I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
Re the colorful nature of the current HMG frontbench, reckon this is one of the great unsung success stories in British politics and society. Beyond individual achievement, a success for their families, communities, the Conservative Party and the whole freaking somewhat occasionally United Kingdom.
What bollox, the colour of their skin gives them no special powers to be any better than the other pile of crap we have, they have climbed the same greasy pole.
Surely it is right and encouraging that there is equal opportunity to rise above levels of competence, regardless of background?
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
I didn’t realise that the incident happened in Hancock’s own personal office. I bet that’ll cause some interesting discussions among ministers - I doubt too many would be aware that they’re being filmed when in their own office.
If they are not, then how come he was?
We were told it’s a security camera, if it wasn’t then it’s a crime without a public interest defence because it goes too far.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
The idea that you can sell off cost centres with no obvious income flows seems to me to have certain flaws. Imagine the pitch:
"Yeah, we are open to all customers every minute of the day and we simply deal with what they throw at us regardless of what it costs".
"Wow, and what do these customers pay for this fabulous service?"
"Well, nothing, it's free at the point of delivery."
"Err... that's a tough sell, even in the current market. Even Uber might make a profit one day."
The taxpayer pays. The contract will have us paying a private company twice what the NHS costs, and they'll charge extra if patients present with more than one symptom.
So why will they give a contract to someone charging twice what the NHS costs ?
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
I didn’t realise that the incident happened in Hancock’s own personal office. I bet that’ll cause some interesting discussions among ministers - I doubt too many would be aware that they’re being filmed when in their own office.
If they are not, then how come he was?
We were told it’s a security camera, if it wasn’t then it’s a crime without a public interest defence because it goes too far.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
The idea that you can sell off cost centres with no obvious income flows seems to me to have certain flaws. Imagine the pitch:
"Yeah, we are open to all customers every minute of the day and we simply deal with what they throw at us regardless of what it costs".
"Wow, and what do these customers pay for this fabulous service?"
"Well, nothing, it's free at the point of delivery."
"Err... that's a tough sell, even in the current market. Even Uber might make a profit one day."
The taxpayer pays. The contract will have us paying a private company twice what the NHS costs, and they'll charge extra if patients present with more than one symptom.
So why will they give a contract to someone charging twice what the NHS costs ?
In the deluded belief that private provision is always better than public provision?
Jess Phillips MP @jessphillips · 1h Hope my husband doesn't start putting me first Matt Hancock style.
It can only be a matter of time before 'Hancock' joins the lexicon of terms to describe...
1.sex at work. ( a quick Hancock) 2.bottom squeezing (a Hancock) 3. being caught on a hidden camera at work (being Hancocked) 4. being fired for any of the above (been Hancocked)
None of them well catered for (at the moment) by the English language
(Jess Phillips for Labour leader-if they can't get Marina Hyde)
My CLP is getting much better speakers (and viewer figures) in monthly online sessions than we did when they had to trek down to Godalming to talk, and Jess's talk a couple of months ago easily topped the list. She's a bit too centrist for my ideal preference, but she is perhaps the closest we've got to Johnson's cheerful sarcasm that is part of his appeal. I could be won over by her.
@HugoGye Sarah Gilbert: 'What none of us foresaw was how the vaccine would become a political football. Our year of painstaking attention to detail resulting in a vaccine with the potential to save millions of lives around the world could be dismissed by a politician with a grudge.'
John Sergeant just described the Hancock affair as one of the most intriguing he can remember. 'With a background of the pandemic'......"and even the woman's name sounds like an Agatha Christie invention Gina Colandangelo. Somewhere between Gina Lollobigida and Pina Colada" A fun observation typical of Ex Millfield boy John Sergeant's sense of humour.
But as the program was finishing the BBC apologised for any offense it might have caused. I'm all for PC but i'm starting to worry that soon nothing will be acceptable.
I am surprised that our BP expert linguists have not come up with a bit of fun on the subject of the fair Gina's surname. Surely "cola" is "tail" and "dangelo" is "of an angel"?
and in the photos, Mr Hancock did seem to be rather keen on that part of her anatomy.
Coda is tail, or queue
In Spanish the word is cola. What does cola mean in Italian?
I've tried splitting the name up a few ways on google translate, and..
I didn’t realise that the incident happened in Hancock’s own personal office. I bet that’ll cause some interesting discussions among ministers - I doubt too many would be aware that they’re being filmed when in their own office.
If they are not, then how come he was?
We were told it’s a security camera, if it wasn’t then it’s a crime without a public interest defence because it goes too far.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
The idea that you can sell off cost centres with no obvious income flows seems to me to have certain flaws. Imagine the pitch:
"Yeah, we are open to all customers every minute of the day and we simply deal with what they throw at us regardless of what it costs".
"Wow, and what do these customers pay for this fabulous service?"
"Well, nothing, it's free at the point of delivery."
"Err... that's a tough sell, even in the current market. Even Uber might make a profit one day."
The taxpayer pays. The contract will have us paying a private company twice what the NHS costs, and they'll charge extra if patients present with more than one symptom.
So why will they give a contract to someone charging twice what the NHS costs ?
In the deluded belief that private provision is always better than public provision?
The over-riding belief the government has is the importance of staying in power.
That is why the NHS is not going to be privatised.
Support for Scottish independence has slipped in recent months, according to a poll that suggests Yes voters would fall short of a majority if a referendum were held tomorrow.
The findings of a Panelbase poll carried out for The Sunday Times indicates that, excluding “don’t knows”, 48 per cent would back independence, down four points since April when support for breaking up the Union stood at 52 per cent. Support for the Union in today’s poll is 52 per cent, up four points.
Canny Scottish electorate - keep Westminster on their toes by returning SNP administrations, keep Holyrood on its toes by prevaricating over independence. They have both where they want them.
I do wonder if the pandemic will have caused a small but significant group of 'waverers' on Independence to reassess the benefits of the UK as opposed to a flirtation with the alternative. Perhaps moving beyond the personalities and looking more at the underlying benefits of UK versus Indy. The reality that throughout the whole pandemic there really have been no independent course adopted by devolved administrations - it's mostly been "rule of 6 versus rule of 5+3 children stuff". Scotland has generally done a bit better perhaps more because it is a bit more remote, less of an international hub, and has slightly different demographics.
