politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Ministers are only just waking up to the Covid hangover

Casino_Royale said:

Andy_JS said:

Interesting that the New Statesman stopped accepting comments on its articles in 2012. Maybe this was an indication that a lot of things they didn't like — like Brexit, Trump, 3 Tory election victories — were going to happen in the near future.

https://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/internet/2012/04/dont-leave-comment

Their solution was to try and silence those they considered "populist" in the hope they'd therefore would go away.

It didn't work because they were just sticking their fingers in their ears and not bothering to try and understand the real issues that underlay it. It's actually a sign of the lack of confidence they had in their own ideas to convince and the contempt they held for those not already of their ilk who had the audacity to disagree with them.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/Steven_Swinford/status/1299638906187657217

Red Wall is not happy

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Andy_JS said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Also, please don't call me Mr Battery, I've asked you before to call me Horse and it's disrespectful to keep ignoring what I've kindly asked you to do.

I don't like being called mate but people still do it. Sometimes you see teenagers calling elderly men they don't know mate which really annoys me. Very disrespectful IMO.

If you feel disrespected I can only apologise, I will call you by your username in future Andy_JS.

Casino_Royale said:

Alistair said:

Casino_Royale said:

Black_Rook said:

SouthamObserver said:

Black_Rook said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

rottenborough said:

Black_Rook said:

tlg86 said:

Without commuters paying peak fares – particularly into London – then it’s hard to see how the sector could survive without serious cuts, given that significantly increased subsidies are likely to be off the table for a government that will need to rein in its budget deficit.

The government has something of a problem. Usage of National Rail is about a 1/3 of what it normally is:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/transport-use-during-the-coronavirus-covid-19-pandemic

Passengers pay c.£10 billion a year. Let's assume that those travelling at the moment are paying quite a lot less than the normal average (i.e. no one will buy a first class ticket, those travelling are probably more local, fewer tickets purchased for business use). Let's say that the government is getting around £2 billion a year (and we're assuming that August usage is maintained - it might be propped up by a higher share of leisure travel).

So as David says, the subsidy goes from £4.5 billion a year to £12.5 billion a year. But what can the government do other than pay it? The people using the trains are people who have to go to work. They are key workers. There would be a huge backlash if the government starts cutting services.

Oh, and one other thing. HS2. How can the government justify ploughing on with that whilst closing existing railways? They can't.

The Government can save some money by reducing the frequency of services, particularly at peak times - indeed, if we arrive in a situation where flexible working means that the remaining passenger journeys are much more spread out during the day, then I can see the entire peak/off-peak divide being tossed in the dustbin.

Certainly it's going to take a couple of years for such changes to come into effect: all those who had to endure the great TSGN timetabling disaster of 2018 will be all too acutely aware of the need to manage these things properly. But it must surely happen?

As for HS2, I think the London to Birmingham section will end up being built in full, for several reasons. Firstly, it's already underway so this Government has to deal with it (whereas the branches to the North can be placed under review and booted into the long grass for the next Prime Minister to worry about.) Secondly, it's being used as much as a means to dole out contracts to the construction industry and maintain and develop skills as it is to build infrastructure, and this arguably becomes a greater priority for Government during a recession. Thirdly, there will be the usual concerns about sunk costs involved in abandoning any partially completed project. Finally, the Tory West Midlands metro-mayor is an enthusiast for the scheme and is up for re-election next May.

However, I seriously doubt if the remainder of HS2 will ever get built.

And that leaves Johnson's levelling up with the North in tatters.

Nonsense. If there really is a WFH revolution, cities and towns won't be competing on proximity to London anymore, it will be on crime, livability, beauty, amenities, surrounding countryside, airports, and price. That will level up the North.

As a Northerner by birth, and Midlander by choice, I don't think many Northern and Midland towns would score very highly on those criteria. I like Leicester, and am not planning to move away, but it is not a tourist hotspot for a reason.

That may be being unnecessarily pessimistic about parts outside the Greater South East. London is hugely expensive and much of it is a complete shithole. There are plenty of nice places to live in the Home Counties but they're also very costly to buy into.

