a good chance it's wrong - so it will be interesting to see if these numbers are true and backed up (in terms of trend) by other pollsters.
I am fully expecting a Con six point lead but not at the expense of the LDs who fall to their lowest figure for generations.
I would imagine most Remainer LDs would be furious at the deal rather than hang their hat on Johnson. Con to Labour switchers less so.
As the Liberals have ceased standing for traditional liberalism and the only policy any person in the street can remember is impossibilist Remain, 4% looks high.
The Liberal Party maintains it's historic position as a supporter of Free Trade and so is anti EU.
"Danish firm DFDS launch new direct cargo service between Ireland & France to bypass the UK. The first ship today carried over 100 trucks & the service is already over-subscribed. Hauliers say the route is longer but avoids Brexit red-tape they would otherwise experience on the UK route."
Suppose it will keep the queues down!
Keeps the traffic down on UK roads. No issue with that.
Well absolutely. I think I made that point, but doesn't it just maybe make you think 'well maybe it has cost and competitive issues for UK companies exporting and UK customers of EU products if Irish hauliers prefer a mega sea journey.
I think it is an interesting development, especially as it seems to be mainly unaccompanied freight. More competition is good.
I wonder whether unaccompanied rail freight across Great Britain will open up more, as the Irish Sea 'border' is already seeming to be quite minimal - 3% of loads to be inspected?
Unaccompanied loads from NI to Tilbury via Holyhead and Liverpool?
And there will be more capacity in a few years due to HS2, and at present due to loss of coal business and Covid.
No impediment for Irish driving in the UK due to the CTA.
In Scotland the Deltapoll Scottish subsample finds the SNP fall fractionally below 50% for the first time in months to 49%, though still obviously well in front.
SCons on 24%, SLab on 16% and SLDs also on 4% level with the Scottish Greens.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
Crossing level 3/4 council boundaries without a reason on the exceptions list has been illegal for weeks.
As a sometimes LD voter they are at their least appealing and least relevant since then as well.
What do you think they're doing wrong at the moment?
It wouldn’t matter, they get little or no coverage in terms of press and TV, it doesn’t really matter there is no GE fr ages, people really are not thinking of who they would vote for. Not sure why they waste money doing polls at this stage of a parliament.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
I realise that but Nicola should announce it and dare Westminster to take her to court to keep planes in the sky. It's the perfect wedge issue for independence IMO. If Westminster fights back against it then it's the single most poignant example of why being ruled from Westminster by the Tories is a disaster for Scotland.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Travel between England and Scotland is now by and large illegal. Only key workers are going to be exempt. I would expect the police to make some efforts to enforce this. Airports, my god, airports, they have been an open wound to infection since March and we are still mucking about.
Getting to and from Turnhouse airport will be the tricky bit now nonessential travel becomes formally illegal.
I never regret voting for Hunt in the 2019 Tory leadership contest, today is just further confirmation.
Hunt would never have got the 80 seat Tory majority Boris got last year
Who gives a shit? Covid-19 doesn't care a jot about the size of Johnson's majority.
Who would have handled the pandemic better? Hunt or Johnson? If you say Johnson then you're a troll.
Campaigning is the easy bit, governing is the hard part, and Boris is failing on the latter.
Whatever the merits of the case, politically it is surely much much tougher to go against the prevailing winds calling for a new lockdown than with them.
I never regret voting for Hunt in the 2019 Tory leadership contest, today is just further confirmation.
Hunt would never have got the 80 seat Tory majority Boris got last year
Who gives a shit? Covid-19 doesn't care a jot about the size of Johnson's majority.
Who would have handled the pandemic better? Hunt or Johnson? If you say Johnson then you're a troll.
Campaigning is the easy bit, governing is the hard part, and Boris is failing on the latter.
If Hunt had been leader the Tories may never have even got a majority in 2019, the Brexit Party would have polled much higher and so Corbyn would still be Labour leader and Brexit would still not have been done.
As for the pandemic we now have one of the highest vaccination rates in Europe, so Boris is improving on that front too
In Scotland the Deltapoll Scottish subsample finds the SNP fall fractionally below 50% for the first time in months to 49%, though still obviously well in front.