On the big issues everyone has been pretty much in lockstep. The criticisms in the English inquiry (over PPE, Care Homes, speed of action etc etc) will probably largely mirror the criticisms in any Scottish inquiry. Possibly there will be a whole area where there are additional criticisms in England (about spending and procurement - but then Scotland didn't have the freedom to spend money willy nilly)
How does someone in Scotland view Hancock? No doubt extremely negatively, like most UK/"westminster" politicians. But then most of the criticisms, and the reason he had to go are not Scottish related. Whereas he did have a part in delivering the vaccine. What are Scottish views of the vaccines? A (grudgingly accepted) UK success story? I don't know. But whilst the merits of EU vs UK vaccines in England were probably largely dominated by Brexit views, where do Scots stand on it? It's quite existential for the Indy question.
Enough rambling... I'm sure malc disagrees with any point i might or might not have been arguing
People are peed off with the SNP Junta and their woke crap. The crooks and ne'er do well wokes are in charge there and people are not happy. Only yesterday it came out that they had Stonewall review all their Minister's social media before publishing so they could get extra Stonewall bonus points for being good fcukwits. Murrel has misappropriated the ringfenced £600K referendum cash, finally after many months they admitted it was gone but that it would return once they had another fundraiser and got £600K. They are ruining the country. Most people know the Tories are rank rotten in Westminster , just a bunch of self serving , money grabbing crooks and the scales are beginning to fall from the eyes of all but the most thick and deluded sheeple in Scotland. Nasty evil cheeks of the same arse would be my opinion.
If I was a Tory (which thank the Lord I'm not sir....) I wouldn't be worried about deckchairs on the Titanic but the monster of a loose cannon that's bouncing all over the ship.
Boris Johnson doesn't appear to have any idea what he signed up to when he entered his Faustian pact making him Prime Minister and Dominic Cummings the most powerful man in the land.
They call him Rasputin but that doesn't do him justice. To sell Brexit to 52% of a population against the forces of government parliament academia business and the media makes him a genius that not even the greatest minds could match.
This is not a person any sane man would cross. This is Anton Chigurth in No Country for Old Men. A man who gets his man.
Good luck Boris.
The man's not a wizard. I dont like his style one bit, but just as with the reaction to the Barnard castle stuff theres a trend of treating him like some all powerful operatic villain.
He's a policy wonk. He had significant influence and is now very driven in his aim of damaging Boris as theres clearly hurt feelings in play, but let's not ho overboard to his significance.
He's not even much of a policy wonk. Even when Gove was at Education, Sam Freedman was much more significant in terms of policy, for good or ill.
Cummings is really every saloon bar bore who goes on about how "They should just do this. Bish bash, job's a goodun. Slash the red tape, grow the pie." Who rails against the rules and conventions, ignoring the fact that pretty much every rule was a response to stop a disaster happening again.
In short, an fool, albeit an educated one. But now he's on another destructive mission (for which he's very well skilled). And destructive men who don't care are dangerous, even if they're fools and untrusted.
Having worked with some of the smartest advertisers anywhere I can tell you that selling a concept as esoteric and self destructive as leaving the EU was not easy. What he had over normal advertisers is that there was no obligation to be truthful. An advantage he used ruthlessly but with extreme skill.
Nonetheless he still had to convince over seventeen million people to buy into something that they had little interest in and which was plainly not to their advantage. A Herculean task. He really isn't to be underestimated
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
Jess Phillips MP @jessphillips · 1h Hope my husband doesn't start putting me first Matt Hancock style.
It can only be a matter of time before 'Hancock' joins the lexicon of terms to describe...
1.sex at work. ( a quick Hancock) 2.bottom squeezing (a Hancock) 3. being caught on a hidden camera at work (being Hancocked) 4. being fired for any of the above (been Hancocked)
None of them well catered for (at the moment) by the English language
(Jess Phillips for Labour leader-if they can't get Marina Hyde)
My CLP is getting much better speakers (and viewer figures) in monthly online sessions than we did when they had to trek down to Godalming to talk, and Jess's talk a couple of months ago easily topped the list. She's a bit too centrist for my ideal preference, but she is perhaps the closest we've got to Johnson's cheerful sarcasm that is part of his appeal. I could be won over by her.
Yes she was my tip when I wrote a thread header saying Sir Keir lacked the charisma to topple Boris
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
The idea that you can sell off cost centres with no obvious income flows seems to me to have certain flaws. Imagine the pitch:
"Yeah, we are open to all customers every minute of the day and we simply deal with what they throw at us regardless of what it costs".
"Wow, and what do these customers pay for this fabulous service?"
"Well, nothing, it's free at the point of delivery."
"Err... that's a tough sell, even in the current market. Even Uber might make a profit one day."
The taxpayer pays. The contract will have us paying a private company twice what the NHS costs, and they'll charge extra if patients present with more than one symptom.
So why will they give a contract to someone charging twice what the NHS costs ?
In the deluded belief that private provision is always better than public provision?
The over-riding belief the government has is the importance of staying in power.
That is why the NHS is not going to be privatised.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
The idea that you can sell off cost centres with no obvious income flows seems to me to have certain flaws. Imagine the pitch:
"Yeah, we are open to all customers every minute of the day and we simply deal with what they throw at us regardless of what it costs".
"Wow, and what do these customers pay for this fabulous service?"
"Well, nothing, it's free at the point of delivery."
"Err... that's a tough sell, even in the current market. Even Uber might make a profit one day."
The taxpayer pays. The contract will have us paying a private company twice what the NHS costs, and they'll charge extra if patients present with more than one symptom.
So why will they give a contract to someone charging twice what the NHS costs ?
Ask the people who signed the various PFI contract, perhaps?
If the someone is a friend of theirs, or has promised them a sinecure after they leave government?
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
NZ decided to abandon AZ at an early stage and switched wholesale to Pfizer. Nothing to do with the “health concerns” which came later, but because of the early suggestions that AZ wasn’t as effective as Pfizer. That in itself was a decision based on a belief that there was no urgency.
I think Australia may not have a problem with anti-Vaxx sentiment per se, but there appears to be anti-AZ sentiment (because of the “health risk”).
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
He showed he was useless and promoted way above his level of competence last time. He is yet another dud.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Vaccines work
Yes, Marr has never been the brightest button but this interaction is extraordinarily thick. He should have been saying “I want to tell you about something absolutely wonderful. I was double jabbed in the spring and as a result, when I had a brush with covid last week, it was akin to a summer cold! And this is me, a 61 year old who has had a stroke and cancer!”