There is a reason why we hear reports of estate agents in Manchester getting a lot of enquiries from worried Hongkongers with BN(O) passports. They are not stupid and know a good deal when they see one.

My guess is that places on a train line within 60-90 minutes of London will see a surge of interest from younger people looking to start families/get on the property ladder who will end up doing one or two days a week down at HQ and the rest WFH. Some of our lot are looking at this right now. The political consequences of changing demographics in such places will be interesting.

It will. Fast forward ten or twenty years and we may find that great swathes of the South-East will have become marginals or fallen to Labour, whilst the Conservatives will have wiped Labour out in much of what's left of its former Northern strongholds.

If we had enough constituency level demographic data then it would probably be possible to accurately predict the outcome in the bulk of seats by plugging a few numbers into a formula: the percentage of voters from various ethnic minority groups, the median age of the electorate, the percentage of voters identifying primarily as British, and the percentage of voters who have a university degree. It's entirely possible that future General Elections will see Labour swapping seats in County Durham for others in Surrey.

I'm not so sure about this. Young people become more conservative as they get older, and their values can evolve too. They will become more concerned about car and home ownership and family responsibilities and conserving the look and feel of their local areas.

Remember: the radical flower-power hippies of the 1960s are the ultra-Boomers of today.

That doesn't map to France where the radical students of the 60s are now far more left wing than the general population.

The flower power hippies were a tiny proportion of the population.

Are they? French people in their 60s and 70s are far more left wing? I can see they prefer Macron to Le Pen more but are they just more 'conservative" because Macron and the current social welfare system works for them, and they fear Le Pen would be too revolutionary?

Of course hippies were a tiny percentage of the population but social attitudes changed massively in the 60s amongst that generation and not many were voting Tory at the time.

edmundintokyo said:

Casino_Royale said:

Andy_JS said:

Interesting that the New Statesman stopped accepting comments on its articles in 2012. Maybe this was an indication that a lot of things they didn't like — like Brexit, Trump, 3 Tory election victories — were going to happen in the near future.

https://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/internet/2012/04/dont-leave-comment

Their solution was to try and silence those they considered "populist" in the hope they'd therefore would go away.

It didn't work because they were just sticking their fingers in their ears and not bothering to try and understand the real issues that underlay it. It's actually a sign of the lack of confidence they had in their own ideas to convince and the contempt they held for those not already of their ilk who had the audacity to disagree with them.

A lot of sites stopped comments around that time. Whatever the public rationales I imagine this kind of decision is more likely to be commercial than about someone not wanting to be contradicted; If people are clicking on the site to write about what an idiot your journalists are and watching the ads, the people in charge aren't going to want to cut them off to protect the journalist's feelings.

The obvious benefits to stopping comments are:
1) You save on moderation costs
2) The discussion goes off to social media instead, which is more likely to send you traffic than an argument among people who are already there

RochdalePioneers said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Andy_JS said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Also, please don't call me Mr Battery, I've asked you before to call me Horse and it's disrespectful to keep ignoring what I've kindly asked you to do.

I don't like being called mate but people still do it. Sometimes you see teenagers calling elderly men they don't know mate which really annoys me. Very disrespectful IMO.

If you feel disrespected I can only apologise, I will call you by your username in future Andy_JS.

Being a Lancastrian I can advice that the proper way to address everyone is "love"

HYUFD said:

Casino_Royale said:

Alistair said:

Casino_Royale said:

Black_Rook said:

SouthamObserver said:

Black_Rook said:

Foxy said:

Luckyguy1983 said:

rottenborough said:

Black_Rook said:

tlg86 said:

Without commuters paying peak fares – particularly into London – then it’s hard to see how the sector could survive without serious cuts, given that significantly increased subsidies are likely to be off the table for a government that will need to rein in its budget deficit.