SCons on 24%, SLab on 16% and SLDs also on 4% level with the Scottish Greens.
IF Boris does not follow Scotland ASAP, this could be the end of his career as PM. Or the making of him. It's that big.
Imagine Boris decides to delay. To wait two weeks or more (as some reports suggest). Imagine if, in that time, London and the SE continues to explode with cases, deaths rocket, hospitals turn away heart attack victims, the NHS totters. Imagine, in that same time, Scotland stabilises, deaths in Scotland fall, Scottish hospitals are fine.
Can Boris survive that? Maybe not.
But you make the point. It wouldn't be just him not surviving that. There'd be several thousand others. Which is why he will surely not prevaricate to that extent.
Wowser. Boris has had a brilliant couple of weeks. That's incredible polling 15 months in and after 10.5 years of a Tory government.
But, if he f*cks up on the new lockdown - which it looks like he might, delaying for a week or two - this will collapse. He's taking an enormous gamble.
Nah that doesn't matter much. If it comes tomorrow or Thursday who cares, no one will be able to determine the difference in the outcomes in a couple of weeks. The succesful Brexit deal gave him a boost but the speed of the vaccine rollout as the light at the end of the tunnel will be more important to VI than lockdown.
But the rumours are that he wants to delay til "the middle of the month". Ten days? Two weeks? That really DOES matter. That's possibly 20,000 lives lost, or not.
We all know its coming in the next few days, the only real hit to his popularity is if it doesn't come at all. Sturgeon spent much of last year copying Boris a few days after the event and the SNP polling was never significantly dented.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
Crossing level 3/4 council boundaries without a reason on the exceptions list has been illegal for weeks.
But the issue isn't Scottish people going to Edinburgh airport, it's flights arriving from Durban or Joburg via Schiphol.
IF Boris does not follow Scotland ASAP, this could be the end of his career as PM. Or the making of him. It's that big.
Imagine Boris decides to delay. To wait two weeks or more (as some reports suggest). Imagine if, in that time, London and the SE continues to explode with cases, deaths rocket, hospitals turn away heart attack victims, the NHS totters. Imagine, in that same time, Scotland stabilises, deaths in Scotland fall, Scottish hospitals are fine.
Can Boris survive that? Maybe not.
What if all of the above do not happen?
As I said: it will be the making of him. If he delays, and Tier 4 starts to work, and London and the SE avoid Apocalypse, and Scotland does no better, then he will look like a prescient hero.
But, I fear all the evidence and data points to him being wrong. And he isn't just gambling with his career, he's gambling with all of us down here in London and the SE
TBH, in this pandemic the public will give you zero credit for taking the more liberal approach to restrictions. Even if the Tier system works as well as Scotland more stringent measures, lots of people will still get it and die, and the call will always be you could and should have been tougher.
Nobody will be arguing x approach was slightly better for job retention. The call will be you still allowed x,000,000 get it and x,000 die, and we could have "just" paid people furlough.
It might be a better approach (I don't think it is, given the current situation), but you definitely won't win brownie points for it.
I believe he would get some credit, but yes, you are more likely to be blamed than praised whatever you do (especially if you err on the side of liberty)
What he needs to do, in terms of presentation, is get Whitty and Van Tam and the rest of the boffins in front of the cameras, explaining why England is not doing the same as Scotland. Unless, of course, all the boffins agree with Sturgeon, in which case Boris is an insane idiot playing politics with our lives.
I never regret voting for Hunt in the 2019 Tory leadership contest, today is just further confirmation.
Hunt would never have got the 80 seat Tory majority Boris got last year
Who gives a shit? Covid-19 doesn't care a jot about the size of Johnson's majority.
Who would have handled the pandemic better? Hunt or Johnson? If you say Johnson then you're a troll.
Campaigning is the easy bit, governing is the hard part, and Boris is failing on the latter.
Whatever the merits of the case, politically it is surely much much tougher to go against the prevailing winds calling for a new lockdown than with them.
Yes, that is true. And there have been times resisting calls for the very toughest measures has been correct, in my view. But now?
