Germany's vaccination rate has noticeably slowed down and it looks like it will plateau in the 60-65% range.
I'm not convinced that's true: I am dealing with a large German reinsurer right now and all my opposite numbers are in their late twenties to mid-30s. None of them have been offered a vaccine yet (much to their annoyance). By contrast, in France (which is ahead of Germany right now), they're even allowing teenagers to get it.
Kids have a world of information at their fingertips which was not available a generation ago. Honestly I don't think I would have lost much by having a teacher teach using Zoom than face to face. The Covid exam generation are going to have people massively questioning the value of their grades.
Is it more than narrowing the syllabus in response to missed schooling through the pandemic? It sounds quite reasonable, though tbh I've not given it a great deal of thought. In a normal year, the syllabus tells students what will be on the exam.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
27,000 -> 34,000 week-over-week, I think. And today's total is only just above the seven day average. Rather encouraging, I think.
Early days, though. And we saw something similar at the end of June. It seems to be a quirk of this wave that the variation within a week and the variation between weeks are of very similar size. Hence the almost vertical steps followed by flat bits on the graph.
The big thing is schools coming towards the end of the academic year.
Germany's vaccination rate has noticeably slowed down and it looks like it will plateau in the 60-65% range.
I'm not convinced that's true: I am dealing with a large German reinsurer right now and all my opposite numbers are in their late twenties to mid-30s. None of them have been offered a vaccine yet (much to their annoyance). By contrast, in France (which is ahead of Germany right now), they're even allowing teenagers to get it.
According to OurWorldInData, France aren't ahead of Germany in vaccinations. They are along way behind on both first dose and fully vaccinated, and behind even the EU average.
The storm developed over Sutton and Epsom and a new storm has developed over central and NW London. Here to the east, still dry.
It's odd. It's rare for there to be little wind meaning that the thunderstorm develops and then doesn't move. Thinking of going for a walk this evening. Might give it a miss just in case we get a storm here.
It could be that it's a convergence line. That's the sort of situation which kicks off a thunderstorm at a specific location and then doesn't move.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
No no no. Parents choose to have children. In doing so they must accept the responsibility to rear them. The great majority can afford to do so. Happy to help where there is genuine need - not happy to give breakfast to kids with affluent parents. Take some responsibility.
The job of schools is to educate children in the most cost effective manner possible, right?
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
Germany's vaccination rate has noticeably slowed down and it looks like it will plateau in the 60-65% range.
Is that population or adults. If it's the latter then that's seriously worrying. We'll top out at 90% by the end of August for adults which is 70% of the population. If we do start with 12-17 year olds we could get to 75% of the population by the end of September. We'd be extremely close to herd immunity, even with delta at that point.
That's population, but it includes some 12-17 year-olds who've been vaccinated too.
Germany's vaccination rate has noticeably slowed down and it looks like it will plateau in the 60-65% range.
Is that population or adults. If it's the latter then that's seriously worrying. We'll top out at 90% by the end of August for adults which is 70% of the population. If we do start with 12-17 year olds we could get to 75% of the population by the end of September. We'd be extremely close to herd immunity, even with delta at that point.
So it looks like Germay and the US are hitting roughly the same plateau.
I never cease to be amazed at the expertise on PB. This afternoon, the armchair epidemiologists who know better than the government's own scientific experts have become armchair football managers who know better than the England one appointed by the FA and his (over) large team. Impressive.
(PS - Kalvin Phillips of Leeds should have taken a penalty).
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
Three Lions looks arrogant on first glance - but then you take a moment to consider that the song itself is about hope in the face of disappointment, and the numerous disappointments which the people singing it have faced since the song was written. As David Baddiel says, the song is about "defiance... [and] hope in the face of history... [but] the song comes from a place of vulnerability". Those brief moments of hope are made bittersweet precisely because we all know how many times that those hopes have been dashed before. Italian footballers might think that the point of Three Lions is screaming "it's coming to Rome" into the camera as your defeated opponents walk past you; in reality, it's singing "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" as you're getting relegated.
I never cease to be amazed at the expertise on PB. This afternoon, the armchair epidemiologists who know better than the government's own scientific experts have become armchair football managers who know better than the England one appointed by the FA and his (over) large team. Impressive.
(PS - Kalvin Phillips of Leeds should have taken a penalty).
Well when it comes to SPI-M....picking a number at random will more than likely end up closer.
Germany's vaccination rate has noticeably slowed down and it looks like it will plateau in the 60-65% range.
Is that population or adults. If it's the latter then that's seriously worrying. We'll top out at 90% by the end of August for adults which is 70% of the population. If we do start with 12-17 year olds we could get to 75% of the population by the end of September. We'd be extremely close to herd immunity, even with delta at that point.
Germany is already above 65% of adults with at least one dose, so @williamglenn must be talking about percent of all people.
Germany is also *very* slow to report. They don't report weekly totals to the EU vaccination site until the following Thursday, so it's also possible that there is a data delay in there.
Germany's vaccination rate has noticeably slowed down and it looks like it will plateau in the 60-65% range.
I'm not convinced that's true: I am dealing with a large German reinsurer right now and all my opposite numbers are in their late twenties to mid-30s. None of them have been offered a vaccine yet (much to their annoyance). By contrast, in France (which is ahead of Germany right now), they're even allowing teenagers to get it.
Germany is allowing teenagers to get vaccinated too.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
No. We are an alpha nation. We conquered the world FFS. We should be winning these things as regularly as Italy. Ffs we invented the sport
We win everything else. This is our hoodoo
The Scots invented football, not the English.
There are lots of claims, though that has to be the silliest. The game was codified on Parker's Piece, Cambridge. I am not aware of any historical account of bagpipes or tartan skirts in evidence.
Boys will have been hitting soft, round objects around since the dawn of time. They would have made their own rules, which evolved into all sorts of different games. Most are hit-the-ball-with-something - you have hit it with a bat (rounders, cricket, softball etc); hit it with a racquet (tennis, real tennis, squash; even fives for a weak definition of 'racquet'); hit it with your foot (soccer; rugby, Aussie rules football, American football etc).
Variations on football evolved in China and Japan; even the Incans and Mayans had versions.
So when was 'football; invented, in the modern sense of the game? It has to be when it was codified, when teams from different towns could play each other using the same rules, using new transport links, allowing leagues to be formed.
And that means the modern game, and therefore football as we know it, was 'invented' on Parker's Piece.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
27,000 -> 34,000 week-over-week, I think. And today's total is only just above the seven day average. Rather encouraging, I think.
Early days, though. And we saw something similar at the end of June. It seems to be a quirk of this wave that the variation within a week and the variation between weeks are of very similar size. Hence the almost vertical steps followed by flat bits on the graph.
The big thing is schools coming towards the end of the academic year.
I think the difference this time is that delta is already everywhere in the country. In some places the vaccination and acquired immunity rate is high enough to prevent a huge third wave, in other places it definitely isn't. Where it isn't there have been third waves of infection and smaller waves of hospitalisations. Last time there was a small pause in the growth rate delta was still being seeded to the rest of the country, that process is now complete and anywhere that's going to experience a third infection wave would already be in it by now and some places like Bolton and Blackburn are on the other side as natural immunity has now pushed those areas to herd immunity for the current level of restrictions and activity.