The government has something of a problem. Usage of National Rail is about a 1/3 of what it normally is:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/transport-use-during-the-coronavirus-covid-19-pandemic

Passengers pay c.£10 billion a year. Let's assume that those travelling at the moment are paying quite a lot less than the normal average (i.e. no one will buy a first class ticket, those travelling are probably more local, fewer tickets purchased for business use). Let's say that the government is getting around £2 billion a year (and we're assuming that August usage is maintained - it might be propped up by a higher share of leisure travel).

So as David says, the subsidy goes from £4.5 billion a year to £12.5 billion a year. But what can the government do other than pay it? The people using the trains are people who have to go to work. They are key workers. There would be a huge backlash if the government starts cutting services.

Oh, and one other thing. HS2. How can the government justify ploughing on with that whilst closing existing railways? They can't.

The Government can save some money by reducing the frequency of services, particularly at peak times - indeed, if we arrive in a situation where flexible working means that the remaining passenger journeys are much more spread out during the day, then I can see the entire peak/off-peak divide being tossed in the dustbin.

Certainly it's going to take a couple of years for such changes to come into effect: all those who had to endure the great TSGN timetabling disaster of 2018 will be all too acutely aware of the need to manage these things properly. But it must surely happen?

As for HS2, I think the London to Birmingham section will end up being built in full, for several reasons. Firstly, it's already underway so this Government has to deal with it (whereas the branches to the North can be placed under review and booted into the long grass for the next Prime Minister to worry about.) Secondly, it's being used as much as a means to dole out contracts to the construction industry and maintain and develop skills as it is to build infrastructure, and this arguably becomes a greater priority for Government during a recession. Thirdly, there will be the usual concerns about sunk costs involved in abandoning any partially completed project. Finally, the Tory West Midlands metro-mayor is an enthusiast for the scheme and is up for re-election next May.

However, I seriously doubt if the remainder of HS2 will ever get built.

And that leaves Johnson's levelling up with the North in tatters.

Nonsense. If there really is a WFH revolution, cities and towns won't be competing on proximity to London anymore, it will be on crime, livability, beauty, amenities, surrounding countryside, airports, and price. That will level up the North.

As a Northerner by birth, and Midlander by choice, I don't think many Northern and Midland towns would score very highly on those criteria. I like Leicester, and am not planning to move away, but it is not a tourist hotspot for a reason.

That may be being unnecessarily pessimistic about parts outside the Greater South East. London is hugely expensive and much of it is a complete shithole. There are plenty of nice places to live in the Home Counties but they're also very costly to buy into.

There is a reason why we hear reports of estate agents in Manchester getting a lot of enquiries from worried Hongkongers with BN(O) passports. They are not stupid and know a good deal when they see one.

My guess is that places on a train line within 60-90 minutes of London will see a surge of interest from younger people looking to start families/get on the property ladder who will end up doing one or two days a week down at HQ and the rest WFH. Some of our lot are looking at this right now. The political consequences of changing demographics in such places will be interesting.

It will. Fast forward ten or twenty years and we may find that great swathes of the South-East will have become marginals or fallen to Labour, whilst the Conservatives will have wiped Labour out in much of what's left of its former Northern strongholds.

If we had enough constituency level demographic data then it would probably be possible to accurately predict the outcome in the bulk of seats by plugging a few numbers into a formula: the percentage of voters from various ethnic minority groups, the median age of the electorate, the percentage of voters identifying primarily as British, and the percentage of voters who have a university degree. It's entirely possible that future General Elections will see Labour swapping seats in County Durham for others in Surrey.

I'm not so sure about this. Young people become more conservative as they get older, and their values can evolve too. They will become more concerned about car and home ownership and family responsibilities and conserving the look and feel of their local areas.

Remember: the radical flower-power hippies of the 1960s are the ultra-Boomers of today.

That doesn't map to France where the radical students of the 60s are now far more left wing than the general population.

The flower power hippies were a tiny proportion of the population.

Are they? French people in their 60s and 70s are far more left wing? I can see they prefer Macron to Le Pen more but are they just more 'conservative" because Macron and the current social welfare system works for them, and they fear Le Pen would be too revolutionary?