In the field of immunology there is an often written line in textbooks when discussing memory immune cells. It goes something like 'Upon a repeated exposure, the immune system is able to respond rapidly and the individual might not even know they are ill'. This is often taken to mean that people don't get reinfected. However, never in the history of the world are people being exposed to a pathogen and being tested for that pathogen so intensively. It seems that infection does occur upon repeated exposure but is simply much milder. A subtle but important distinction. After this there will be a sea change in our understanding of the immune system, which I find all very exciting.
If I was a Tory (which thank the Lord I'm not sir....) I wouldn't be worried about deckchairs on the Titanic but the monster of a loose cannon that's bouncing all over the ship.
Boris Johnson doesn't appear to have any idea what he signed up to when he entered his Faustian pact making him Prime Minister and Dominic Cummings the most powerful man in the land.
They call him Rasputin but that doesn't do him justice. To sell Brexit to 52% of a population against the forces of government parliament academia business and the media makes him a genius that not even the greatest minds could match.
This is not a person any sane man would cross. This is Anton Chigurth in No Country for Old Men. A man who gets his man.
Good luck Boris.
The man's not a wizard. I dont like his style one bit, but just as with the reaction to the Barnard castle stuff theres a trend of treating him like some all powerful operatic villain.
He's a policy wonk. He had significant influence and is now very driven in his aim of damaging Boris as theres clearly hurt feelings in play, but let's not ho overboard to his significance.
He's not even much of a policy wonk. Even when Gove was at Education, Sam Freedman was much more significant in terms of policy, for good or ill.
Cummings is really every saloon bar bore who goes on about how "They should just do this. Bish bash, job's a goodun. Slash the red tape, grow the pie." Who rails against the rules and conventions, ignoring the fact that pretty much every rule was a response to stop a disaster happening again.
In short, an fool, albeit an educated one. But now he's on another destructive mission (for which he's very well skilled). And destructive men who don't care are dangerous, even if they're fools and untrusted.
Having worked with some of the smartest advertisers anywhere I can tell you that selling a concept as esoteric and self destructive as leaving the EU was not easy. What he had over normal advertisers is that there was no obligation to be truthful. An advantage he used ruthlessly but with extreme skill.
Nonetheless he still had to convince over seventeen million people to buy into something that they had little interest in and which was plainly not to their advantage. A Herculean task. He really isn't to be underestimated
If I was a Tory (which thank the Lord I'm not sir....) I wouldn't be worried about deckchairs on the Titanic but the monster of a loose cannon that's bouncing all over the ship.
Boris Johnson doesn't appear to have any idea what he signed up to when he entered his Faustian pact making him Prime Minister and Dominic Cummings the most powerful man in the land.
They call him Rasputin but that doesn't do him justice. To sell Brexit to 52% of a population against the forces of government parliament academia business and the media makes him a genius that not even the greatest minds could match.
This is not a person any sane man would cross. This is Anton Chigurth in No Country for Old Men. A man who gets his man.
Good luck Boris.
The man's not a wizard. I dont like his style one bit, but just as with the reaction to the Barnard castle stuff theres a trend of treating him like some all powerful operatic villain.
He's a policy wonk. He had significant influence and is now very driven in his aim of damaging Boris as theres clearly hurt feelings in play, but let's not ho overboard to his significance.
He's not even much of a policy wonk. Even when Gove was at Education, Sam Freedman was much more significant in terms of policy, for good or ill.
Cummings is really every saloon bar bore who goes on about how "They should just do this. Bish bash, job's a goodun. Slash the red tape, grow the pie." Who rails against the rules and conventions, ignoring the fact that pretty much every rule was a response to stop a disaster happening again.
In short, an fool, albeit an educated one. But now he's on another destructive mission (for which he's very well skilled). And destructive men who don't care are dangerous, even if they're fools and untrusted.
Having worked with some of the smartest advertisers anywhere I can tell you that selling a concept as esoteric and self destructive as leaving the EU was not easy. What he had over normal advertisers is that there was no obligation to be truthful. An advantage he used ruthlessly but with extreme skill.
Nonetheless he still had to convince over seventeen million people to buy into something that they had little interest in and which was plainly not to their advantage. A Herculean task. He really isn't to be underestimated
Professional admiration trumps all
But, but, but he also had a pre-committed Rupert Murdoch.
Who, it appears, was once slighted by being kept waiting by a senior Eurocrat.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
It is, and I’m fairly sure that he isn’t. Hunt would have been a far better appointment if only because he has more than a faint clue if what the job entails.
That said, I’m looking forward to the social care plan which the Hancock resignation letter assured us was not only oven ready, but almost full baked…
One of Hancock's major flaws is that he is an inveterate liar, and not just to his wife and kids. I wouldn't put too much store on that.
He also, in fairness, had strengths and I think that he did much better in the second half of the crisis than he did in the first. Clearly not a stupid man, he applied himself diligently and got on top of some of the chaos he had caused in the initial panic. But its a bit of a stretch to think he had a lot of spare time to think about Social Care.
David, unfortunately it was what he got on top of that caused the problem.
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
There’s “uncontrollable” in general terms, and “uncontrollable” in zero Covid terms. Basically the latter means containment has failed and basic track and trace has to switch to being a mitigation measure. (Remember all this from March 2020?). At the moment they are still trying to contain.
Finland now has cases rising at 45% WoW, the fastest in the EU (with the exception of Malta, but Malta has only cases 18 all week)
Presumably its the Delta Variant, and possibly came across the long land boarder with Russia, but at this point it does not matter, its there now. infection for now is still at a low level, 130 cases/million over the last week, a tenth of the UK level.
Finland has so far had a much better pandemic that anywhere else in the EU with just 175 Deaths per million, about a tenth of the EU average. The Flip side of this though is less infection bourn immunity will make it easier to transmit.
On vaccines, overall Finland is middle of pack, 76/100 people just behind the EU average 77/100.
However it is at the extreme of using the 'first doses first' policy. They have the second highest proportion of people with one jab, (behind Malta) but the second lowest proportion with both jabs (behind Bulgaria)
How will this play out? I don't know, possibly OK, as in a lots of cases but not that much hospitalisation or death. which would be a good, and a validation of the 'first doses first' policy. but one to watch.
P.S. at 175 deaths per million they are by a long way the lowest in the EU, that would have to almost triple to 427, just to be the second best, so still lots of room to keep there crown.
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
Lord, I've tried, the best I can I've asked everybody in Kazakhstan But I still don't understand Bob Wilson, anchorman.
I've been to Kent, Gwent, Senegal I've even been to ask Jim Rosenthal I found him on his knees at the wailing wall, crying Bob Wilson anchorman.