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved
Hasn't stopped Guernsey. Test on arrival. Mandatory self quarantine. £10,000 fine for breaches. Test on Day 14. If you don't want to take a test, mandatory quarantine for 21 days. 8 current cases in total - all caught through "Test on arrival".
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Travel between England and Scotland is now by and large illegal. Only key workers are going to be exempt. I would expect the police to make some efforts to enforce this. Airports, my god, airports, they have been an open wound to infection since March and we are still mucking about.
I'm a cross border key worker, the Polis have been on the border, anecdotally they are stopping the bleeding obvious piss takers e.g. minibuses full of tourists going up to the Highlands. Although one of my colleagues was stopped and admonished for essential food shopping (nearest supermarket is in England), which is not what the guidance states.
ScotGov don't have control of the UK border at the airports, so there is nothing Sturgeon can do. There were still plenty of tourists in AirBnBs in Edinburgh over Hogmanay, according to Twitter reports.
In Scotland the Deltapoll Scottish subsample finds the SNP fall fractionally below 50% for the first time in months to 49%, though still obviously well in front.
SCons on 24%, SLab on 16% and SLDs also on 4% level with the Scottish Greens.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
I realise that but Nicola should announce it and dare Westminster to take her to court to keep planes in the sky. It's the perfect wedge issue for independence IMO. If Westminster fights back against it then it's the single most poignant example of why being ruled from Westminster by the Tories is a disaster for Scotland.
Not sure that is at all legal. Not devolved. And there's nothing wrong with planes in the sku per se - though some good compulsoty quarantine would be a good idea.
As I have just said, they're making nonessential travel within Scotland illegal - so good luck getting to and from your plane in the first place.
Deltapoll also finds the Tories back in front with middle class ABC1s on 40% to 39% for Labour and the Tories are 12% ahead with working class C2DEs on 48% to 36% for Labour
IF Boris does not follow Scotland ASAP, this could be the end of his career as PM. Or the making of him. It's that big.
Imagine Boris decides to delay. To wait two weeks or more (as some reports suggest). Imagine if, in that time, London and the SE continues to explode with cases, deaths rocket, hospitals turn away heart attack victims, the NHS totters. Imagine, in that same time, Scotland stabilises, deaths in Scotland fall, Scottish hospitals are fine.
Can Boris survive that? Maybe not.
What if all of the above do not happen?
As I said: it will be the making of him. If he delays, and Tier 4 starts to work, and London and the SE avoid Apocalypse, and Scotland does no better, then he will look like a prescient hero.
But, I fear all the evidence and data points to him being wrong. And he isn't just gambling with his career, he's gambling with all of us down here in London and the SE
TBH, in this pandemic the public will give you zero credit for taking the more liberal approach to restrictions. Even if the Tier system works as well as Scotland more stringent measures, lots of people will still get it and die, and the call will always be you could and should have been tougher.
Nobody will be arguing x approach was slightly better for job retention. The call will be you still allowed x,000,000 get it and x,000 die, and we could have "just" paid people furlough.
It might be a better approach (I don't think it is, given the current situation), but you definitely won't win brownie points for it.
I believe he would get some credit, but yes, you are more likely to be blamed than praised whatever you do (especially if you err on the side of liberty)
What he needs to do, in terms of presentation, is get Whitty and Van Tam and the rest of the boffins in front of the cameras, explaining why England is not doing the same as Scotland. Unless, of course, all the boffins agree with Sturgeon, in which case Boris is an insane idiot playing politics with our lives.
I am fairly certain Witty especially will be in the "lockdown yesterday" camp. Consistently over the past 9 months, he has always been in take the most cautious approach camp, and fairly clear that he didn't think most of the Tier system works.
Note: the last one was done for The Mail on Sunday; the latest one is for The Mirror.
Interesting figures include the Lib Dems retaining only 30% of their 2019 vote in the latest poll (it was 73% in the last poll).