Of course hippies were a tiny percentage of the population but social attitudes changed massively in the 60s amongst that generation and not many were voting Tory at the time.

Older people in France still vote for the conservatives just as they do in the UK and USA, eg in 2017 in the first round Fillon got 27% of 60 to 69 year olds to 26% for Macron and Fillon got 45% of over 70s to just 27% for Macron.

However French pensioners still preferred Macron to the far right and Le Pen, with Macron winning 70% of 60 to 69 year olds to 30% for Le Pen and 78% of over 70s to 22% for Le Pen in the second round run off

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_French_presidential_election

Casino_Royale said:

Andy_JS said:

Interesting that the New Statesman stopped accepting comments on its articles in 2012. Maybe this was an indication that a lot of things they didn't like — like Brexit, Trump, 3 Tory election victories — were going to happen in the near future.

https://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/internet/2012/04/dont-leave-comment

Their solution was to try and silence those they considered "populist" in the hope they'd therefore would go away.

It didn't work because they were just sticking their fingers in their ears and not bothering to try and understand the real issues that underlay it. It's actually a sign of the lack of confidence they had in their own ideas to convince and the contempt they held for those not already of their ilk who had the audacity to disagree with them.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

At some point the public will surely go, what is the point in a Government with a massive majority if it doesn't do anything

Carnyx said:

Casino_Royale said:

Carnyx said:

Casino_Royale said:

Casino_Royale said:

GarethoftheVale2 said:

I'm getting quite miffed with all the articles in the Mail and the Telegraph blaming the lazy workers for not going back. It is partly up to employers as well. Most companies will already have budgeted for the cost of the office but if workers go back they will need to budget for daily deep cleaning, buying partitions etc etc.
Most modern offices are open plan and badly set up for social distancing.

Even when COVID is over (assuming we get a vaccine), I think most companies will move to a model of 2-3 days in the office and 2-3 at home, with smaller offices and hot desking.

One thing I haven't seen mentioned anywhere is how completely screwed the RMT is. Their strike power which led to them getting 60+k a year has completely evaporated. If the authorities have any sense, it is time to start looking at driverless tubes.

They are reflecting the prejudices of their readers, most of whom are retired and had to do the same throughout their working careers.

PS. One way to make railways more sustainable is to fully digitise operation.

We don't have nor need signalman, brakemen or firemen anymore.

There is no need for a guard either.

Signals have been massively automated already, with networks hugely simplified by the removal of points and sidings and conflicting routes (presumably why the multiple crossover at Newcastle, under the Castle tower, sadly no longer exists).

Brakemen are so C19.

Firemen are so C20.

But guards ... especially on non- commuter trains.

Guards exist to safely close and open doors, dispatch trains and make announcements.

There is none of that which can't be automated.

I don'ty commute (didn't commute). I went on long distance trains which needed train crews to deal with problems and collect ticket revenue from unstaffed/ungated stations.

Fishing said:

On topic, there is a phrase for all this change - creative destruction. It is the very essence of capitalism. If city centres are as out of date as saddlers were when people started to buy cars, or miners were when cheap gas became available, then the capitalist system shouldn't protect them, but should redeploy their inefficiently used land, labour and capital to other, sunrise industries. And governments should get on the right side of history and welcome and, where possible, facilitate such changes. That was the lesson that Mrs Thatcher taught us, though many people seem to have forgotten it.

Many commercial districts are too large, so shrinking them by facilitating change of use from commercial to residential or green space shoud be a priority. And if we don't need such a large commuter train network, that's good because the resources can be deployed in other sectors. And so on.

SandyRentool said:

Who are all these WFH people who are going into town for their lunch? I, like I suspect the vast majority, just go into the kitchen to make a sandwich and dip into the fruit bowl.

contrarian said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/Steven_Swinford/status/1299638906187657217

Red Wall is not happy

See the comments beneath the latest Matt Hancock generated scare piece in the Mail. Its not just the tory MPs who are mutinous.

