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Parliament must return in person and permanently – politicalbetting.com
Parliament must return in person and permanently – politicalbetting.com
Parliament will return from its Easter recess on Monday to allow MPs to make tributes to the late Duke of Edinburgh. It is right that they can do so. Most, however, will continue to dial in via videoconferencing; few will be in the chamber. That is no longer right.
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But what happens when major parts of the civil service are moved outside London? Either ministers go with them, in which case they will not be in the Commons most of the time, or ministers stay in London and lose control of their departments.
No, MPs can return in full when it’s safe to do so like everyone else.
Good job, David - thank you for the piece.
Today only nearly everybody still in bed. If you were.
I might be inclined towards having a session in summer; keep the buggers busy. Though unfortunately they would then pass more laws.
Except, it is happening. Not fully, but the numerous WhatsApp groups where MPs respond, plan, plot, lobby and speculate have a power. It wasn't Rashford that changed school meals for kids - it was the response to his involvement on the WhatsApp group that spooked MPs into action. That won't go away when MPs return.
And there is now a lot of pressure on MPs to return. The average age of MPs is now around 50. That means half will have already had at least one jab. Once they have had their jab plus 3 weeks, they should be back. It wouldn't take that much effort for the rest of MPs to be given priority to receive "any spare vaccines at the end of the day, nudge nudge...." The rest could be quietly done within the week. Westminster could be back to normal on 10th May - by the time the local election results have been counted.
The situation in Scotland following those votes needs discussion by a full House.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/apr/09/joe-biden-supreme-court-expansion-commission-reform
Make them come back, and sit in the same seat in the chamber for six hours a day wearing masks.
All their bullshit ideas on forcing schools to do this would vanish faster than Johnson’s fidelity on seeing a beautiful woman.
What amused me was the liberal judge who said it was wrong to pack the court - and faced calls from democrats to resign because he dared disagree with them
Not that one could go and watch of course, unless passing the ground ' happened' to be on one's walk. Bar's closed, of course.
I suspect Mr L is right; our PM doesn't like being challenged, and perhaps the idea of being reminded of 'promises broken' by angry DUP MP's is playing on his mind.
Incidentally can anyone explain why Carrie didn't lend him a hairbrush before he went out make his statement yesterday? Or check his tie? The phrase 'dragged through a hedge backwards' came to mind; one that was used to me long years ago when I didn't look like the neat, smart schoolboy my mother fondly imagined me to be.
Although I can hardly criticise him for that given I did much the same thing for 7 years.
With COVID itself, despite the randomness of a pandemic, we know that if we catch it, we will ourselves have decided to put ourselves at risk by being in the situation of being too close to other people. Most people also feel that, as such a disease plays out, we might have some influence over its course through the treatment and self-care we receive and from our underlying state of health.
With an injection that has a tiny chance if death, we just have to take the chance and wait passively for the outcome.
I am quite happy to go ahead with my second AZN on the balance of odds, but I fully understand why people are nervous. When I had the Yellow Fever vaccination, the risks including a tiny chance of death were explained to me and I had to sign away my consent before it was given. Going through that procedure in itself makes you somewhat apprehensive.
RIP, Prince Philip.
Mr. Doethur, I just let it thin then shaved it all off. To be honest, if I'd known how much I prefer having no hair I would've done it years ago.
... Biden’s executive order directs the commission to complete its report within 180 days of its first meeting...
“...What amused me was the liberal judge who said it was wrong to pack the court - and faced calls from democrats to resign because he dared disagree with them...”
So you hadn’t noticed what happened with Ginsburg, then ?
It’s as though you didn’t read the article.
Untidy hair is, I was always taught, the sign of an untidy mind. I shall be delighted when, next week, I can take myself off to the barbers. The appointment was made as soon as the barbers announced their opening date.
Which my iPad tried to correct to ‘Tory mind’, which is still pertinent.
I hope you are not saying our PM is trying to demonstrate wisdom?
Of course he IS trying in many other ways!
But I don’t know how it was for you - I found I was really upset by going bald and wanted to put it off as long as possible. That surprised me as I’ve never particularly cared about my appearance. And I’m not in a job where I’m constantly photographed and judged on how I look, where Johnson is.