The Tories (up 20 pp) and Labour (up 19 pp) had similar increases in their shares of the 2019 LD vote. I'm never too sure how this all works, but there was quite a large increase in the unweighted 2019 Tory vote:
Con - 45.5% (+5.8 pp on the previous poll) Lab - 36.8% (-2.6 pp) LD - 7.2% (-1.5 pp) Other - 11.0% (-1.7 pp)
That might account for why the Tories appear to have gained in this poll. I think it's generally accepted as a positive sign when people remember voting for you last time.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved
Hasn't stopped Guernsey. Test on arrival. Mandatory self quarantine. £10,000 fine for breaches. Test on Day 14. If you don't want to take a test, mandatory quarantine for 21 days. 8 current cases in total - all caught through "Test on arrival".
"Danish firm DFDS launch new direct cargo service between Ireland & France to bypass the UK. The first ship today carried over 100 trucks & the service is already over-subscribed. Hauliers say the route is longer but avoids Brexit red-tape they would otherwise experience on the UK route."
Suppose it will keep the queues down!
Keeps the traffic down on UK roads. No issue with that.
Well absolutely. I think I made that point, but doesn't it just maybe make you think 'well maybe it has cost and competitive issues for UK companies exporting and UK customers of EU products if Irish hauliers prefer a mega sea journey.
Marginally, so be it. We already have marginal cost issues by using a different currency but the benefits outweigh the costs.
Plus of course the Irish potentially need to do the paperwork twice, whereas the Brits only need to do it once.
I agree with all of your reply Philip except one. What are these benefits? I mean actual benefits not abstract ones Iike sovereignty. I can list a whole lot of benefits I have personally lost. I can not think of a single benefit I have gained.
You can now throw out (or elect), via the ballot box, all the people who make the crucial political decisions that govern your life.
Take the Covid vaccine. The UK government is entirely responsible for buying, distributing and injecting this stuff into our arms. If they fuck it up, vote them out. If they do well, re-elect them, should you so wish.
The EU however, via the Commission, decided to do an EU-wide scheme, launched on the same day, which some have found seriously flawed and laborious.
If you're an EU citizen angry about this, how do you democratically punish those responsible? You can't.
It's very abstract and also does not ring true. If the big stuff used to be Brussels and Westminster was a parish council how come anyone here got even remotely frightened about PM Corbyn?
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
Crossing level 3/4 council boundaries without a reason on the exceptions list has been illegal for weeks.
But the issue isn't Scottish people going to Edinburgh airport, it's flights arriving from Durban or Joburg via Schiphol.
That's still travelling into a level 4 area. The problem is that the law isn't enforced.
IF Boris does not follow Scotland ASAP, this could be the end of his career as PM. Or the making of him. It's that big.
Imagine Boris decides to delay. To wait two weeks or more (as some reports suggest). Imagine if, in that time, London and the SE continues to explode with cases, deaths rocket, hospitals turn away heart attack victims, the NHS totters. Imagine, in that same time, Scotland stabilises, deaths in Scotland fall, Scottish hospitals are fine.
Can Boris survive that? Maybe not.
But you make the point. It wouldn't be just him not surviving that. There'd be several thousand others. Which is why he will surely not prevaricate to that extent.
So if he's not going to prevaricate and he is going to do it, Just Bloody Do It Now. What possible gain is there in waiting an extra hour, let alone a few days?
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
Crossing level 3/4 council boundaries without a reason on the exceptions list has been illegal for weeks.
But the issue isn't Scottish people going to Edinburgh airport, it's flights arriving from Durban or Joburg via Schiphol.
That's still travelling into a level 4 area. The problem is that the law isn't enforced.
Yes, and enforcing that law is much, much more difficult to do than simply closing the airports.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
It's quite viable as there are surprising few border crossings.
Only 5 or so major roads crossing from England to Scotland but 20+ minor ones.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved
Hasn't stopped Guernsey. Test on arrival. Mandatory self quarantine. £10,000 fine for breaches. Test on Day 14. If you don't want to take a test, mandatory quarantine for 21 days. 8 current cases in total - all caught through "Test on arrival".
You're not part of the UK.
The UK government is responsible for foreign relations.
This is a Public Health (which is devolved to Scotland) issue.
Wowser. Boris has had a brilliant couple of weeks. That's incredible polling 15 months in and after 10.5 years of a Tory government.
But, if he f*cks up on the new lockdown - which it looks like he might, delaying for a week or two - this will collapse. He's taking an enormous gamble.