Heading back to racism - I see someone has started given other racists advice
The bit that he won't get is that twitter sends an email everytime someone logs into your account and I bet the person being investigated doesn't have any of those emails.
For the record, Matt Singh of Number Cruncher points out that Southgate himself in his press conference said that most (but not all) of the racist online abuse of England's players came from overseas trolls. Thrris was ascertained by the FA's social media This point was entirely glossed over by the British media, the twitterati, the Labour Party and the race industry.
Not to mention a few posters on here earlier today.
Fake news, as somebody once said.
"Social media experts?" Must be right. Gotta trust them experts. It's odd that the stands are verifiably packed with flesh and blood racists though, or are they bots from abroad too? Like Blade Runner?
ETA and the Rashford mural defacers, also from overseas? And BTW what the fuck does "Take pride in knowing that your struggle will play the biggest role in your purpose" mean anyway?
I thought that was something his mum said, but what it means is anyone's guess.
I never cease to be amazed at the expertise on PB. This afternoon, the armchair epidemiologists who know better than the government's own scientific experts have become armchair football managers who know better than the England one appointed by the FA and his (over) large team. Impressive.
(PS - Kalvin Phillips of Leeds should have taken a penalty).
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
I think cases have now peaked. That's it. But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double to over 1,400 daily admissions and an average daily deaths of over 70 before beginning to decrease. End of fourth wave.
I never cease to be amazed at the expertise on PB. This afternoon, the armchair epidemiologists who know better than the government's own scientific experts have become armchair football managers who know better than the England one appointed by the FA and his (over) large team. Impressive.
(PS - Kalvin Phillips of Leeds should have taken a penalty).
Given the UK government's handling of the pandemic, and yesterday's result, perhaps the experts should be listening.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
27,000 -> 34,000 week-over-week, I think. And today's total is only just above the seven day average. Rather encouraging, I think.
Next week we've got the end of the tournament to figure in for England and the following week it's the end of schools. The infection rate could actually drop pretty fast in the next 10-12 days.
Is the 40k 1st vaccinations evidence of reaching the plateau - or are there supply and holiday explanations for it?
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
How would you conduct that experiment? No council is willingly going to redirect money from teachers to other school expenditure - the uproar would be immediate and massive.
Easy solution: one council area sees every school get money for an additional teacher, while the other gets money for free school meals.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
No no no. Parents choose to have children. In doing so they must accept the responsibility to rear them. The great majority can afford to do so. Happy to help where there is genuine need - not happy to give breakfast to kids with affluent parents. Take some responsibility.
The job of schools is to educate children in the most cost effective manner possible, right?
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
I just want to confirm that's your view.
Yes. You want poor people to pay for your kids' breakfasts right? I just want to confirm your view?
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
I think cases have now peaked. That's it. But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double before beginning to decrease. End of fourth wave.
Zoe App Data, which has been ahead of the actual case reporting, shows that among unvaccinated people it shows the curve looking like it is now heading downward. The only concerning thing was a rise in "vaccinated" (first and second) dose cases.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
27,000 -> 34,000 week-over-week, I think. And today's total is only just above the seven day average. Rather encouraging, I think.
Next week we've got the end of the tournament to figure in for England and the following week it's the end of schools. The infection rate could actually drop pretty fast in the next 10-12 days.
Is the 40k 1st vaccinations evidence of reaching the plateau - or are there supply and holiday explanations for it?
Demand wall. Appointments are available for first doses same day or next day for any over 18 who wants one. There's literally no wait time.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
I think cases have now peaked. That's it. But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double before beginning to decrease. End of fourth wave.
Zoe App Data, which has been ahead of the actual case reporting, shows that among unvaccinated people it shows the curve looking like it is now heading downward. The only concerning thing was a rise in "vaccinated" (first and second) dose cases.
Does anyone have a good explanation for why that is happening? Seems counter-intuitive.
The storm developed over Sutton and Epsom and a new storm has developed over central and NW London. Here to the east, still dry.
It's odd. It's rare for there to be little wind meaning that the thunderstorm develops and then doesn't move. Thinking of going for a walk this evening. Might give it a miss just in case we get a storm here.
There's been a ferocious storm here with massive thunder and lightening. Car alarms going off and the street outside is a river.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
I think cases have now peaked. That's it. But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double before beginning to decrease. End of fourth wave.
Zoe App Data, which has been ahead of the actual case reporting, shows that among unvaccinated people it shows the curve looking like it is now heading downward. The only concerning thing was a rise in "vaccinated" (first and second) dose cases.
Does anyone have a good explanation for why that is happening? Seems counter-intuitive.
I presume riskier behaviour among those who have been vaccinated + some vaccine escape (especially with only one dose).
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
At my school no one now knows if one gets free school meals except the parents and (possibly) the pupil: payments are all electronic using a finger scanner. This has the added benefit that pupils don't bring in cash on a regular basis.
Germany's vaccination rate has noticeably slowed down and it looks like it will plateau in the 60-65% range.
I'm not convinced that's true: I am dealing with a large German reinsurer right now and all my opposite numbers are in their late twenties to mid-30s. None of them have been offered a vaccine yet (much to their annoyance). By contrast, in France (which is ahead of Germany right now), they're even allowing teenagers to get it.
Germany is allowing teenagers to get vaccinated too.
Each week for the last 5 has been slower than the last.
Where's your
Well, that pegs them at 58.5% of the population with at least one dose, and still doing a fair number of first doses a day. So, 60-65% seems a little pessimistic.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
Yes you are. Its a bittersweet song not an arrogant one.
Its a lot less arrogant than the vast majority of anthems countries sing.
I don't think any country is univerally loved across Europe nor should any be. Kind of creepy if they are.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
At my school no one now knows if one gets free school meals except the parents and (possibly) the pupil: payments are all electronic using a finger scanner. This has the added benefit that pupils don't bring in cash on a regular basis.
But where do the bullies then get their money for ciggies?
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
No. We are an alpha nation. We conquered the world FFS. We should be winning these things as regularly as Italy. Ffs we invented the sport
We win everything else. This is our hoodoo
The Scots invented football, not the English.
There are lots of claims, though that has to be the silliest. The game was codified on Parker's Piece, Cambridge. I am not aware of any historical account of bagpipes or tartan skirts in evidence.
Boys will have been hitting soft, round objects around since the dawn of time. They would have made their own rules, which evolved into all sorts of different games. Most are hit-the-ball-with-something - you have hit it with a bat (rounders, cricket, softball etc); hit it with a racquet (tennis, real tennis, squash; even fives for a weak definition of 'racquet'); hit it with your foot (soccer; rugby, Aussie rules football, American football etc).
Variations on football evolved in China and Japan; even the Incans and Mayans had versions.
So when was 'football; invented, in the modern sense of the game? It has to be when it was codified, when teams from different towns could play each other using the same rules, using new transport links, allowing leagues to be formed.