Well I marvel at the things we find beneath the ground, And that man can go faster than the speed of sound, But I still can't get my head around Bob Wilson, anchorman.
I'm cold and I'm hungry and I'm in Dundalk, I've got no bus fare; I've got to walk, It's raining soup and I've got a fork, Where be my campervan?
I'd like to meet Stevenson the engineer, I'd like to meet Faraday and buy him a beer, I'd love to meet the man who had the bright idea: Bob Wilson, anchorman.
Very good! I love HMHB, should be seeing them soon, COVID willing.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
NZ decided to abandon AZ at an early stage and switched wholesale to Pfizer. Nothing to do with the “health concerns” which came later, but because of the early suggestions that AZ wasn’t as effective as Pfizer. That in itself was a decision based on a belief that there was no urgency.
I think Australia may not have a problem with anti-Vaxx sentiment per se, but there appears to be anti-AZ sentiment (because of the “health risk”).
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
Ultimately this pandemic will only end when you have sufficient herd immunity, either from acquired protection or a vaccine. Otherwise you will continually be bouncing between varying levels of restrictions (often quite suddenly imposed) and in the case of Oz and NZ, draconian border measures.
A burst of delta in Australia might wake them up a bit over there that they can’t keep it out forever and instead they need to get themselves vaxxed.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
Finland now has cases rising at 45% WoW, the fastest in the EU (with the exception of Malta, but Malta has only cases 18 all week)
Presumably its the Delta Variant, and possibly came across the long land boarder with Russia, but at this point it does not matter, its there now. infection for now is still at a low level, 130 cases/million over the last week, a tenth of the UK level.
Finland has so far had a much better pandemic that anywhere else in the EU with just 175 Deaths per million, about a tenth of the EU average. The Flip side of this though is less infection bourn immunity will make it easier to transmit.
On vaccines, overall Finland is middle of pack, 76/100 people just behind the EU average 77/100.
However it is at the extreme of using the 'first doses first' policy. They have the second highest proportion of people with one jab, (behind Malta) but the second lowest proportion with both jabs (behind Bulgaria)
How will this play out? I don't know, possibly OK, as in a lots of cases but not that much hospitalisation or death. which would be a good, and a validation of the 'first doses first' policy. but one to watch.
P.S. at 175 deaths per million they are by a long way the lowest in the EU, that would have to almost triple to 427, just to be the second best, so still lots of room to keep there crown.
Thanks. Will be interesting especially as Finland was one of the countries people who did not want to hear about Sweden constantly compared the latter to in order to quickly show that Tegnell's policy was an utter disaster.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
You are making a different mistake, focusing on why the appointment was made rather than thinking about whether he will be any good at it. I think the Carrie connection has probably helped him but so has being a loyal foot soldier ever since he quit, never joining the awkward squad. Hunt has been a bit more equivocal in his committee role and personal loyalty is very, very important to Boris.
Howard Beckett firmly believes the Saj has been brought in just to sell off the NHS..
The idea that you can sell off cost centres with no obvious income flows seems to me to have certain flaws. Imagine the pitch:
"Yeah, we are open to all customers every minute of the day and we simply deal with what they throw at us regardless of what it costs".
"Wow, and what do these customers pay for this fabulous service?"
"Well, nothing, it's free at the point of delivery."
"Err... that's a tough sell, even in the current market. Even Uber might make a profit one day."
The taxpayer pays. The contract will have us paying a private company twice what the NHS costs, and they'll charge extra if patients present with more than one symptom.
So why will they give a contract to someone charging twice what the NHS costs ?
Ask the people who signed the various PFI contract, perhaps?
If the someone is a friend of theirs, or has promised them a sinecure after they leave government?
Well we will see.
If you're right we will see a mixture of NHS spending doubling or NHS services halving.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
I think a lot of BBC contracts are of the “whatever we ask you to do” type, rather than being paid for specific programmes. So they are used for whatever ad hoc presenting job is going and can be fitted in.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
No lockdown is total, and Delta can find a way of spreading in a lockdown that would defeat Alpha or the original variant
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
Depends upon how hard and how long the lockdown is and what the R for Delta is.
If a lockdown could bring R down from 3 to 0.6 then it might bring Delta's R down from 6 to 1.2 - still an increase but a slow increase.
Now that gives time to embark on mass vaccination but if people still refuse AZ then things will steadily deteriorate while the damage from the lockdown increases.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
No lockdown is total, and Delta can find a way of spreading in a lockdown that would defeat Alpha or the original variant
Agreed.
And even at the height of our original lockdown the scientists were estimating R only ever bottomed out at around 0.8 or so, i.e. there wasn't much headroom even then without the variant three down the line each of which is more transmissible than the last. I remember when were worried the Kent variant would put us over the top regardless of lockdown, let alone Delta.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
No lockdown is total, and Delta can find a way of spreading in a lockdown that would defeat Alpha or the original variant
That hasn't been demonstrated. It's just an assumption based on modelling of R, which is also based on assumptions about how many restrictions are actually being observed.
Sam Coates Sky @SamCoatesSky · 1h New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
Hope so, I do think that when the 4 week extension was announced, it has some words about a possible early end of Monday the 5 July, I do hope that that happens.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
No lockdown is total, and Delta can find a way of spreading in a lockdown that would defeat Alpha or the original variant
That hasn't been demonstrated. It's just an assumption based on modelling of R, which is also based on assumptions about how many restrictions are actually being observed.
China had a lockdown. When there’s a “work exemption” it’s not, ultimately, a lockdown. And will Australians accept a seriously lengthy “lockdown” of the sort we’ve had here, when the avoidance of that sort of thing is why they took the approach they did.
But it’s still speculation as it’s very early days. And clearly their border policy is a major advantage as it isolates the state/country in a way we never did.
Putting why Hancock had to go to one side, a fresh approach and pair of eyes at Health is just what we need hopefully.
Hancock had become utterly blinkered and totally focused on covid to the exclusion of all else health related imho. Not necessarily a criticism. Who wouldn't in the circumstances of the last 18 months, but a change was needed.
It's amazing how many interesting bits of data and graphs are lurking behind various links and search boxes on that site -- I only stumbled on that particular page fairly recently. The graph for daily first-dose jab count in Cambridge is interesting -- look at the number per day steadily going up and up over the last couple of months as younger cohorts have become elegible. Almost none in early April, 500 a day by late May, over a thousand a day now, still trending upwards...
(Edit: looking at the 2nd-dose count some of it also seems to have been capacity being used for 2nd doses, as one goes down the other goes up.)