So although he looks a mess, and although I hate his guts, I think he should be cut (no pun intended) a bit of slack over this.
My hair has finally got past the point it can be tied back which makes it neater
But quickly realised it was much better than having hair.
Breyer is a fine judge but politically a total moron. Just like RBG.
Breyer is 82 and Sotomayor is 66, replacing those two with 50-year-olds would hopefully avoid another RBG situation for them down the line. Ginsberg could have retired in 2013 or 14, in her eighties, and have been replaced by someone nominated by a Dem President and confirmed by a Dem Senate.
Perhaps it’s a generational thing ?
From 1963...
https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2017/dec/06/beatles-hair-cut-fashion-archive-1963
Thomas Charnock (16) returns to work as an apprentice at a Birkenhead factory today after a two-week suspension imposed because he had a Beatles-style haircut.
Thomas, of Pasture Road, Moreton, a first year apprentice at the K.W.K. engineering factory, at Park Street, Birkenhead, was told along with other apprentices by the managing director, Mr William Kaminski, to get his hair cut properly. Mr Kaminski said Beatles haircuts were unsightly, unsafe, unruly, and unclean....
I remember last autumn Rees-Mogg tried to force them back (around the time someone in HMG briefed the Press that office workers should go back to work in the office or lose their job).
I'm a bit mystified by the change in government tone compared to then. Maybe they saw how bad the winter really was in hospitals, to an extent that the media hasn't told the public, and are terrified of repeating their mistakes - so instead making new ones. It doesn't have to be driven by a desire to keep MPs away and prevent scrutiny.
Though looking at its membership, it does not seem designed to do any such thing (a more pertinent critique than that Charles expressed).
The politicians will be against term limits, because it removes control from themselves over the process.
"Ninety-nine years old, he never slowed down at all. Which I admire the devil out of."
Strong hint that he intends to run for a 2nd term, health permitting.
https://twitter.com/ianincyaak/status/1380782230834937856
As much as we all want to go back to normal, we can't just casually ignore the potential impact of a disease that almost killed the Prime Minister. Cases need to be far lower to allow such things as what is proposed here.
https://twitter.com/crimeldn/status/1380575727389659137?s=21
Although the real problem with that piece is that uniquely in organ music AFAIK the manuals and the pedals have different time signatures. So he’s playing compound time with his fingers and simple time with his feet.
I still have them 25 years later, and they’ve come in awfully handy during a pandemic!
We all have points at which we feel to risk to ourselves has become minimal - personally I'd be up for it when i've had 2 weeks since my 2nd vaccination. But the general sense that we shouldn't force people to come in if they're scared remains, and that is a bad example to lots of businesses with rough employers and weak unions.
Isn't there a middle course? Make sessions in Parliament the norm, but allow Members who feel vulnerable to take part remotely? That would be a shift from the current position and I'd guess most will return in person, but it avoids the element of effective compulsion. It wopuld also be a useful fallback in cases of MPs suffering lengthy illnesses but still willing and able to take part if they don't need to travel in.
Author: Mike Smithson" et c'est tout.
https://spectator.us/life/vaccine-passports-enough-chip/amp/
“ What I really want to examine in this piece is the concept of ‘vaccine passports’. The US has recently ruled out the possibility of implementing these schemes federally, and I for one am disappointed. A huge missed opportunity here. This was the one thing I felt I could get behind. The idea of being able to refuse entry or services to certain uncooperative members of society very much appealed to my social-justice roots. I am hoping that Joe Biden rethinks this decision over the coming weeks and realises just how beneficial a system like this could be.”
Depressing, but highly recommended.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/04/12/surviving-the-crackdown-in-xinjiang
It's pointless angling to be George VII - everyone will just call him Charles III, so he may as well own it.
It's called Social Credit and the Chinese are up and running with it.
It is one of the reasons I am utterly opposed to an app for vaxports. We will never get rid of it and it will be constantly upgraded and extended to add "useful" features.
Seems so far the public don't care. I am hoping Starmer isn't one of them, but I have real doubts.
It all depends on how docile its own MPs are and how smart the Opposition is.
That carries its own punishment.