And that means the modern game, and therefore football as we know it, was 'invented' on Parker's Piece.
There is some kind of bat and ball game in the epic of Gilgamesh - the gods give enkidu a game in which you hit some sort of object made of wood with a different sort of object made of wood, and he gets pissy when he loses the hit object. The Penguin edition translates as croquet which is a technical fit, but with weird overtones.
So last night I mentioned a friend of mine left Wembley at half time because of the unsafe atmosphere.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
Kids have a world of information at their fingertips which was not available a generation ago. Honestly I don't think I would have lost much by having a teacher teach using Zoom than face to face. The Covid exam generation are going to have people massively questioning the value of their grades.
Telling the pupils what will be on the exam papers (in general terms) is known as "teaching"...
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
Yes you are. Its a bittersweet song not an arrogant one.
Its a lot less arrogant than the vast majority of anthems countries sing.
I don't think any country is univerally loved across Europe nor should any be. Kind of creepy if they are.
But all those "oh so nears" Wear you down through the years
Yes. Three Lions is about hope in the face of bitter, or bitter-sweet, experience.
So last night I mentioned a friend of mine left Wembley at half time because of the unsafe atmosphere.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
I hope.
Those scenes of fans with tickets beating those storming in was very strange. In the past, more often the police and stewards are trying to stop those with tickets helping those without to get in.
Ministers are drawing up plans to impose carbon taxes on imports from abroad as part of efforts to hit Britain’s net-zero target by 2050, i understands.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
I think cases have now peaked. That's it. But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double before beginning to decrease. End of fourth wave.
Zoe App Data, which has been ahead of the actual case reporting, shows that among unvaccinated people it shows the curve looking like it is now heading downward. The only concerning thing was a rise in "vaccinated" (first and second) dose cases.
I pity the modellers! There are regional variations, age differences, vax versus non-vax, different population densities, different behaviours by different cohorts, football, schools etc etc. How on earth can you sensibly model all that!
I'm just fitting a curve to the actual data using a quadratic (constant 2nd differential). Previous peaks of 7 day moving averages (7MOV) seem to have a quadratic shape. That's why I think 7 MOV cases have just peaked at about 33,000 with admissions and deaths 16 days behind.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
I think cases have now peaked. That's it. But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double to over 1,400 daily admissions and an average daily deaths of over 70 before beginning to decrease. End of fourth wave.
I think it's quite likely that the travel and mixing associated with the final yesterday will produce another boost for the virus. With the schools then closing for the summer in England that will probably be that, until September.
I hope there's a plan to rapidly vaccinate teenagers no later than the start of the new school year, and to encourage higher take-up of the vaccines on university campuses.
So last night I mentioned a friend of mine left Wembley at half time because of the unsafe atmosphere.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
I hope.
You might have missed my earlier post when I said I knew of someone who had confronted some racists and ended up in hospital.
You can tell your friend they made the right call.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
Yes you are. Its a bittersweet song not an arrogant one.
Its a lot less arrogant than the vast majority of anthems countries sing.
I don't think any country is univerally loved across Europe nor should any be. Kind of creepy if they are.
But all those "oh so nears" Wear you down through the years
Yes. Three Lions is about hope in the face of bitter, or bitter-sweet, experience.
It's "thirty years of hurt" I can't stand, was there ever a more twee and spineless sentiment? And all because it rhymes with shirt.
34471 cases, 6 deaths, no update for hospital admissions...
I think cases have now peaked. That's it. But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double before beginning to decrease. End of fourth wave.
Zoe App Data, which has been ahead of the actual case reporting, shows that among unvaccinated people it shows the curve looking like it is now heading downward. The only concerning thing was a rise in "vaccinated" (first and second) dose cases.
Does anyone have a good explanation for why that is happening? Seems counter-intuitive.
Could be some early signs of waning immunity, vaccines aren't 100% protective as well.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
How would you conduct that experiment? No council is willingly going to redirect money from teachers to other school expenditure - the uproar would be immediate and massive.
Easy solution: one council area sees every school get money for an additional teacher, while the other gets money for free school meals.
No-one loses a teacher.
Back of an envelope calculation suggests it would be more like a dozen more teachers at my school, not just one.
So last night I mentioned a friend of mine left Wembley at half time because of the unsafe atmosphere.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
I hope.
Those scenes of fans with tickets beating those storming in was very strange. In the past, more often the police and stewards are trying to stop those with tickets helping those without to get in.
It was a case of the stewards acting like 'I don't get paid enough to deal with this shit', he said it was a complete failure on the stewarding and police front.
As with these things he said you cannot help wonder what would have happened last night if ISIS or Al Qaeda affiliated terrorists had tried something.
So last night I mentioned a friend of mine left Wembley at half time because of the unsafe atmosphere.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
I hope.
As we move from restrictions to guidance on Covid restrictions, we might see more things like this, albeit on a smaller and more manageable scale. Some people's "common sense" differs from other people's.
So last night I mentioned a friend of mine left Wembley at half time because of the unsafe atmosphere.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
I hope.
Those scenes of fans with tickets beating those storming in was very strange. In the past, more often the police and stewards are trying to stop those with tickets helping those without to get in.
It was a case of the stewards acting like 'I don't get paid enough to deal with this shit', he said it was a complete failure on the stewarding and police front.
As with these things he said you cannot help wonder what would have happened last night if ISIS or Al Qaeda affiliated terrorists had tried something.
The authorities don't really have any excuse, they can hardly say they didn't expect it....wasn't exactly like some demo that turned out to be much more widely attended.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
Yes you are. Its a bittersweet song not an arrogant one.
Its a lot less arrogant than the vast majority of anthems countries sing.
I don't think any country is univerally loved across Europe nor should any be. Kind of creepy if they are.
Indeed. "Football's coming home" was originally written in the sense that the tournament is being held in England. It doesn't make any sense any other way.
It is peculiar for its particularly untriumphant nature. The 2018 version even opens with a rant from Alan Shearer about how terrible the team are, which the video illustrates with famous images of England failure through the years. This is not a triumphalist song. The fact that it is so popular is down primarily to the fact that both melodies are easy to sing. (Ditto "Sweet Caroline" which has even less relevance to sport.)
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
At my school no one now knows if one gets free school meals except the parents and (possibly) the pupil: payments are all electronic using a finger scanner. This has the added benefit that pupils don't bring in cash on a regular basis.
But where do the bullies then get their money for ciggies?
That was one of the positive side effects of the new system (unless you are one of the bullies of course).
Well that's starting to look more encouraging again.
Although the "percentage change in recent 7-day case rates by specimen date" is showing a slowing down of the rate of decline in rate of increase (third derivative? Fourth?). Which is less encouraging.
So last night I mentioned a friend of mine left Wembley at half time because of the unsafe atmosphere.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
I hope.
You might have missed my earlier post when I said I knew of someone who had confronted some racists and ended up in hospital.
You can tell your friend they made the right call.
Sorry to hear that.
I think I'll stick to following Liverpool.