Sarah Gilbert: 'What none of us foresaw was how the vaccine would become a political football. Our year of painstaking attention to detail resulting in a vaccine with the potential to save millions of lives around the world could be dismissed by a politician with a grudge.'
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
Depends upon how hard and how long the lockdown is and what the R for Delta is.
If a lockdown could bring R down from 3 to 0.6 then it might bring Delta's R down from 6 to 1.2 - still an increase but a slow increase.
Now that gives time to embark on mass vaccination but if people still refuse AZ then things will steadily deteriorate while the damage from the lockdown increases.
I think A lockdown in Australia now, will be harder to get widespread public buy-in in the way it had before, one is just a time thing 16 months since it started, another is seeing the rest of the would including the USA open up. but also those that have had the Jab have less incentive to abide by the regulations, other younger people whose elderly relatives have been jabbed, have less personal incentive to abide by the regulations, and if many people have been offered a Jab and sead no, then the rest may take the attitude 'you where offered it and if you sead no its your won fault if you get it'.
That does not mean that the government can not close bars and restraints, and it will, but that still leaves a lot of scope for braking the rules in privet homes, (or offices Hancock steal!)
That doesn't seem to quote the PHE out this week, which was far more encouraging.
Only 50 over 50s who have been double jabbed have died in 5 months. And 0 under 50s.
Once you factor in some of those will be extremely old and vulnerable, with a host of other conditions, and would have died from literally any illness, we really are talking about hardly anybody.
If I was a Tory (which thank the Lord I'm not sir....) I wouldn't be worried about deckchairs on the Titanic but the monster of a loose cannon that's bouncing all over the ship.
Boris Johnson doesn't appear to have any idea what he signed up to when he entered his Faustian pact making him Prime Minister and Dominic Cummings the most powerful man in the land.
They call him Rasputin but that doesn't do him justice. To sell Brexit to 52% of a population against the forces of government parliament academia business and the media makes him a genius that not even the greatest minds could match.
This is not a person any sane man would cross. This is Anton Chigurth in No Country for Old Men. A man who gets his man.
Good luck Boris.
The man's not a wizard. I dont like his style one bit, but just as with the reaction to the Barnard castle stuff theres a trend of treating him like some all powerful operatic villain.
He's a policy wonk. He had significant influence and is now very driven in his aim of damaging Boris as theres clearly hurt feelings in play, but let's not ho overboard to his significance.
He's not even much of a policy wonk. Even when Gove was at Education, Sam Freedman was much more significant in terms of policy, for good or ill.
Cummings is really every saloon bar bore who goes on about how "They should just do this. Bish bash, job's a goodun. Slash the red tape, grow the pie." Who rails against the rules and conventions, ignoring the fact that pretty much every rule was a response to stop a disaster happening again.
In short, an fool, albeit an educated one. But now he's on another destructive mission (for which he's very well skilled). And destructive men who don't care are dangerous, even if they're fools and untrusted.
Having worked with some of the smartest advertisers anywhere I can tell you that selling a concept as esoteric and self destructive as leaving the EU was not easy. What he had over normal advertisers is that there was no obligation to be truthful. An advantage he used ruthlessly but with extreme skill.
Nonetheless he still had to convince over seventeen million people to buy into something that they had little interest in and which was plainly not to their advantage. A Herculean task. He really isn't to be underestimated
Absolutely agree that one shouldn't underestimate Domski, and frankly a wounded Dom is a dangerous Dom. Also I doubt there's much more personal dirt on him; partly because we would have seen it had it been there, and partly because he strikes me more as a mad monk type- bonkers, but sincere, and that's what makes him dangerous. I doubt he is on the make personally.
But once you ditch the requirement to be truthful, it's really not that difficult to win political campaigns. I can think of at least one small time, small town local pol who has been doing Dom stuff for a decades. It's not intellectually difficult, it just requires focus, hard work and a complete cauterisation of conscience.
The only problem with winning an election or a referendum with lies and hatred is that then you have to govern. And you can't govern according to your campaign promises, because they were lies. Non-foolish people think that far ahead, and that constrains how they campaign. Fools rush in, thinking that campaign ethics are for weaklings ignoring the reality trap that they run into, gloating.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
No lockdown is total, and Delta can find a way of spreading in a lockdown that would defeat Alpha or the original variant
That hasn't been demonstrated. It's just an assumption based on modelling of R, which is also based on assumptions about how many restrictions are actually being observed.
China had a lockdown. When there’s a “work exemption” it’s not, ultimately, a lockdown. And will Australians accept a seriously lengthy “lockdown” of the sort we’ve had here, when the avoidance of that sort of thing is why they took the approach they did.
But it’s still speculation as it’s very early days. And clearly their border policy is a major advantage as it isolates the state/country in a way we never did.
Also when the punishment for breaking the rules could be a re-education camp and everybody knows the government is spying on your every move... slightly different to Western Europe, where in the unlikely event you get caught, you might get a small fine.
Sam Coates Sky @SamCoatesSky · 1h New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
Hope so, I do think that when the 4 week extension was announced, it has some words about a possible early end of Monday the 5 July, I do hope that that happens.
I consider that highly unlikely. The Government has been making no noises about speeding the process up, and the non-loopy, non-ISAGE faction of the scientists still want us to have the full month to get more people jabbed. Besides which, an early finish would require an announcement tomorrow, to give that week for affected businesses to prepare to open up that we've had for the previous phases. No sign of that coming.
Sam Coates Sky @SamCoatesSky · 1h New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
How much will he hold the line once he is “fully briefed”
Wasn't he a banker? Maybe he is numerate enough to ask that the modelling be done again using parameters that actually match what exists in the real world e.g. on vaccine uptake and efficiency.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia has a problem with people "waiting for Pfizer" over the locally produced AZ which in some locations is nearing the end of its shelf life.
O/T - Australia seems to have a real problem. Astra is their main vaccine but nobody wants it. Some of the discussions sound like U.K. April 20 (“Policemen moving people on for sitting on park benches!”). Contact tracing appears to be on the verge of reaching it’s limit (how many “venues of concern” becomes unmanageable?).
They must really hope it hasn’t spread far more than they are picking up.
Obviously they are far better off than almost everywhere is objective terms. But when the entire country has got used to the zero Covid mindset...
Does Australia have a problem with people not wanting the vaccine? (at leased any more that other Weston nations e.g. the UK and USA)
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
Australia's problem seems to be that it has AZ but most people do not want AZ.