The public are totally losing faith in the government.

Why wouldn;t they when voters are at once being terrorised by Hanock on Corona, at at the same time being screamed at by Johnson to go back to work?

SouthamObserver said:

Casino_Royale said:

Andy_JS said:

Interesting that the New Statesman stopped accepting comments on its articles in 2012. Maybe this was an indication that a lot of things they didn't like — like Brexit, Trump, 3 Tory election victories — were going to happen in the near future.

https://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/internet/2012/04/dont-leave-comment

Their solution was to try and silence those they considered "populist" in the hope they'd therefore would go away.

It didn't work because they were just sticking their fingers in their ears and not bothering to try and understand the real issues that underlay it. It's actually a sign of the lack of confidence they had in their own ideas to convince and the contempt they held for those not already of their ilk who had the audacity to disagree with them.

I doubt that it had much to do with not liking comments from the populist right in the case of the New Statesman. The far-left may have been more of an issue, espoecially with regards to Israel, and concerns about potential legal liability for what was posted.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

If anyone has felt disrespected by my calling them mate I do apologise and if you let me know what you'd prefer to be called, please do so and I will listen.

It's only fair if I wish to be called Horse - as I've explained before Mr makes me feel like you're putting me above yourself and I'm below most of you in knowledge and experience - that I call you by your preferred name.

Casino_Royale said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

If anyone has felt disrespected by my calling them mate I do apologise and if you let me know what you'd prefer to be called, please do so and I will listen.

It's only fair if I wish to be called Horse - as I've explained before Mr makes me feel like you're putting me above yourself and I'm below most of you in knowledge and experience - that I call you by your preferred name.

I can't tell if you're joking or not but - if you're not - since this is obviously not your real name (at least.. I really hope for your sake it isn't) then why does it matter?

I couldn't care less if I'm called Casino, Mr. Royale or any other derivative. It's not my name. It's an internet ID.

I do care if someone personally insults me or swears at me but that's different.

Casino_Royale said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Casino_Royale said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

If anyone has felt disrespected by my calling them mate I do apologise and if you let me know what you'd prefer to be called, please do so and I will listen.

It's only fair if I wish to be called Horse - as I've explained before Mr makes me feel like you're putting me above yourself and I'm below most of you in knowledge and experience - that I call you by your preferred name.

I can't tell if you're joking or not but - if you're not - since this is obviously not your real name (at least.. I really hope for your sake it isn't) then why does it matter?

I couldn't care less if I'm called Casino, Mr. Royale or any other derivative. It's not my name. It's an internet ID.

I do care if someone personally insults me or swears at me but that's different.

It's the Mr I'd prefer not to be called because to me it's like you're putting me above yourself.

It's like when I go into a shop and they start calling me Mr X, I just don't feel comfortable with it

Fair enough, I quite like it and feel very respected when addressed in that manner. It's a sign of courtesy.

If someone I don't know repeats my name time and time again (yes, I'm talking to you Starbucks and HSBC call centre) then I find it overlyfamiliar and rather irritating.

eristdoof said:

Another problem with assuming a title e.g. Mr Eristdoof, is that you do not know whether Eritstdoof is male or female or even if that thitle is appropriate. For all you know I could be Baroness Eristdoof.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Morris_Dancer said:

Horse, I forgot about that request regarding your name. It was a genuine error.

You continuing to annoy and pester me is a deliberate and repeated choice. Let me make this plain: I don't care that you dislike that I don't use the quote button. I didn't care the first time you posted that. Or when you posted it today. And if you post the same thing tomorrow I won't care then.

My disinterest in your attempts to make me use the quote button is as boundless as the ocean.

That's okay, I understand about the name.

The quote thing is more frustrating because I don't have a clue what you're responding to, most of your comments are interesting but I don't have a clue what you're going on about I'm afraid. It's odd you won't use it, very odd indeed but we all have odd quirks.

All the best Morris_Dancer.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

“We thought we were electing a Churchill and many of us believe, including myself, that this remains the case. But he has to believe in himself.”