Nah that doesn't matter much. If it comes tomorrow or Thursday who cares, no one will be able to determine the difference in the outcomes in a couple of weeks. The succesful Brexit deal gave him a boost but the speed of the vaccine rollout as the light at the end of the tunnel will be more important to VI than lockdown.
But the rumours are that he wants to delay til "the middle of the month". Ten days? Two weeks? That really DOES matter. That's possibly 20,000 lives lost, or not.
20,000 additional lives on top of those who are going to die already. 1500 additional lives for every day of delay seems reasonable although I suspect that most education authorities will take the decision out of the government's hands if they don't act immediately and that will help.
So do we think we will exceed the 60k cases reported today?
My father reckons we'll hit 75,000 this week, that's down to the Christmas hall pass kicking in and the unwind from non reporting over the Christmas break.
362. I accept that oppression as a bar to extradition requires a high threshold. I also accept that there is a strong public interest in giving effect to treaty obligations and that this is an important factor to have in mind. However, I am satisfied that, in these harsh conditions, Mr. Assange’s mental health would deteriorate causing him to commit suicide with the “single minded determination” of his autism spectrum disorder.
363. I find that the mental condition of Mr. Assange is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the United States of America.
Since the District Judge found for the USA on most of the points of law - tricky to see how they can appeal this.
So, he voluntarily imprisoned himself in a small apartment for seven years, which made him go mad. And now he’s mad, he’s unfit to be deported to stand trial?
Did I get that right?
And he's coming out of Belmarsh into Tier 5 lockdown.
I hope he gets The Vid.
Does anyone have him in the pool?
No. I made a trophy out of a broken BMW piston before I broke my wrist and it is sat on my desk awaiting a lucky winner.
Amazing that is not settled yet. We were rubbish.
Maybe we should have another round for the 2nd (3rd?) wave. My gutsy, long shot of a 104 year old pick unfortunately died (of old age).
Well I had the Queen (as it were). Still do, I suppose.
Not really one to win, it has to be said. If it happens I won't be piping up. Will wait for Dura to approach me.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
Crossing level 3/4 council boundaries without a reason on the exceptions list has been illegal for weeks.
But the issue isn't Scottish people going to Edinburgh airport, it's flights arriving from Durban or Joburg via Schiphol.
Are SA flights not banned in several European countries (including the Netherlands)?
"Danish firm DFDS launch new direct cargo service between Ireland & France to bypass the UK. The first ship today carried over 100 trucks & the service is already over-subscribed. Hauliers say the route is longer but avoids Brexit red-tape they would otherwise experience on the UK route."
Suppose it will keep the queues down!
Keeps the traffic down on UK roads. No issue with that.
Well absolutely. I think I made that point, but doesn't it just maybe make you think 'well maybe it has cost and competitive issues for UK companies exporting and UK customers of EU products if Irish hauliers prefer a mega sea journey.
Marginally, so be it. We already have marginal cost issues by using a different currency but the benefits outweigh the costs.
Plus of course the Irish potentially need to do the paperwork twice, whereas the Brits only need to do it once.
I agree with all of your reply Philip except one. What are these benefits? I mean actual benefits not abstract ones Iike sovereignty. I can list a whole lot of benefits I have personally lost. I can not think of a single benefit I have gained.
Sovereignty is the benefit.
Ah you say that is abstract, but so what? It will be for governments we elect to turn it into actual benefits and how it will turn into actual benefits will evolve over time depending upon which governments.
There is no right answer apart from sovereignty. We might elect a more liberal government than the EU - or a more authoritarian one. We might elect a more socialist government - or a more dry Conservative one.
The choice is ours. The future isn't written yet.
The first formal divergence was the abolition of the tampon tax, which was illegal under EU law. It won't be the last one.
Well tampon tax I will give you, but sovereignty really? I am interested in personal freedoms and I can think of a hell of a lot of things I can't do now that I could before and nothing that I can do that I couldn't before.
"Danish firm DFDS launch new direct cargo service between Ireland & France to bypass the UK. The first ship today carried over 100 trucks & the service is already over-subscribed. Hauliers say the route is longer but avoids Brexit red-tape they would otherwise experience on the UK route."