I am increasingly certain I will vote Lib Dem on 6th May - the Government needs to be sent a very strong message.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/opinion/trump-corporate-tax-reform.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
Interesting, if technical piece on the failure of Trump's corporation tax changes to spur on investment.
Plenty of people have had to miss attendance at funerals because of the Covid rules. The rules shouldn't be bent for him.
Now they rush to copy them. Very depressing and sinister. There is nothing good about a social credit system or anything remotely like it - certainly not if you value freedom and what it brings you. No wonder China thinks the West is on the decline when it cannot even stand up for what it claims to value most.
Even more thrillingly I bought myself new lingerie yesterday. I may only have sheep and newborn lambs to speak to but I shall be soignée while I do so.
Their Social Credit system is far more Orwellian than Orwell himself could conceive.
Harry has always had a good relationship with the Queen, it seems to be the apparatchicks and courtiers that get his goat, and of course the British Press.
"Two pieces Daily Mail columnists can have ready to go right now:
1. Why Meghan Markle’s presence at the funeral is an insult, designed to overshadow a somber occasion.
2. Why Meghan Markle’s absence from the funeral, is an insult, designed to overshadow a somber occasion."
https://twitter.com/sturdyAlex/status/1380503080245063681?s=19
Equally true for Harry. It is interesting that it is the supposedly Royalists that are egging up Harry as the issue.
Most of these people won’t even know him. I find this really quite weird.
However, I won't cut him any slack simply because the unkempt look is part of his Benny Hill/ Ken Dodd, national treasure schtick. His main role is not that of music hall comic, but Prime Minister, therefore making the effort to look more like a Prime Minister, rather than a 1970s TV character seems most appropriate. His appearance should reflect the seriousness of the role, therefore he is not taking his office seriously.
A decent haircut is the uniform of Prime Ministerial office. If any of our military personnel turned up to work looking like Johnson, they would do it only once, and find themselves whitewashing an awful lot of flagstones.
They were the future once when they said 'the network was the computer' and then...
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-truth-about-prince-philip-s-gaffes-/amp
“His whole body language was aimed at not producing any deference. He kept his drink in his right hand – so we couldn’t shake hands – and there was no expectation that we should bow, as I’d have been delighted to do.
‘Who roped you into this?’ Prince Philip asked us. His tone wasn’t aggressive or rude. Quite the opposite – it was conspiratorial and friendly; another way to break the ice.
I went on to tell him how Thomas Longford had been killed at Gallipoli in 1915, after his last words to his second-in-command, crouching down to avoid the hail of shells overhead: ‘Please don’t duck, Fred. It won’t help you and it’s no good for the men’s morale.’ Longford was shot dead moments later.
'Were you allowed to duck in the Navy during the war?' I asked Prince Philip, who served with great distinction in the war.
...
His words may look rude on the page. In fact, they were funny and teasing (and quite right) – I burst into laughter, while he kept a straight, deadpan face. I realised afterwards that all his so-called ‘gaffes’ were quite the reverse. They were masterclasses in putting people at their ease – and drawing out their most interesting side.
If he’d kept the royal drawbridge up and encouraged deference, all he would have had in his 73 years as the Queen’s husband would have been a series of terrified, tongue-tied people to talk to at a thousand events. For a serious, curious, clever man, that would have been agony.
Is that enough for a Sun obituary?
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Vsxxsrn2Tfs
If it's weird, it's a very common kind of weird, and I find the surprise at that weirdness, well, very weird.
People have strong emotional reactions to the goings on of fictional people, too, in movies and books. I do not believe it can be a surprise some people react about a public figure. People didn't know Churchill but showed up for his funeral.
If I have interpreted that correctly I have disagree: this has to be the last lockdown. If we need to tweak the vaccinations in the autumn for new ‘variants’ then so be it. But we cannot go through this ever again.
It has been interesting from a media perpective. I am sure the BBC used yesterday as a dry-run for any future, more intense, national mourning events, hence the pulling of all programming.
Politically too, Philip's lamented passing was a fortunate divine intervention for Johnson. I remarked during Thursday night's news that the bulletin, for the first time since December, was disproportunately bad for Johnson; Northern Ireland, AZ and the Cameron, Sunak affair. The tide had turned...or so I thought, then nature took its turn.
Let's see what the clown looks like afterwards.