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
I strongly suspect Delta is now uncontrollable within Sydney - it's just too easily infectious
I hope that's too pessimistic. A lockdown is a lockdown. A more infectious variant can't magically overcome the absence of social mixing.
No lockdown is total, and Delta can find a way of spreading in a lockdown that would defeat Alpha or the original variant
That hasn't been demonstrated. It's just an assumption based on modelling of R, which is also based on assumptions about how many restrictions are actually being observed.
You yourself said it was more infectious. So more likely to spread during casual contact in a shop, or at work, for example. Whereas for earlier variants you wouldn't get a sufficient viral load to bypass the immune system.
Is Rog trying to claim advertising industry is morally virtuous place, who only ever speak the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about products...crickey....i am not sure i have ever seen a fast food ad say well this over priced junk won't look anything like this, will taste pretty shit and is full of salt and fat and is generally really bad for your healthy...which will only have you singing I'm not really luv'ing it....
https://twitter.com/jbloom_lab/status/1408161515606138883 I am getting lots of questions if my pre-print about some #SARSCoV2 sequences that were removed from Sequence Read Archive tell us anything about lab accident versus natural zoonosis.
I posted summary of pre-print below, but did not directly address this point explicitly (1/n)
… The answer is NO. The people using it to strongly support either argument are those that have become so emotionally invested in their opinion that they have lost the ability to analyze anything objectively outside of the framework of that argument.
Sam Coates Sky @SamCoatesSky · 1h New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
Hope so, I do think that when the 4 week extension was announced, it has some words about a possible early end of Monday the 5 July, I do hope that that happens.
I consider that highly unlikely. The Government has been making no noises about speeding the process up, and the non-loopy, non-ISAGE faction of the scientists still want us to have the full month to get more people jabbed. Besides which, an early finish would require an announcement tomorrow, to give that week for affected businesses to prepare to open up that we've had for the previous phases. No sign of that coming.
Seems highly unlikely. Javid wont even have read all the briefings by the time they would need to announce tomorrow.
I have some sympathy with Cummings on this. The Saj was not great as Chancellor during his brief spell. I remember a financial statement where he was consistently told off for spending nearly all of his time attacking Labour by the Speaker. It was, frankly, an embarrassingly poor effort. He seemed out of his depth in a way that Rishi simply doesn't, notwithstanding having a similar background in finance.
He's clearly not stupid and we can only hope that he has learned from that experience but social care in particular is going to need a much more conciliatory approach since any long term solution will ideally be cross party. I am not sure on the basis of his previous experience that that is his style.
Personally, I would rather have had Hunt back if he had been willing to do it. He probably has a better grip of these issues than anyone in government and has kept on top of them with his select committee role. Zahawi would have been another possibility. What Boris clearly wanted was someone who would slot in with no other reshuffle at this point and the Saj does achieve that. I hope I am wrong in this but Health and Social Care Secretary is going to be at least the third most important job in the government after PM and Chancellor over the next couple of years. I am not completely convinced Javid is the man for that.
You are making the mistake of analysing Johnson's government in conventional terms. Clearly I took this too far yesterday when I declared that Hancock would not go, due to Johnson's debasement of our political culture, but I think a much more important aspect to Javid's return is that Carrie was once one of his special advisors and, since the palace coup that ousted Cummings, a personal connection to Mrs PM is of far greater importance than the trifling details of being on top of his brief, or able to make a decent fist of a statement to the Commons.
The inevitable Johnson - Carrie bust up is really going be quite something. Who will get custody of the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care?
(This) Mrs Johnson, as an RC, doesn't, I assume, believe in divorce, only in annulment.
Why are you making that assumption? She seemed to have no problem with committing adultery so we should perhaps hold back on the "devout Catholic" bollocks.
It's amazing how many interesting bits of data and graphs are lurking behind various links and search boxes on that site -- I only stumbled on that particular page fairly recently. The graph for daily first-dose jab count in Cambridge is interesting -- look at the number per day steadily going up and up over the last couple of months as younger cohorts have become elegible. Almost none in early April, 500 a day by late May, over a thousand a day now, still trending upwards...
(Edit: looking at the 2nd-dose count some of it also seems to have been capacity being used for 2nd doses, as one goes down the other goes up.)
At the bottom of that page, it shoes you the take up by age group over time, what's worrying about Cambridge it the much above average number of old and middle age people who have not been jabbed compared to the national average,
e.g.
50-54 Year olds only 77% compared to England average of 85%,
Sam Coates Sky @SamCoatesSky · 1h New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
How much will he hold the line once he is “fully briefed”
Wasn't he a banker? Maybe he is numerate enough to ask that the modelling be done again using parameters that actually match what exists in the real world e.g. on vaccine uptake and efficiency.
Insert joke about financial crash and similar flawed models by the "smartest men in the room".
If the reports are to be believed it wasn't Hancock was innumerate, it was he hid positive data from Boris, and obviously Boris is clueless about these models, just sees big numbers and goes oh crap, lock it down.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
Marr is an amateur painter. That does not make him an expert but it does give him some insight. His programme on his fellow dauber, Winston Churchill, was quite interesting.
Gloriously brutal question. Gloriously weasley response from Brandon "what border" Lewis. As I said earlier I couldn't be a front line politician having to defend the indefensible like that.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
Marr is an amateur painter. That does not make him an expert but it does give him some insight. His programme on his fellow dauber, Winston Churchill, was quite interesting.
Though in general I would rather watch experts than generalists like Dimbleby but it is the big name that means the programme is commissioned in the first place.
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade.
She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that, deep down inside, you are not the Master of the Universe you purport to be. And some people don’t like to be reminded of that.
There just cannot be a woman blind enough or stupid enough to even consider an affair with Gollum Gove.
If I was a woman, the thought of sex with Gove would convert me to lesbianism.
I feel like that about most of the Cabinet. Scrub that: all of them. And if lesbianism weren't on offer, the dirtiest most back-breaking gardening work would be infinitely preferable.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
Marr is an amateur painter. That does not make him an expert but it does give him some insight. His programme on his fellow dauber, Winston Churchill, was quite interesting.
It has become a trend in tv, you can't have a programme without a celeb / known name. Chiles on problem drinking, Joey Essex on depression etc. Yes they may have personal experience, but it doesn't make them an expert, in fact probably too connected to be objective.
Gloriously brutal question. Gloriously weasley response from Brandon "what border" Lewis. As I said earlier I couldn't be a front line politician having to defend the indefensible like that.