Suppose it will keep the queues down!
Keeps the traffic down on UK roads. No issue with that.
Well absolutely. I think I made that point, but doesn't it just maybe make you think 'well maybe it has cost and competitive issues for UK companies exporting and UK customers of EU products if Irish hauliers prefer a mega sea journey.
Marginally, so be it. We already have marginal cost issues by using a different currency but the benefits outweigh the costs.
Plus of course the Irish potentially need to do the paperwork twice, whereas the Brits only need to do it once.
I agree with all of your reply Philip except one. What are these benefits? I mean actual benefits not abstract ones Iike sovereignty. I can list a whole lot of benefits I have personally lost. I can not think of a single benefit I have gained.
Sovereignty is the benefit.
Ah you say that is abstract, but so what? It will be for governments we elect to turn it into actual benefits and how it will turn into actual benefits will evolve over time depending upon which governments.
There is no right answer apart from sovereignty. We might elect a more liberal government than the EU - or a more authoritarian one. We might elect a more socialist government - or a more dry Conservative one.
The choice is ours. The future isn't written yet.
The first formal divergence was the abolition of the tampon tax, which was illegal under EU law. It won't be the last one.
AIUI, the abolition is now possible in the EU. I believe the Govt hung on to it to make themselves seem good.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
It's quite viable as there are surprising few border crossings.
Only 5 or so major roads crossing from England to Scotland but 20+ minor ones.
From memory someone on here calculated it at 31, which includes farm tracks and the like which are navigable via car albeit very remote in some cases. Not too many all in all!
I never regret voting for Hunt in the 2019 Tory leadership contest, today is just further confirmation.
Hunt would never have got the 80 seat Tory majority Boris got last year
Who gives a shit? Covid-19 doesn't care a jot about the size of Johnson's majority.
Who would have handled the pandemic better? Hunt or Johnson? If you say Johnson then you're a troll.
Campaigning is the easy bit, governing is the hard part, and Boris is failing on the latter.
Not sure I agree with that TSE. May was probably better at governing than Boris is but it made F all difference because she was such a crap campaigner she did not get a majority (against Corbyn for god's sake). As a result she achieved nothing other than agony for us all.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Scotland can't close the Airports.
The restrictions make it illegal to travel to the airport but she can't stop the planes. That's a UK competence.
As a sometimes LD voter they are at their least appealing and least relevant since then as well.
What do you think they're doing wrong at the moment?
Lack of imagination, lack of talent. Its not so much that they are doing that much wrong, but they are not coming up with any creative solutions or policies. Playing it safe and dull can make sense for Labour when you have a chaotic govt, but if I want safe and dull why choose LDs ahead of Starmer?
Hopefully some of their few MPs can follow the example of Norman Lamb, find one issue, be an expert in it, and leverage that to be relevant.
Note: the last one was done for The Mail on Sunday; the latest one is for The Mirror.
Interesting figures include the Lib Dems retaining only 30% of their 2019 vote in the latest poll (it was 73% in the last poll).
The Tories (up 20 pp) and Labour (up 19 pp) had similar increases in their shares of the 2019 LD vote. I'm never too sure how this all works, but there was quite a large increase in the unweighted 2019 Tory vote:
Con - 45.5% (+5.8 pp on the previous poll) Lab - 36.8% (-2.6 pp) LD - 7.2% (-1.5 pp) Other - 11.0% (-1.7 pp)
That might account for why the Tories appear to have gained in this poll. I think it's generally accepted as a positive sign when people remember voting for you last time.
Just noticed that the Tories are retaining 87% (was 80%) of their 2019 vote in the latest poll. Also they are on 8% (was 2%) of 2019 others, so presumably they are getting some Brexit Party voters too.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
It's quite viable as there are surprising few border crossings.
Only 5 or so major roads crossing from England to Scotland but 20+ minor ones.
From memory someone on here calculated it at 31, which includes farm tracks and the like which are navigable via car albeit very remote in some cases. Not too many all in all!