Only time I've ever had racism directed towards me following Liverpool in this country was against Chelsea in the 2005 Rumbelows Cup final. I was lucky in the respect that it was two Chelsea fans decided to mouth out in front me and a few dozens other Liverpool fans who I didn't know. Those fans pretty much made a buffer zone around me, and put the Chelsea fans in their place.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
I have travelled and worked in most European countries. In my experience, "we" are neither loved nor loathed except by some extreme chauvinists in Scotland and Wales, a few in France and a few lefty self loathers in our own country. Most see us with amusement for our sense of humour and admiration for our political system (up to approximately 2016), and a certain amount of incredulity for our isolationism (which is why some refer to us as "the islanders" in a slightly piss-takeish way). I do not think we are loved or loathed in any greater measure than any other nationality.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
Yes you are. Its a bittersweet song not an arrogant one.
Its a lot less arrogant than the vast majority of anthems countries sing.
I don't think any country is univerally loved across Europe nor should any be. Kind of creepy if they are.
Indeed. "Football's coming home" was originally written in the sense that the tournament is being held in England. It doesn't make any sense any other way.
It is peculiar for its particularly untriumphant nature. The 2018 version even opens with a rant from Alan Shearer about how terrible the team are, which the video illustrates with famous images of England failure through the years. This is not a triumphalist song. The fact that it is so popular is down primarily to the fact that both melodies are easy to sing. (Ditto "Sweet Caroline" which has even less relevance to sport.)
I am in no way a fan of football, but I have fond memories of being in the Whitworth Institute back in 1996, singing 'Three lions' with some friends whilst drunk as a skunk. It is just so eminently catchy and singable. You just cannot help but join in.
Freedom day appears to have been watered down so far as to be nearly meaningless for my purposes. "We're going to take away the law that you have to wear masks - but if you don't carry on wearing them we'll reintroduce it."
If we are asking "if not now, when?", the answer therefore appears to be "never".
The BBC, the Labour Party, isage etc - have won. Again.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
No no no. Parents choose to have children. In doing so they must accept the responsibility to rear them. The great majority can afford to do so. Happy to help where there is genuine need - not happy to give breakfast to kids with affluent parents. Take some responsibility.
The job of schools is to educate children in the most cost effective manner possible, right?
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
I just want to confirm that's your view.
Yes. You want poor people to pay for your kids' breakfasts right? I just want to confirm your view?
I want to maximise the educational achievements of kids, particularly those from lower incomes, as cost efficiently as possible.
All I'm saying is let's test it and see what achieves the best educational outcome. If it turns out that spending money on meals does it, then hell yes, poor people's taxes should be spent on it. Why shouldn't their taxes be spent in the most cost effective manner possible?
I find it interesting to see how the infection rates appear to be steady. Last week I caught the covid virus and I'll share just how easy it was to do so. I was sitting at Birmingham New St, station waiting for a southbound train. A young lady wearing a mask and using two crutches hobbled past me and a minute later returned to ask if this was the right platform for Suffolk. I thought, well yes and no, but who gives Suffolk as a destination so I asked where was she going? Suffolk was all I could hear and I must have looked either blank, confused or both. She lowered her mask and at a distance of 1m I heard her say Stafford! The railway staff must have also misheard because she was on the wrong platform. With her facemask now back on (and of course I was wearing mine all the time whilst on the station) I escourted her to the lift and helped her over to the correct platform via the station lifts. I left her there and went on my way. Five days later I was struck down with what is thankfully a relatively mild flu with visible symptons lasting two days but with effects still lingering a week later as I have no active taste or smell. I tested positive for covid and am now in isolation for the rest of this week. (FWIW I am 65+, overweight with a double jab). I noticed whilst we were in the lift that her forehead was sweating profusely but put that down to the effort it takes to use crutches on a warm day. That was all it took for me to get enough of the virus to fall sick but I suspect, even had I known what the outcome would be, I would do the same again. She needed help to get to her train and was on her way to Stafford Royal Infirmary to have one of her legs amputated below the knee.
Interesting to look at current hospitalisation/death data and to compare with the Warwick model that led to the extension of lockdown for four weeks.
According to that model we should be having ~1700 daily hospital admissions by now. 7-day average upto the 10th is instead 444 I believe.
According to that model we should have ~11,000 hospitalised. Latest data on dashboard is 2,731.
Daily deaths should be upto 90 by now. Daily average now is 28.
And worth remembing of course that ~90% of those who are hospitalised are antivaxxers I believe so have brought it on themselves.
The model was complete nonsense. Of course.
Erhhh...one point, 90% of those in hospital aren't anti-vaxxers, 90% aren't fully vaxxed. Good chunk of anti-vaxxers in there, but I think there is a fair number of 30-50 years old that will have caught it in the last month that just weren't fully vaccinated.
Well that's starting to look more encouraging again.
Although the "percentage change in recent 7-day case rates by specimen date" is showing a slowing down of the rate of decline in rate of increase (third derivative? Fourth?). Which is less encouraging.
Errr.. this one?
What this shows in the day to increases (or decreases) in cases. Such data is always lumpy. and seems to be cyclic as well. So you get periodic ups and downs as well as trends.
What we certainly can say is that in the longer terms (weeks) the rate of increase is slowing.
Freedom day appears to have been watered down so far as to be nearly meaningless for my purposes. "We're going to take away the law that you have to wear masks - but if you don't carry on wearing them we'll reintroduce it."
If we are asking "if not now, when?", the answer therefore appears to be "never".
The BBC, the Labour Party, isage etc - have won. Again.
I think it's more the case that restrictions are being removed more incrementally. And while that's annoying, the reality is that case numbers are going to start declining again, and those restrictions will be removed.
Not sure whether this has been posted - largest analysis yet of deaths and Covid-related deaths in children. It doesn't look at other issues, e.g. long Covid (I'm aware of another study running at present that is looking at that in children). https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-689684/v1
Key points on deaths: "There were an estimated 469,982 CYP infected with SARS-CoV-2 in England from March 2020 to February 2021, giving an infection fatality rate of 5 per 100,000 CYP (0·005%) and, based on a population of 12,023,568, a mortality rate of 2 per million CYP (0·0002%)."
Disclaimer: I was very loosely involved in this early on, advising on one small aspect and I know some of the authors. Beyond that, I had no involvement (I did not see the manuscript before it was uploaded to the pre-pub site).
Well that's starting to look more encouraging again.
Although the "percentage change in recent 7-day case rates by specimen date" is showing a slowing down of the rate of decline in rate of increase (third derivative? Fourth?). Which is less encouraging.
Errr.. this one?
What this shows in the day to increases (or decreases) in cases. Such data is always lumpy. and seems to be cyclic as well. So you get periodic ups and downs as well as trends.
What we certainly can say is that in the longer terms (weeks) the rate of increase is slowing.
What about a chart showing how quickly the rate of change is changing?
Freedom day appears to have been watered down so far as to be nearly meaningless for my purposes. "We're going to take away the law that you have to wear masks - but if you don't carry on wearing them we'll reintroduce it."
If we are asking "if not now, when?", the answer therefore appears to be "never".