Seems a bit cruel to Lewis to make him the patsy sent round to stonewall a story like this, and also be NI Secretary. He's paid his dues serving as the latter.
Sam Coates Sky @SamCoatesSky · 1h New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
Hope so, I do think that when the 4 week extension was announced, it has some words about a possible early end of Monday the 5 July, I do hope that that happens.
I consider that highly unlikely. The Government has been making no noises about speeding the process up, and the non-loopy, non-ISAGE faction of the scientists still want us to have the full month to get more people jabbed. Besides which, an early finish would require an announcement tomorrow, to give that week for affected businesses to prepare to open up that we've had for the previous phases. No sign of that coming.
You are probably right, sadly this is most likely to be another of my dashed hopes,
However based of the Covid Dashboards, we have almost 40% ish of 18-24 year olds jabbed, and are jabbing at a rate of 2% a day, given that only 60 ish % of over 30-34 are jabbed, I expect it to max out at about the same level i.e. in about 10 days, so what then? 16 and 17 Year olds, fine, but that will not take long, then what? maybe open a week early?
Handy extra job experience for Hancock’s paramour. … She was also a director at the press consultancy Luther Pendragon, which specialises in crisis and reputation management.…
Sam Coates Sky @SamCoatesSky · 1h New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
How much will he hold the line once he is “fully briefed”
One thing Javid never has been is a slavish acolyte to ‘lines.’ If he were, he would have been Chancellor under Cummings’ thumb for the last 16 months.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
Marr is an amateur painter. That does not make him an expert but it does give him some insight. His programme on his fellow dauber, Winston Churchill, was quite interesting.
Though in general I would rather watch experts than generalists like Dimbleby but it is the big name that means the programme is commissioned in the first place.
Interestingly again the internet shows us that having experts talking about stuff they are expert in is actually very popular.
I would suggest again it is a sign of legacy tv "we must have a star name", otherwise nobody will watch it. And the big hits of lockdown, the Queen's gambit with an actress with little star power and the tiger king documentary, both popular because they are bloody good stories.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
Marr is an amateur painter. That does not make him an expert but it does give him some insight. His programme on his fellow dauber, Winston Churchill, was quite interesting.
It has become a trend in tv, you can't have a programme without a celeb / known name. Chiles on problem drinking, Joey Essex on depression etc. Yes they may have personal experience, but it doesn't make them an expert, in fact probably too connected to be objective.
Someone who is a good presenter, enthusiastic if amateur, presenting professionally prepared material and talking with experts, seems resaonable. Ideally the presenter would be an expert too, but not all experts are good presenters.
Now having been infected he moves to a much higher level of protection.
The vaccination allowed him to do that with only minor effects.
Yes, strange he says it’s both ‘very nasty’ and akin to a ‘summer cold’, which doesn’t sound that nasty, relatively speaking.
Just what you would expect from the bellend, he is a useless presenter.
But Marr keeps getting the gigs. He is now presenting a series about great art on the BBC. Since when was he an expert on art? Marr's history book had to be pulped because it contained a slander. Yet he seems to be one of those indispensable to the BBC.
Marr is an amateur painter. That does not make him an expert but it does give him some insight. His programme on his fellow dauber, Winston Churchill, was quite interesting.
It has become a trend in tv, you can't have a programme without a celeb / known name. Chiles on problem drinking, Joey Essex on depression etc. Yes they may have personal experience, but it doesn't make them an expert, in fact probably too connected to be objective.
Someone who is a good presenter, enthusiastic if amateur, presenting professionally prepared material and talking with experts, seems resaonable. Ideally the presenter would be an expert too, but not all experts are good presenters.
No, but too many of these are "my truth" type programs.
Talking of good presenters / experts...Hal Robson Kanu....get him on the footy more often, far better than so many of the usual duffers. Compare and contrast with morons like Ashley Cole or Robbie Savage.
Jess Phillips MP @jessphillips · 1h Hope my husband doesn't start putting me first Matt Hancock style.
It can only be a matter of time before 'Hancock' joins the lexicon of terms to describe...
1.sex at work. ( a quick Hancock) 2.bottom squeezing (a Hancock) 3. being caught on a hidden camera at work (being Hancocked) 4. being fired for any of the above (been Hancocked)
None of them well catered for (at the moment) by the English language
(Jess Phillips for Labour leader-if they can't get Marina Hyde)
My CLP is getting much better speakers (and viewer figures) in monthly online sessions than we did when they had to trek down to Godalming to talk, and Jess's talk a couple of months ago easily topped the list. She's a bit too centrist for my ideal preference, but she is perhaps the closest we've got to Johnson's cheerful sarcasm that is part of his appeal. I could be won over by her.
I have to ask. "A bit centrist" = Jess Phillips? You were an MP in a time where there was a Labour government. I assume your ambition for colleagues is that they be denied the same privilege as you want a Labour party where Jess is too far to the right to be mainstream...
Clause 1 of the Labour Party constitution states that the aim of the party is to promote the election of Labour representatives. How does this balance off against the left's desire for MPs where Zarah Sultana, Laura Pidcock and Rickie Dickie Burgon are the pinnacle of intellectual and political nous?
Comments
We were told it’s a security camera, if it wasn’t then it’s a crime without a public interest defence because it goes too far.
I heard somebody say that about both Australia and NZ on here a few weeks ago, but when I talked to my family in NZ they are adamant that there is no big anti vax thing, just slow in getting hold of vaccines in big numbers. and looked a some NZ news outlets, and nothing there.
Australia and New Zealand are different and it may be that what's happening on one is not the same as the other. But, I think its probably the case that Australia has vaccinated less of its population than other Weston nations mostly because of the late and low supply, even if Anti Vaz sentiment by some, has not helped.
I can imagine how it could be a redeeming feature.
https://popbitch.com/2019/01/swing-vote/
Sarah Gilbert: 'What none of us foresaw was how the vaccine would become a political football. Our year of painstaking attention to detail resulting in a vaccine with the potential to save millions of lives around the world could be dismissed by a politician with a grudge.'
https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1409099323690921984
"Col a d'angelo" apparently means "With an angel"
So that might be it?
That is why the NHS is not going to be privatised.
Most people know the Tories are rank rotten in Westminster , just a bunch of self serving , money grabbing crooks and the scales are beginning to fall from the eyes of all but the most thick and deluded sheeple in Scotland.
Nasty evil cheeks of the same arse would be my opinion.