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Foreign travel isn't devolved. But already nonessential travel within Scotland was discouraged - now to be made formally illegal. I.e. you can't go over the border or out of the airport without breaking the law. I'm waiting to see the details (used to be crossing health board authorities' boundaries, and I do know the police were stopping and talking to people in cars in the bit of boundary near me).
I realise that but Nicola should announce it and dare Westminster to take her to court to keep planes in the sky. It's the perfect wedge issue for independence IMO. If Westminster fights back against it then it's the single most poignant example of why being ruled from Westminster by the Tories is a disaster for Scotland.
Not sure that is at all legal. Not devolved. And there's nothing wrong with planes in the sku per se - though some good compulsoty quarantine would be a good idea.
As I have just said, they're making nonessential travel within Scotland illegal - so good luck getting to and from your plane in the first place.
Poor old Hamish McPublic can't really understand why there are endless flights to and from everywhere from and to Glasgow and Edinburgh while very local cross- border travel is so frowned upon.
Here we go......2 days too late. Lets hope it isn't another I am announcing this evening that from a week on Thursday....
Well at least he has managed to do it on the same day as Sturgeon, and at a better time for maximum TV news-drama. So he won't look like the usual Johnny cum lately.
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
Scotland can't close the Airports.
The restrictions make it illegal to travel to the airport but she can't stop the planes. That's a UK competence.
Ah a bit like independence referenda are the competence of the UK government.
So why is Sturgeon likely to do one and not the other?
Is it she cares more about independence than Covid-19?
Tbh, even Nicola is failing the border test. Why hasn't Scotland closed its airports and opened checkpoints into Scotland from England with rapid testing stations. Something like that would be perfectly reasonable at this time. It might even shock Westminster into acting, keeping the border with Scotland open is far more important than keeping the border open with RoW. The UK should be an impenetrable fortress at this point a year after we first realised this was going to be awful.
It's quite viable as there are surprising few border crossings.
Only 5 or so major roads crossing from England to Scotland but 20+ minor ones.
From memory someone on here calculated it at 31, which includes farm tracks and the like which are navigable via car albeit very remote in some cases. Not too many all in all!
Comments
https://twitter.com/GdnPolitics/status/1346100084589559809
Bozo dithers.
Again and again and again.
Can we move the border to the Humber?
Thailand has done really well with the virus, for a middle income country with a massive tourist industry and long, open borders. It's not been perfect, there are outbreaks, and the economy has suffered, but it has done way better than anyone in Europe.
Why?
One reason must be their extremely strict quarantine rules. You simply can't get in unless you agree to stay in a state-mandated hotel, on arrival, for two weeks (with no booze). And you have to pay for it. And you pay for tests.
And this applies to Thai citizens as much as foreigners. A Thai woman I know has just completed her quarantine there.
Imagine if we'd done this in the UK from March. I cannot understand why we have not. And I cannot understand why the scientists seem to agree with this policy. Perhaps our new PB-er from sub-SAGE might enlighten us?
His Relief Dividend. Maximized to the hilt. I did try to warn people. The guy's a total player.
But the good news? Just as the No Deal talk was fluff, so is this poll bounce. The deal is a Thin Deal. These LD switchers are bright. They'll suss it out before too long.
Last poll: http://www.deltapoll.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Deltapoll-MoS201128.pdf
Latest poll: http://www.deltapoll.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Deltapoll-Mirror201230.pdf
Note: the last one was done for The Mail on Sunday; the latest one is for The Mirror.
Interesting figures include the Lib Dems retaining only 30% of their 2019 vote in the latest poll (it was 73% in the last poll).
Ah you say that is abstract, but so what? It will be for governments we elect to turn it into actual benefits and how it will turn into actual benefits will evolve over time depending upon which governments.
There is no right answer apart from sovereignty. We might elect a more liberal government than the EU - or a more authoritarian one. We might elect a more socialist government - or a more dry Conservative one.
The choice is ours. The future isn't written yet.
The first formal divergence was the abolition of the tampon tax, which was illegal under EU law. It won't be the last one.
Letting Hunt own Sadiq Khan's full support.
Boris really should be taking notes and repeating. This is going to be a horrific month. We really cannot afford to make it any worse.