The BBC, the Labour Party, isage etc - have won. Again.
Strange how a Conservative government in power for 11 years with a majority of 80 is cruelly bullied and pushed from pillar to post by a heartless BBC, Labour and scientists. The bastards.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
How would you conduct that experiment? No council is willingly going to redirect money from teachers to other school expenditure - the uproar would be immediate and massive.
Easy solution: one council area sees every school get money for an additional teacher, while the other gets money for free school meals.
No-one loses a teacher.
Back of an envelope calculation suggests it would be more like a dozen more teachers at my school, not just one.
When I watched Jamie's School Dinners, they had a budget of something like 27p per student for a meal. Now, times have changed. But that doesn't suggest it would it would take a dozen more teachers* to make meals free for all pupils.
* Unless you were in a really enormous school of course.
Interesting to look at current hospitalisation/death data and to compare with the Warwick model that led to the extension of lockdown for four weeks.
According to that model we should be having ~1700 daily hospital admissions by now. 7-day average upto the 10th is instead 444 I believe.
According to that model we should have ~11,000 hospitalised. Latest data on dashboard is 2,731.
Daily deaths should be upto 90 by now. Daily average now is 28.
And worth remembing of course that ~90% of those who are hospitalised are antivaxxers I believe so have brought it on themselves.
The model was complete nonsense. Of course.
Erhhh...one point, 90% of those in hospital aren't anti-vaxxers, 90% aren't fully vaxxed. Good chunk of anti-vaxxers in there, but I think there is a fair number of 30-50 years old that will have caught it in the last month that just weren't fully vaccinated.
Fair enough.
Do we have any data on that 90% for what's the split between antivaxxers, partially vaccinated but not due second yet, or partially vaccinated and rejected the second?
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
How would you conduct that experiment? No council is willingly going to redirect money from teachers to other school expenditure - the uproar would be immediate and massive.
Easy solution: one council area sees every school get money for an additional teacher, while the other gets money for free school meals.
No-one loses a teacher.
Back of an envelope calculation suggests it would be more like a dozen more teachers at my school, not just one.
When I watched Jamie's School Dinners, they had a budget of something like 27p per student for a meal. Now, times have changed. But that doesn't suggest it would it would take a dozen more teachers* to make meals free for all pupils.
* Unless you were in a really enormous school of course.
The cost of food is sadly a very small part of school meal costs...
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
No no no. Parents choose to have children. In doing so they must accept the responsibility to rear them. The great majority can afford to do so. Happy to help where there is genuine need - not happy to give breakfast to kids with affluent parents. Take some responsibility.
The job of schools is to educate children in the most cost effective manner possible, right?
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
I just want to confirm that's your view.
Yes. You want poor people to pay for your kids' breakfasts right? I just want to confirm your view?
I want to maximise the educational achievements of kids, particularly those from lower incomes, as cost efficiently as possible.
All I'm saying is let's test it and see what achieves the best educational outcome. If it turns out that spending money on meals does it, then hell yes, poor people's taxes should be spent on it. Why shouldn't their taxes be spent in the most cost effective manner possible?
You do realise that an extra £2.50 a day for a school meal (and I'm ignoring the capital cost here) is a roughly 10% rise in the cost of education? £5000 a year for the 200 teaching days of the school year (these number are about right) is £25 a day.
Interesting to look at current hospitalisation/death data and to compare with the Warwick model that led to the extension of lockdown for four weeks.
According to that model we should be having ~1700 daily hospital admissions by now. 7-day average upto the 10th is instead 444 I believe.
According to that model we should have ~11,000 hospitalised. Latest data on dashboard is 2,731.
Daily deaths should be upto 90 by now. Daily average now is 28.
And worth remembing of course that ~90% of those who are hospitalised are antivaxxers I believe so have brought it on themselves.
The model was complete nonsense. Of course.
I'd love it that 90% of the hospitalised are anti-vaxxers - do you have a source, or is it an estimate?
I made a mistake it seems, I recall it being mentioned here before and in a Parliamentary statement or PMQs that only 10% were vaccinated, but it seems the figure was 10% fully vaccinated.
But still, considering full-vaccination has already been offered to all over 40s and given the age profile of hospitalisations in general pre-vaccinations, having only 10% fully vaccinated shows remarkable efficacy. Much, much higher than 90% given the risk to age profile ratio.
Interesting to look at current hospitalisation/death data and to compare with the Warwick model that led to the extension of lockdown for four weeks.
According to that model we should be having ~1700 daily hospital admissions by now. 7-day average upto the 10th is instead 444 I believe.
According to that model we should have ~11,000 hospitalised. Latest data on dashboard is 2,731.
Daily deaths should be upto 90 by now. Daily average now is 28.
And worth remembing of course that ~90% of those who are hospitalised are antivaxxers I believe so have brought it on themselves.
The model was complete nonsense. Of course.
Erhhh...one point, 90% of those in hospital aren't anti-vaxxers, 90% aren't fully vaxxed. Good chunk of anti-vaxxers in there, but I think there is a fair number of 30-50 years old that will have caught it in the last month that just weren't fully vaccinated.
Fair enough.
Do we have any data on that 90% for what's the split between antivaxxers, partially vaccinated but not due second yet, or partially vaccinated and rejected the second?
Government are being very quiet on how cases and hospitalization break down. The only reason we have some idea on cases is because of ZOE app.
I presume the government don't want the media to start running scare stories and the public to panic, think vaccination is pointless, because yes 10% of cases are fully vaccinated people. Look how they reacted to unremarkable story of Andrew Marr getting it.
I am sure it wasn't pleasant for him, but a) he ended up in a covid hotspot staffed by loads of unvaccinated people with covid for days on end and b) he is already more vulnerable due to health conditions.
He got a nasty cold and felt crap for a few days, but it was reported like it was reason to panic like mad.
Interesting to look at current hospitalisation/death data and to compare with the Warwick model that led to the extension of lockdown for four weeks.
According to that model we should be having ~1700 daily hospital admissions by now. 7-day average upto the 10th is instead 444 I believe.
According to that model we should have ~11,000 hospitalised. Latest data on dashboard is 2,731.
Daily deaths should be upto 90 by now. Daily average now is 28.
And worth remembing of course that ~90% of those who are hospitalised are antivaxxers I believe so have brought it on themselves.
The model was complete nonsense. Of course.
I'd love it that 90% of the hospitalised are anti-vaxxers - do you have a source, or is it an estimate?
It's not as simple as that, of course. The last update we had was that 88% of people in hospital were unvaccinated or partially vaccinated. Only 12% of inpatients were from the fully vaccinated cohort. One of the things the government can and should do is get rid of the arbitrary 8 week gap between doses for under 40s. We've actually now got vaccines piling up in fridges.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
No no no. Parents choose to have children. In doing so they must accept the responsibility to rear them. The great majority can afford to do so. Happy to help where there is genuine need - not happy to give breakfast to kids with affluent parents. Take some responsibility.
The job of schools is to educate children in the most cost effective manner possible, right?
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
I just want to confirm that's your view.