Nobody thought we were electing a Churchill

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The very MPs who should be benefiting the most from the prime minister’s levelling-up agenda are among those who feel the most disenchanted. Their Whatsapp group, mistakenly called the 109 group to reflect the size of the new Tory intake (in fact there are 107), has been abuzz with discontent.

Maths is obviously not their strong point

Carnyx said:

Casino_Royale said:

Carnyx said:

Casino_Royale said:

Casino_Royale said:

GarethoftheVale2 said:

I'm getting quite miffed with all the articles in the Mail and the Telegraph blaming the lazy workers for not going back. It is partly up to employers as well. Most companies will already have budgeted for the cost of the office but if workers go back they will need to budget for daily deep cleaning, buying partitions etc etc.
Most modern offices are open plan and badly set up for social distancing.

Even when COVID is over (assuming we get a vaccine), I think most companies will move to a model of 2-3 days in the office and 2-3 at home, with smaller offices and hot desking.

One thing I haven't seen mentioned anywhere is how completely screwed the RMT is. Their strike power which led to them getting 60+k a year has completely evaporated. If the authorities have any sense, it is time to start looking at driverless tubes.

They are reflecting the prejudices of their readers, most of whom are retired and had to do the same throughout their working careers.

PS. One way to make railways more sustainable is to fully digitise operation.

We don't have nor need signalman, brakemen or firemen anymore.

There is no need for a guard either.

Signals have been massively automated already, with networks hugely simplified by the removal of points and sidings and conflicting routes (presumably why the multiple crossover at Newcastle, under the Castle tower, sadly no longer exists).

Brakemen are so C19.

Firemen are so C20.

But guards ... especially on non- commuter trains.

Guards exist to safely close and open doors, dispatch trains and make announcements.

There is none of that which can't be automated.

I don'ty commute (didn't commute). I went on long distance trains which needed train crews to deal with problems and collect ticket revenue from unstaffed/ungated stations.

Mortimer said:

Casino_Royale said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Casino_Royale said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

If anyone has felt disrespected by my calling them mate I do apologise and if you let me know what you'd prefer to be called, please do so and I will listen.

It's only fair if I wish to be called Horse - as I've explained before Mr makes me feel like you're putting me above yourself and I'm below most of you in knowledge and experience - that I call you by your preferred name.

I can't tell if you're joking or not but - if you're not - since this is obviously not your real name (at least.. I really hope for your sake it isn't) then why does it matter?

I couldn't care less if I'm called Casino, Mr. Royale or any other derivative. It's not my name. It's an internet ID.

I do care if someone personally insults me or swears at me but that's different.

It's the Mr I'd prefer not to be called because to me it's like you're putting me above yourself.

It's like when I go into a shop and they start calling me Mr X, I just don't feel comfortable with it

Fair enough, I quite like it and feel very respected when addressed in that manner. It's a sign of courtesy.

If someone I don't know repeats my name time and time again (yes, I'm talking to you Starbucks and HSBC call centre) then I find it overlyfamiliar and rather irritating.

I totally agree!

Call centre operatives calling me Mr first name also annoys me....

Somewhat crass even at the time, but a friend at Uni's dad had been to the same college. When one of the Porter's addressed the friend as 'mate' he turned around and without irony said, 'He's sir to you, or nothing'. Ouch.

RobD said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

The very MPs who should be benefiting the most from the prime minister’s levelling-up agenda are among those who feel the most disenchanted. Their Whatsapp group, mistakenly called the 109 group to reflect the size of the new Tory intake (in fact there are 107), has been abuzz with discontent.

Maths is obviously not their strong point

Not 109? https://www.bbc.com/news/election-2019-50803194

eristdoof said:

Back to Corona :-)
This is something I have been cogitating for the last couple of weeks, and would like the opinion of NigelB or Foxy or anyone else with a better biology background than me.