Nonetheless he still had to convince over seventeen million people to buy into something that they had little interest in and which was plainly not to their advantage. A Herculean task. He really isn't to be underestimated
https://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2020/06/06/the-case-for-making-personality-ratings-a-good-electoral-indicator/
Now that's not a problem if Australia can keep Delta out until it has vaccinated with Pfizer.
But if Delta gets in (as it has) and proves uncontrollable (which we will see in the next few weeks) then it will have Delta rampaging around a country with little vaccination and almost zero acquired immunity.
If the someone is a friend of theirs, or has promised them a sinecure after they leave government?
I think Australia may not have a problem with anti-Vaxx sentiment per se, but there appears to be anti-AZ sentiment (because of the “health risk”).
Who, it appears, was once slighted by being kept waiting by a senior Eurocrat.
Finland now has cases rising at 45% WoW, the fastest in the EU (with the exception of Malta, but Malta has only cases 18 all week)
Presumably its the Delta Variant, and possibly came across the long land boarder with Russia, but at this point it does not matter, its there now. infection for now is still at a low level, 130 cases/million over the last week, a tenth of the UK level.
Finland has so far had a much better pandemic that anywhere else in the EU with just 175 Deaths per million, about a tenth of the EU average. The Flip side of this though is less infection bourn immunity will make it easier to transmit.
On vaccines, overall Finland is middle of pack, 76/100 people just behind the EU average 77/100.
However it is at the extreme of using the 'first doses first' policy. They have the second highest proportion of people with one jab, (behind Malta) but the second lowest proportion with both jabs (behind Bulgaria)
How will this play out? I don't know, possibly OK, as in a lots of cases but not that much hospitalisation or death. which would be a good, and a validation of the 'first doses first' policy. but one to watch.
P.S. at 175 deaths per million they are by a long way the lowest in the EU, that would have to almost triple to 427, just to be the second best, so still lots of room to keep there crown.
Telegraph
I laughed out loud.
A burst of delta in Australia might wake them up a bit over there that they can’t keep it out forever and instead they need to get themselves vaxxed.
If you're right we will see a mixture of NHS spending doubling or NHS services halving.
But I remain sceptical.
Good news if so. Albeit I don’t know what the age profile is compared to the national average and it may be slightly higher.
If a lockdown could bring R down from 3 to 0.6 then it might bring Delta's R down from 6 to 1.2 - still an increase but a slow increase.
Now that gives time to embark on mass vaccination but if people still refuse AZ then things will steadily deteriorate while the damage from the lockdown increases.
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/vaccinations?areaType=ltla&areaName=Cannock Chase
And even at the height of our original lockdown the scientists were estimating R only ever bottomed out at around 0.8 or so, i.e. there wasn't much headroom even then without the variant three down the line each of which is more transmissible than the last. I remember when were worried the Kent variant would put us over the top regardless of lockdown, let alone Delta.
@SamCoatesSky
·
1h
New Health Secretary Sajid Javid says his priority is “that we return to normal as soon and as quickly as possible”
Promising start.
Hopefully he is completely zero-covid free.
https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/commentisfree/2021/jun/27/why-most-people-who-now-die-with-covid-have-been-vaccinated
But it’s still speculation as it’s very early days. And clearly their border policy is a major advantage as it isolates the state/country in a way we never did.
A good figure anyway. Around two thirds must be getting close to where Covid will be a minor nuisance not a serious public health menace.
If the stats are accurate, then Cannock Chase is probably around the national average in terms of age, or only very slightly above.
Hancock had become utterly blinkered and totally focused on covid to the exclusion of all else health related imho. Not necessarily a criticism. Who wouldn't in the circumstances of the last 18 months, but a change was needed.
(Edit: looking at the 2nd-dose count some of it also seems to have been capacity being used for 2nd doses, as one goes down the other goes up.)
She talking about you Macron.....
That does not mean that the government can not close bars and restraints, and it will, but that still leaves a lot of scope for braking the rules in privet homes, (or offices Hancock steal!)
Only 50 over 50s who have been double jabbed have died in 5 months. And 0 under 50s.
Once you factor in some of those will be extremely old and vulnerable, with a host of other conditions, and would have died from literally any illness, we really are talking about hardly anybody.
But once you ditch the requirement to be truthful, it's really not that difficult to win political campaigns. I can think of at least one small time, small town local pol who has been doing Dom stuff for a decades. It's not intellectually difficult, it just requires focus, hard work and a complete cauterisation of conscience.
The only problem with winning an election or a referendum with lies and hatred is that then you have to govern. And you can't govern according to your campaign promises, because they were lies. Non-foolish people think that far ahead, and that constrains how they campaign. Fools rush in, thinking that campaign ethics are for weaklings ignoring the reality trap that they run into, gloating.
The only question is- when does reality bite?
https://twitter.com/jbloom_lab/status/1408161515606138883
I am getting lots of questions if my pre-print about some #SARSCoV2 sequences that were removed from Sequence Read Archive tell us anything about lab accident versus natural zoonosis.
I posted summary of pre-print below, but did not directly address this point explicitly (1/n)
… The answer is NO. The people using it to strongly support either argument are those that have become so emotionally invested in their opinion that they have lost the ability to analyze anything objectively outside of the framework of that argument.
e.g.
50-54 Year olds only 77% compared to England average of 85%,
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9728843/Matt-Hancocks-affair-footage-office-CCTV-reveals-GLEN-OWEN.html
If the reports are to be believed it wasn't Hancock was innumerate, it was he hid positive data from Boris, and obviously Boris is clueless about these models, just sees big numbers and goes oh crap, lock it down.
Though in general I would rather watch experts than generalists like Dimbleby but it is the big name that means the programme is commissioned in the first place.
However based of the Covid Dashboards, we have almost 40% ish of 18-24 year olds jabbed, and are jabbing at a rate of 2% a day, given that only 60 ish % of over 30-34 are jabbed, I expect it to max out at about the same level i.e. in about 10 days, so what then? 16 and 17 Year olds, fine, but that will not take long, then what? maybe open a week early?
… She was also a director at the press consultancy Luther Pendragon, which specialises in crisis and reputation management.…
I would suggest again it is a sign of legacy tv "we must have a star name", otherwise nobody will watch it. And the big hits of lockdown, the Queen's gambit with an actress with little star power and the tiger king documentary, both popular because they are bloody good stories.
Clause 1 of the Labour Party constitution states that the aim of the party is to promote the election of Labour representatives. How does this balance off against the left's desire for MPs where Zarah Sultana, Laura Pidcock and Rickie Dickie Burgon are the pinnacle of intellectual and political nous?