She said that 100k had been vaccinated in Scotland and they expected 900k more doses by the end of the month. Assuming that is Scotland's share we really should be looking to have 10-12m vaccinated by the end of January. Anything short of that (unless we simply cannot get the vaccine) would be unacceptable.
The m became a comma, its neighbouring key!
But, I fear all the evidence and data points to him being wrong. And he isn't just gambling with his career, he's gambling with all of us down here in London and the SE
https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1346102104511885313
Nobody will be arguing x approach was slightly better for job retention. The call will be you still allowed x,000,000 get it and x,000 die, and we could have "just" paid people furlough.
It might be a better approach (I don't think it is, given the current situation), but you definitely won't win brownie points for it.
That's quite something.
24% of 2019 LDs are now voting Tory and 39% of 2019 LDs are now voting Labour, just 30% of 2019 LDs are sticking with the party
http://www.deltapoll.co.uk/polls/end-of-year-voting-intentions
A factor often overlooked is the pressure to adopt similar measures to our European neighbours. I believe this to be crucial (and will also determine when the government meaningfully restores liberties).
If France, Germany, Italy etc, didn`t lock down as they did would we have followed? Or would we have at least kept to the "lockdown only to protect the health service" rational which was originally given, but long departed from - instead favouring a policy of giving the public the information and trusting them to manage their risk and living with the virus as they saw fit?
I hadn't seen the term 'all-rounder' used in that context before.
Who would have handled the pandemic better? Hunt or Johnson? If you say Johnson then you're a troll.
Campaigning is the easy bit, governing is the hard part, and Boris is failing on the latter.
The LD's on the other hand.......
I wonder whether unaccompanied rail freight across Great Britain will open up more, as the Irish Sea 'border' is already seeming to be quite minimal - 3% of loads to be inspected?
Unaccompanied loads from NI to Tilbury via Holyhead and Liverpool?
And there will be more capacity in a few years due to HS2, and at present due to loss of coal business and Covid.
No impediment for Irish driving in the UK due to the CTA.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/jeremy-hunt-downed-tools-refused-play-asked-turn-ventilators/
SCons on 24%, SLab on 16% and SLDs also on 4% level with the Scottish Greens.
http://www.deltapoll.co.uk/polls/end-of-year-voting-intentions
However, Boris needs to listen to Hunt comment today
As for the pandemic we now have one of the highest vaccination rates in Europe, so Boris is improving on that front too
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-55530366
What he needs to do, in terms of presentation, is get Whitty and Van Tam and the rest of the boffins in front of the cameras, explaining why England is not doing the same as Scotland. Unless, of course, all the boffins agree with Sturgeon, in which case Boris is an insane idiot playing politics with our lives.
ScotGov don't have control of the UK border at the airports, so there is nothing Sturgeon can do. There were still plenty of tourists in AirBnBs in Edinburgh over Hogmanay, according to Twitter reports.
As I have just said, they're making nonessential travel within Scotland illegal - so good luck getting to and from your plane in the first place.
http://www.deltapoll.co.uk/polls/end-of-year-voting-intentions
Con - 45.5% (+5.8 pp on the previous poll)
Lab - 36.8% (-2.6 pp)
LD - 7.2% (-1.5 pp)
Other - 11.0% (-1.7 pp)
That might account for why the Tories appear to have gained in this poll. I think it's generally accepted as a positive sign when people remember voting for you last time.
It is totally mystifying.
This is a Public Health (which is devolved to Scotland) issue.
I'm also expecting a murder Tuesday/Wednesday.
Not really one to win, it has to be said. If it happens I won't be piping up. Will wait for Dura to approach me.
https://www.government.nl/latest/news/2020/12/21/immediate-ban-on-flights-from-south-africa
Biden comes to power with no big bombs or cruise missiles left.
https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/1345820224063356930
https://twitter.com/SamCoatesSky/status/1346107122262618113?s=20
The restrictions make it illegal to travel to the airport but she can't stop the planes. That's a UK competence.
Hopefully some of their few MPs can follow the example of Norman Lamb, find one issue, be an expert in it, and leverage that to be relevant.
Oh God. Full lockdown in January. Grisly.
So why is Sturgeon likely to do one and not the other?
Is it she cares more about independence than Covid-19?