In the last couple of months we have seen big increases in the number of cases of SARS-COV2 in some countries, but the level of severe illness is much lower than expected, as measured by hospitalisations and deaths. There was speculation in the spring that the virus would not spread as quickly in summer as colds and flu are strongly seasonal. But it seems that the spread of the SARS-COV2 virus has little to do with the season.


Is it at all plausible though, that these seasonal illness viruses still spread at a similar rate but less frequently appears as an illness? It is possible that the human body is under less stress in summer and more stress in winter, due to lots of reasons: not moving from cold to warm environments several times a day, not inhailing air under 10 degrees, generally getting more exercise, sunlight and fresh air etc. If the body or in particular the immune system is under more stress then an onslaught from a virus is more likely to develop into illness.

Is it plausible that catching the virus is just as easy in summer, but this developing into a serious disease is much lower in summer and higher in winter? For most other Rhino/Corona/Flu viruses there is as good as no testing of the prevelance of the virus in the general population, so we do not really appreciate how widley cold viruses are spread in summer, and only if the immune system is under some other kind of stress does this develop into a "summer cold" which are ususally not as heavy as a winter cold.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Casino_Royale said:

Wulfrun_Phil said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/Steven_Swinford/status/1299638906187657217

Red Wall is not happy

In the face of such chaotic and incompetant government, what is keeping the Conservative poll ratings afloat is in my view the unfinished business of Brexit. Referencing the last YouGov poll, the leave vote is still very solidly behind Johnson (71% v 13% for Lab), the Tories are still further ahead of Labour with C2DEs than they are with ABC1s (9% v 4%) and over 65s are still rock solid for the Conservatives (62% v 21% Lab).

We have to accept that Brexit is still the defining political issue of our generation, strong enough to supersede normal political loyalties. It is still redefining those loyalties. However, I think that once the UK has left in 2021, Brexit will be regarded as a done deal and there will scope for a quite rapid shift of loyalties as people look to the future rather than the past. The political mood appears to be as febrile as it did in John Major's latter years, and without the Brexit support crutch the Conservatives will find themselves trailing in the polls.

We'll walk straight into an existential debate over the UK and a constitutional crisis, and a battle over those who want to tear down British heritage and those who want to preserve it.

What I will say about Starmer is that so far he's proved fairly skilled (far better than Biden, for example) at avoiding falling into the obvious elephant traps for him here.

Blair was right when he said, don't have the culture war at all, we can't win. We only lose.

Scott_xP said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

“We thought we were electing a Churchill and many of us believe, including myself, that this remains the case. But he has to believe in himself.”

Nobody thought we were electing a Churchill

Randolf

rottenborough said:

The Black Lives Matter movement could sink the Democrats and ensure Donald Trump's reelection.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/08/28/democrats-embrace-blm-may-monumentally-backfire/

Sandpit said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Casino_Royale said:

Wulfrun_Phil said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/Steven_Swinford/status/1299638906187657217

Red Wall is not happy

In the face of such chaotic and incompetant government, what is keeping the Conservative poll ratings afloat is in my view the unfinished business of Brexit. Referencing the last YouGov poll, the leave vote is still very solidly behind Johnson (71% v 13% for Lab), the Tories are still further ahead of Labour with C2DEs than they are with ABC1s (9% v 4%) and over 65s are still rock solid for the Conservatives (62% v 21% Lab).

We have to accept that Brexit is still the defining political issue of our generation, strong enough to supersede normal political loyalties. It is still redefining those loyalties. However, I think that once the UK has left in 2021, Brexit will be regarded as a done deal and there will scope for a quite rapid shift of loyalties as people look to the future rather than the past. The political mood appears to be as febrile as it did in John Major's latter years, and without the Brexit support crutch the Conservatives will find themselves trailing in the polls.

We'll walk straight into an existential debate over the UK and a constitutional crisis, and a battle over those who want to tear down British heritage and those who want to preserve it.

What I will say about Starmer is that so far he's proved fairly skilled (far better than Biden, for example) at avoiding falling into the obvious elephant traps for him here.

Blair was right when he said, don't have the culture war at all, we can't win. We only lose.