Yes. You want poor people to pay for your kids' breakfasts right? I just want to confirm your view?
I want to maximise the educational achievements of kids, particularly those from lower incomes, as cost efficiently as possible.
All I'm saying is let's test it and see what achieves the best educational outcome. If it turns out that spending money on meals does it, then hell yes, poor people's taxes should be spent on it. Why shouldn't their taxes be spent in the most cost effective manner possible?
You do realise that an extra £2.50 a day for a school meal (and I'm ignoring the capital cost here) is a roughly 10% rise in the cost of education? £5000 a year for the 200 teaching days of the school year (these number are about right) is £25 a day.
There's economies of scale, if universal it ought to be possible to do healthy school meals for much cheaper than £2.50 per pupil per day.
Re school meals. From supply teaching I've been to very many. The quality varies enormously. FSM is of little use if it is borderline inedible and of low nutritional value. Getting the worst up to the standards of the better (And some are really quite good) might be a more efficient use of resources.
Freedom day appears to have been watered down so far as to be nearly meaningless for my purposes. "We're going to take away the law that you have to wear masks - but if you don't carry on wearing them we'll reintroduce it."
If we are asking "if not now, when?", the answer therefore appears to be "never".
The BBC, the Labour Party, isage etc - have won. Again.
I think it's more the case that restrictions are being removed more incrementally. And while that's annoying, the reality is that case numbers are going to start declining again, and those restrictions will be removed.
If we aren't getting rid of masks now, we never will. There will always be a reason to keep them.
I never really expected freedom day to happen. Just as I never expected England to win last night. But it not happening is still a massive kick in the nuts.
Well that's starting to look more encouraging again.
Although the "percentage change in recent 7-day case rates by specimen date" is showing a slowing down of the rate of decline in rate of increase (third derivative? Fourth?). Which is less encouraging.
Errr.. this one?
What this shows in the day to increases (or decreases) in cases. Such data is always lumpy. and seems to be cyclic as well. So you get periodic ups and downs as well as trends.
What we certainly can say is that in the longer terms (weeks) the rate of increase is slowing.
What about a chart showing how quickly the rate of change is changing?
7th! Order! Forces!
....Sorry, was channeling E.E. Smith there for a second....
Yes, you can go down that road - not sure the data is stable enough to mean much at that point...
The afternoon after the night before - I don't think anyone says that (well, I just have).
Reflections - first, the positives. Backing the draw at 19/10 was another winner - of the seven matches from the quarter-finals onward, I backed the draw at 90 minutes in all of them and won four times so a nice little profit - not obviously in the league of those on here who bet thousands on every move of equities, commodities or two flies up a wall.
Now, the not quite so positives.
In terms of the match, not a classic by any stretch. I do wonder if the early goal was the last thing England needed - we either had to go hard for a second to finish it or park the bus and hope for a goal on the counter. Someone mentioned this morning the disadvantage of playing in front of the home crowd at Wembley.
It's a paradox - most clubs would argue the support of the fans can be like a twelfth player on the pitch but Wembley can also be a cauldron - would it have been easier in an empty stadium?
The greatest irony if there's one man who should be aware of the pressure of taking a penalty in a vital match at Wembley it's Gareth Southgate. I can only presume he prepared - perhaps over-thought and over-prepared - the penalty shoot-out which can be the crucial part of the game. He will have known, more than anyone else, the nature of the pressure each and every player would have faced. It is quite literally a career-defining moment and most people's lives don't turn on such moments.
It's a truth some people can handle pressure and others can't but the nature of what was happening last evening would have tested anyone's mental strength to the limit.
Looking ahead, this isn't the first team we've heard the "they're a young team, give them time, they'll improve" line. We heard it back in the days of the "golden generation" for example. The 2022 World Cup looks wide open - Paddy go 5/1 France 11/2 Brazil, 6/1 Germany, 15/2 Italy, Spain and England.
I certainly agree there's very little between Italy, Spain and England on Euro 2020 evidence - I'd throw in Argentina and Brazil and say the next World Cup winner is one of those five.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
No no no. Parents choose to have children. In doing so they must accept the responsibility to rear them. The great majority can afford to do so. Happy to help where there is genuine need - not happy to give breakfast to kids with affluent parents. Take some responsibility.
The job of schools is to educate children in the most cost effective manner possible, right?
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
I just want to confirm that's your view.
Yes. You want poor people to pay for your kids' breakfasts right? I just want to confirm your view?
I want to maximise the educational achievements of kids, particularly those from lower incomes, as cost efficiently as possible.
All I'm saying is let's test it and see what achieves the best educational outcome. If it turns out that spending money on meals does it, then hell yes, poor people's taxes should be spent on it. Why shouldn't their taxes be spent in the most cost effective manner possible?
You do realise that an extra £2.50 a day for a school meal (and I'm ignoring the capital cost here) is a roughly 10% rise in the cost of education? £5000 a year for the 200 teaching days of the school year (these number are about right) is £25 a day.
The ingredients cost of meals is much smaller than the cost of the staff to serve and prepare. The marginal cost of adding meals is going to be well below £2.50.
I find it interesting to see how the infection rates appear to be steady. Last week I caught the covid virus and I'll share just how easy it was to do so. I was sitting at Birmingham New St, station waiting for a southbound train. A young lady wearing a mask and using two crutches hobbled past me and a minute later returned to ask if this was the right platform for Suffolk. I thought, well yes and no, but who gives Suffolk as a destination so I asked where was she going? Suffolk was all I could hear and I must have looked either blank, confused or both. She lowered her mask and at a distance of 1m I heard her say Stafford! The railway staff must have also misheard because she was on the wrong platform. With her facemask now back on (and of course I was wearing mine all the time whilst on the station) I escourted her to the lift and helped her over to the correct platform via the station lifts. I left her there and went on my way. Five days later I was struck down with what is thankfully a relatively mild flu with visible symptons lasting two days but with effects still lingering a week later as I have no active taste or smell. I tested positive for covid and am now in isolation for the rest of this week. (FWIW I am 65+, overweight with a double jab). I noticed whilst we were in the lift that her forehead was sweating profusely but put that down to the effort it takes to use crutches on a warm day. That was all it took for me to get enough of the virus to fall sick but I suspect, even had I known what the outcome would be, I would do the same again. She needed help to get to her train and was on her way to Stafford Royal Infirmary to have one of her legs amputated below the knee.
Masks don't protect you from infection via eyes. You have no idea where you caught it from - or when - that way madness lies.
I think one of the many regretful things in this pandemic has been the instinct to blame someone who you think "gave" it to you (though to your credit you haven't blamed the person as such and indeed went to creditable lengths to help her out). The villain is the virus not other people.
No.10 "totally rejects" claim by @GNev2 after Euro2020 that @BorisJohnson has himself “promoted” racist abuse with language like Muslim women looking like letterboxes.
i have never understood how this country gets into such a mess with school meals.