Add to the long list of reasons Tony Blair won elections, and no Labour leader two decades either side of him has been able to do so.

SandyRentool said:

Who are all these WFH people who are going into town for their lunch? I, like I suspect the vast majority, just go into the kitchen to make a sandwich and dip into the fruit bowl.

Sandpit said:

Mortimer said:

Casino_Royale said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Casino_Royale said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

If anyone has felt disrespected by my calling them mate I do apologise and if you let me know what you'd prefer to be called, please do so and I will listen.

It's only fair if I wish to be called Horse - as I've explained before Mr makes me feel like you're putting me above yourself and I'm below most of you in knowledge and experience - that I call you by your preferred name.

I can't tell if you're joking or not but - if you're not - since this is obviously not your real name (at least.. I really hope for your sake it isn't) then why does it matter?

I couldn't care less if I'm called Casino, Mr. Royale or any other derivative. It's not my name. It's an internet ID.

I do care if someone personally insults me or swears at me but that's different.

It's the Mr I'd prefer not to be called because to me it's like you're putting me above yourself.

It's like when I go into a shop and they start calling me Mr X, I just don't feel comfortable with it

Fair enough, I quite like it and feel very respected when addressed in that manner. It's a sign of courtesy.

If someone I don't know repeats my name time and time again (yes, I'm talking to you Starbucks and HSBC call centre) then I find it overlyfamiliar and rather irritating.

I totally agree!

Call centre operatives calling me Mr first name also annoys me....

Somewhat crass even at the time, but a friend at Uni's dad had been to the same college. When one of the Porter's addressed the friend as 'mate' he turned around and without irony said, 'He's sir to you, or nothing'. Ouch.

Mr Firstname is common in Asia and Arabia, used to show deference when talking to someone more senior. It still annoys me after a decade and a half of living in Asia and Arabia.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

If anyone has felt disrespected by my calling them mate I do apologise and if you let me know what you'd prefer to be called, please do so and I will listen.

It's only fair if I wish to be called Horse - as I've explained before Mr makes me feel like you're putting me above yourself and I'm below most of you in knowledge and experience - that I call you by your preferred name.

Wulfrun_Phil said:

alex_ said:

Wulfrun_Phil said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/Steven_Swinford/status/1299638906187657217

Red Wall is not happy

In the face of such chaotic and incompetant government, what is keeping the Conservative poll ratings afloat is in my view the unfinished business of Brexit. Referencing the last YouGov poll, the leave vote is still very solidly behind Johnson (71% v 13% for Lab), the Tories are still further ahead of Labour with C2DEs than they are with ABC1s (9% v 4%) and over 65s are still rock solid for the Conservatives (62% v 21% Lab).

We have to accept that Brexit is still the defining political issue of our generation, strong enough to supersede normal political loyalties. It is still redefining those loyalties. However, I think that once the UK has left in 2021, Brexit will be regarded as a done deal and there will scope for a quite rapid shift of loyalties as people look to the future rather than the past. The political mood appears to be as febrile as it did in John Major's latter years, and without the Brexit support crutch the Conservatives will find themselves trailing in the polls.

I think somebody made the good point the other day that there is also the massive issue of Labour having elected Corbyn, and, even worse, come very close to having got him into power in 2017. Lots of voters who were frankly terrified of the prospect of him becoming Prime Minister, will take a lot of convincing that Labour might not do it again (obviously not Corbyn himself, but somebody of that ilk) but after they’ve actually got into power on a “moderate” platform. All it takes is a leadership challenge and a paltry amount of nominations from the Parliamentary party.

I don't think that more than a handful of the electorate might entertain that risible idea, excluding those whose perspective is clouded by the reality that they would never have voted Labour in a month of Sundays.

Pulpstar said:

SandyRentool said:

Who are all these WFH people who are going into town for their lunch? I, like I suspect the vast majority, just go into the kitchen to make a sandwich and dip into the fruit bowl.

Isn't that what people do in offices ? Or are there two types of office worker ?