The taxpayer rightly funds a free education until 18 including the huge expense of teachers, facilities , equipment, books ,IT etc yet for some reason stops short of funding a universal free meal during the school day . I mean why ? It cannot be but a very small fraction of the overall education cost so it is on the face of it extremely petty but also would solve the bullying some kids get fro having free meals and also give all kids a better diet.
Really odd the position on school meals to me that we have had for years
I've already answered that - some families are so dysfunctional that the children need to be fed, but not so dysfunctional that the children need to be taken into care (for that costs real money)..
I think what state_go_away meant was - why not simply provide meals for free, for all pupils, in all state schools?
Way too expensive and when it was trialled it didn't provide many benefits.
is it that expensive ? If the government can fund everything else to do with a kids educuation it seems odd this is left out
WTF is the point of having parents and families at all?
wow - a bit aggressive ! i am sure parents are invented for kids to do more than prepare a packed lunch
The idea is for them to raise a family with all the easy and not so easy stuff included. There is no compulsion to rear children if you lack the means to do so. You seem to forget that all this money has to be provided by someone. Taxpayers would generally like to keep some of thier earnings for themselves. Paying for other people's kids to be fed is not part of the deal in my book. Sorry if you find that aggressive. 33 years in the classroom taught me that most parents expect to provide for their children's needs even when sacrifices are needed to do so. Mine certainly were.
Unfortunately such sensible talk as this post does not apply anymore. It is now the Governments responsibilty to feed all children , not the parents.
There's a reason why free school meals exist. Some parents aren't as attentive as others. They'd rather spend what little money they have on themselves rather than on their children.
There is quite a lot of research out of the US that free school meals programs result in better health and academic outcomes for poorer kids.
The only question, really, is how important to you is improving the life chances of the disadvantaged?
You missed the argument - he wanted free school meals for everyone, not just the poor. Then you add in breakfast, tea and supper and we're in Aldous Huxley territory.
I think there's a good argument for that too - both breakfast and for all.
Firstly, free school meals come with a stigma attached. Do you not remember being at school? Getting a free school meal marked you out for derision as it marked your parents as poor. Kids would beg their (poor) parents to get shitty packed lunches rather than suffer from the stigma of being a free school means kid.
Secondly, you know what... all the evidence is that free breakfasts boost academic and health outcomes more than lunch.
Here's a simple solution. Let's pick two council areas with roughly similar demographics and academic outcomes. In one, let's take money away from teachers and sports facilities, and instead use that money to give food to kids at breakfast and lunch.
And then let's compare the academic and health outcomes of the two council areas. Will the free school meals have been better at improving results than spending the money on teachers.
I really don't know that answer to that question, by the way. But I do think the right way to answer it is with data, not with bringing up the spectre of Aldous Huxley.
No no no. Parents choose to have children. In doing so they must accept the responsibility to rear them. The great majority can afford to do so. Happy to help where there is genuine need - not happy to give breakfast to kids with affluent parents. Take some responsibility.
The job of schools is to educate children in the most cost effective manner possible, right?
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
I just want to confirm that's your view.
Yes. You want poor people to pay for your kids' breakfasts right? I just want to confirm your view?
I want to maximise the educational achievements of kids, particularly those from lower incomes, as cost efficiently as possible.
All I'm saying is let's test it and see what achieves the best educational outcome. If it turns out that spending money on meals does it, then hell yes, poor people's taxes should be spent on it. Why shouldn't their taxes be spent in the most cost effective manner possible?
You do realise that an extra £2.50 a day for a school meal (and I'm ignoring the capital cost here) is a roughly 10% rise in the cost of education? £5000 a year for the 200 teaching days of the school year (these number are about right) is £25 a day.
There's economies of scale, if universal it ought to be possible to do healthy school meals for much cheaper than £2.50 per pupil per day.
That will depend on whether you give them any choice as to what they eat of course.
Is no-one in England happy with their team's success ?
I think they should be immensely proud of their silver medals. Shocking that the spoilt brats immediately removed them from their necks within seconds of being awarded them. Very rude.
Yes. It's as though they believe themselves too good to accept a medal lesser than a winners. Whatever they intended it read as arrogant which to a lot of watchers made them bad losers. Not attractive at all
It's like the "Football's Coming Home" nonsense that gets wheeled out every tournament as soon as England wins a game.
It needs to be binned. It's arrogant. it's embarrassing and the rest of Europe is just laughing and not in a good way.
Its only arrogant if you are a pathetic self-hating twunt or xenophobe from overseas who has no sense of humour.
With lyrics like "England's gonna throw it away" its the complete opposite of arrogance.
So for expressing my opinion that the message conveyed from "It's Coming Home" is arrogant that makes me a "pathetic self-hating twunt". Thank you. And we wonder why the English are so universally loved across Europe.
Yes you are. Its a bittersweet song not an arrogant one.
Its a lot less arrogant than the vast majority of anthems countries sing.
I don't think any country is univerally loved across Europe nor should any be. Kind of creepy if they are.
But all those "oh so nears" Wear you down through the years
Yes. Three Lions is about hope in the face of bitter, or bitter-sweet, experience.
It's "thirty years of hurt" I can't stand, was there ever a more twee and spineless sentiment? And all because it rhymes with shirt.
No, I think "thirty years of hurt" is consistent with the theme of the song. I think there are dodgier lines, like "Bobby belting the ball", for instance, but personally I'm more pleased the latest videos have clearer pictures of some of the historic clips.
Comments
It seems to be a quirk of this wave that the variation within a week and the variation between weeks are of very similar size. Hence the almost vertical steps followed by flat bits on the graph.
The big thing is schools coming towards the end of the academic year.
If it turned out that a particular policy improved educational outcomes at a lower cost, we shouldn't do it because it offends you.
I just want to confirm that's your view.
(PS - Kalvin Phillips of Leeds should have taken a penalty).
Germany is also *very* slow to report. They don't report weekly totals to the EU vaccination site until the following Thursday, so it's also possible that there is a data delay in there.
Their data is here - https://impfdashboard.de/
Each week for the last 5 has been slower than the last.
Variations on football evolved in China and Japan; even the Incans and Mayans had versions.
So when was 'football; invented, in the modern sense of the game? It has to be when it was codified, when teams from different towns could play each other using the same rules, using new transport links, allowing leagues to be formed.
And that means the modern game, and therefore football as we know it, was 'invented' on Parker's Piece.
But admissions and deaths will continue to rise for the next two weeks and will at least double to over 1,400 daily admissions and an average daily deaths of over 70 before beginning to decrease.
End of fourth wave.
Is the 40k 1st vaccinations evidence of reaching the plateau - or are there supply and holiday explanations for it?
No-one loses a teacher.
Well, that pegs them at 58.5% of the population with at least one dose, and still doing a fair number of first doses a day. So, 60-65% seems a little pessimistic.
Its a lot less arrogant than the vast majority of anthems countries sing.
I don't think any country is univerally loved across Europe nor should any be. Kind of creepy if they are.
He said the people who stormed in (and the people outside trying to get in) justified it on the grounds that there were 25,000 spare seats so it wouldn't be another Hillsborough.
Fortunately I don't think we'll see such idiocy at Premier League grounds if grounds are at 75% capacity.
I hope.
Wear you down through the years
Yes. Three Lions is about hope in the face of bitter, or bitter-sweet, experience.
- New cases: 8,522
- Average: 6,667 (+997)
- In hospital: 213 (+7)
- In ICU: 84 (-4)
- New deaths: 1
Bangladesh reports 13,768 new coronavirus cases, the biggest one-day increase on record, and 220 new deaths
https://inews.co.uk/news/rishi-sunak-could-set-out-green-taxes-for-imports-to-help-uk-hit-net-zero-target-1099079
I'm just fitting a curve to the actual data using a quadratic (constant 2nd differential). Previous peaks of 7 day moving averages (7MOV) seem to have a quadratic shape. That's why I think 7 MOV cases have just peaked at about 33,000 with admissions and deaths 16 days behind.
I hope there's a plan to rapidly vaccinate teenagers no later than the start of the new school year, and to encourage higher take-up of the vaccines on university campuses.
You can tell your friend they made the right call.
The Booster programme could be vital.
As with these things he said you cannot help wonder what would have happened last night if ISIS or Al Qaeda affiliated terrorists had tried something.
It is peculiar for its particularly untriumphant nature. The 2018 version even opens with a rant from Alan Shearer about how terrible the team are, which the video illustrates with famous images of England failure through the years. This is not a triumphalist song.
The fact that it is so popular is down primarily to the fact that both melodies are easy to sing.
(Ditto "Sweet Caroline" which has even less relevance to sport.)
Although the "percentage change in recent 7-day case rates by specimen date" is showing a slowing down of the rate of decline in rate of increase (third derivative? Fourth?). Which is less encouraging.
I think I'll stick to following Liverpool.
Only time I've ever had racism directed towards me following Liverpool in this country was against Chelsea in the 2005 Rumbelows Cup final. I was lucky in the respect that it was two Chelsea fans decided to mouth out in front me and a few dozens other Liverpool fans who I didn't know. Those fans pretty much made a buffer zone around me, and put the Chelsea fans in their place.
According to that model we should be having ~1700 daily hospital admissions by now. 7-day average upto the 10th is instead 444 I believe.
According to that model we should have ~11,000 hospitalised. Latest data on dashboard is 2,731.
Daily deaths should be upto 90 by now. Daily average now is 28.
And worth remembing of course that ~90% of those who are hospitalised are antivaxxers I believe so have brought it on themselves.
The model was complete nonsense. Of course.
If we are asking "if not now, when?", the answer therefore appears to be "never".
The BBC, the Labour Party, isage etc - have won. Again.
All I'm saying is let's test it and see what achieves the best educational outcome. If it turns out that spending money on meals does it, then hell yes, poor people's taxes should be spent on it. Why shouldn't their taxes be spent in the most cost effective manner possible?
What this shows in the day to increases (or decreases) in cases. Such data is always lumpy. and seems to be cyclic as well. So you get periodic ups and downs as well as trends.
What we certainly can say is that in the longer terms (weeks) the rate of increase is slowing.
https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-689684/v1
Key points on deaths: "There were an estimated 469,982 CYP infected with SARS-CoV-2 in England from March 2020 to February 2021, giving an infection fatality rate of 5 per 100,000 CYP (0·005%) and, based on a population of 12,023,568, a mortality rate of 2 per million CYP (0·0002%)."
Disclaimer: I was very loosely involved in this early on, advising on one small aspect and I know some of the authors. Beyond that, I had no involvement (I did not see the manuscript before it was uploaded to the pre-pub site).
Updating the 8 month graph every day isn't showing anything meaningfully new - whereas the 2 month graph was much more helpful.
The bastards.
* Unless you were in a really enormous school of course.
The longer terms graphs are good for comparison.
Do we have any data on that 90% for what's the split between antivaxxers, partially vaccinated but not due second yet, or partially vaccinated and rejected the second?
But still, considering full-vaccination has already been offered to all over 40s and given the age profile of hospitalisations in general pre-vaccinations, having only 10% fully vaccinated shows remarkable efficacy. Much, much higher than 90% given the risk to age profile ratio.
I presume the government don't want the media to start running scare stories and the public to panic, think vaccination is pointless, because yes 10% of cases are fully vaccinated people. Look how they reacted to unremarkable story of Andrew Marr getting it.
I am sure it wasn't pleasant for him, but a) he ended up in a covid hotspot staffed by loads of unvaccinated people with covid for days on end and b) he is already more vulnerable due to health conditions.
He got a nasty cold and felt crap for a few days, but it was reported like it was reason to panic like mad.
https://twitter.com/REWearmouth/status/1414613609410437126
The quality varies enormously. FSM is of little use if it is borderline inedible and of low nutritional value.
Getting the worst up to the standards of the better (And some are really quite good) might be a more efficient use of resources.
I never really expected freedom day to happen. Just as I never expected England to win last night. But it not happening is still a massive kick in the nuts.
....Sorry, was channeling E.E. Smith there for a second....
Yes, you can go down that road - not sure the data is stable enough to mean much at that point...
The afternoon after the night before - I don't think anyone says that (well, I just have).
Reflections - first, the positives. Backing the draw at 19/10 was another winner - of the seven matches from the quarter-finals onward, I backed the draw at 90 minutes in all of them and won four times so a nice little profit - not obviously in the league of those on here who bet thousands on every move of equities, commodities or two flies up a wall.
Now, the not quite so positives.
In terms of the match, not a classic by any stretch. I do wonder if the early goal was the last thing England needed - we either had to go hard for a second to finish it or park the bus and hope for a goal on the counter. Someone mentioned this morning the disadvantage of playing in front of the home crowd at Wembley.
It's a paradox - most clubs would argue the support of the fans can be like a twelfth player on the pitch but Wembley can also be a cauldron - would it have been easier in an empty stadium?
The greatest irony if there's one man who should be aware of the pressure of taking a penalty in a vital match at Wembley it's Gareth Southgate. I can only presume he prepared - perhaps over-thought and over-prepared - the penalty shoot-out which can be the crucial part of the game. He will have known, more than anyone else, the nature of the pressure each and every player would have faced. It is quite literally a career-defining moment and most people's lives don't turn on such moments.
It's a truth some people can handle pressure and others can't but the nature of what was happening last evening would have tested anyone's mental strength to the limit.
Looking ahead, this isn't the first team we've heard the "they're a young team, give them time, they'll improve" line. We heard it back in the days of the "golden generation" for example. The 2022 World Cup looks wide open - Paddy go 5/1 France 11/2 Brazil, 6/1 Germany, 15/2 Italy, Spain and England.
I certainly agree there's very little between Italy, Spain and England on Euro 2020 evidence - I'd throw in Argentina and Brazil and say the next World Cup winner is one of those five.
I think one of the many regretful things in this pandemic has been the instinct to blame someone who you think "gave" it to you (though to your credit you haven't blamed the person as such and indeed went to creditable lengths to help her out). The villain is the virus not other people.
“I totally reject that claim," PM's official spokesperson says.
https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1414570545782349829