I fear the government hasn’t had a COVID policy for a while. It seemed to con itself into believing that it had gone away by itself.
There are three possible policies...
1) Minimise disruption, do nothing/herd immunity 2) Minimise economic and social impact, manage it to within NHS capacity 3) Minimise casualties, aim for eradication
That’s about it. You have to pick either 1,2 or 3.
Whatever they go for, it has to be a set of clear consistent policies that we are going to stick with for 6 months. Absolutely pointless to do 2 weeks of harsh restrictions, then flip to a different set of more lack rules for the next 4, then back to something harsher.
Given the coverage of tomorrow's announcement in the press and on Twitter, we clearly still have government policies being leaked out to the favoured press in dribs and drabs, despite the Speaker insisting that such announcements should be made in the House of Commons. I wonder what the source of the leaks is? It's a poor way to govern, whatever. They (the government and advisors) should shut up until BJ addresses the Commons and then has his press conference in the evening.
I feel like my entire life Speakers have been complaining about announcements being made through the press rather than the Commons. I agree with the complaint, but I have no idea if it really has gotten any worse.
Its a shame [May] didn't follow the path of other ex-PMs in recent years and step down from politics at the next election.
I disagree. Whether one likes May now, or did before, or whether one never liked her, I think it a positive thing that she continues to serve her constituents and her country in her role as an MP. I don't see why an ex-PM who still wants to give back to public life should feel obliged to do so through setting up some foundation or whatever rather than going back to a role which they might well have been better at than the role of PM. They would still have valuable insights to offer (perhaps only in doing the reverse of what they suggest, for those who disliked them), and perhaps even could return to ministerial office one day. Especially as some people enter the Commons young, and are there for decades, they should not feel like there is nothing left in politics for them.
Fascinating how it's always the migrant Jocks who think that the SNP are obsessed by Bannockburn and Braveheart. Shows how long they've been away from Scotland I guess.
I can't remember the last time (apart from that very strange vandalism of the statue which convinced nobody) that 1314 came up in Scottish discourse, outside said self-exiles, apart from the MoD trying to wreck the 1314 commemoration in 2014 by putting on jets at a suddenly arranged armed forces day nearby. The irony was it was the National Trust for Scotland who were doing the event. An organization which let Neil Oliver inveigh against indy in his spare time, at least when he later (?) became convener, (but which got rid of him for other political sins latterly).
PS I did enjoy Dr OLiver's battlefields research, to give him full credit.
I mostly agree, but we're still left with that grim anthem...
Well, some people prefer to sing about Flodden, but I prefer 'A man's a man for a that' myself!
Burns is always worth it. Maybe not the easiest song for group singing?
I guess everyone linking arms for "Auld Lang Syne" is out this Hogmanay?
I fear the government hasn’t had a COVID policy for a while. It seemed to con itself into believing that it had gone away by itself.
There are three possible policies...
1) Minimise disruption, do nothing/herd immunity 2) Minimise economic and social impact, manage it to within NHS capacity 3) Minimise casualties, aim for eradication
That’s about it. You have to pick either 1,2 or 3.
4) Minimise economic and social impact, balanced with casualties, until the Phase III vaccine trial finishes and we can move on.
Given the coverage of tomorrow's announcement in the press and on Twitter, we clearly still have government policies being leaked out to the favoured press in dribs and drabs, despite the Speaker insisting that such announcements should be made in the House of Commons. I wonder what the source of the leaks is? It's a poor way to govern, whatever. They (the government and advisors) should shut up until BJ addresses the Commons and then has his press conference in the evening.
I feel like my entire life Speakers have been complaining about announcements being made through the press rather than the Commons. I agree with the complaint, but I have no idea if it really has gotten any worse.
Its a shame [May] didn't follow the path of other ex-PMs in recent years and step down from politics at the next election.
I disagree. Whether one likes May now, or did before, or whether one never liked her, I think it a positive thing that she continues to serve her constituents and her country in her role as an MP. I don't see why an ex-PM who still wants to give back to public life should feel obliged to do so through setting up some foundation or whatever rather than going back to a role which they might well have been better at than the role of PM. They would still have valuable insights to offer (perhaps only in doing the reverse of what they suggest, for those who disliked them), and perhaps even could return to ministerial office one day. Especially as some people enter the Commons young, and are there for decades, they should not feel like there is nothing left in politics for them.
Ted Heath of course returned to being a backbench MP for 27 years after he ceased to be PM
I fear the government hasn’t had a COVID policy for a while. It seemed to con itself into believing that it had gone away by itself.
There are three possible policies...
1) Minimise disruption, do nothing/herd immunity 2) Minimise economic and social impact, manage it to within NHS capacity 3) Minimise casualties, aim for eradication
That’s about it. You have to pick either 1,2 or 3.
What we need are clear aims. Stay home, save lives, protect the NHS was brilliant. Everyone can still quote it. Unfortunately, like Brexit, it seems the Tory coalition is negotiating with itself. There are probably advocates for all 3 positions within Cabinet. And no majority for any. So we don't get clear aims.
I can't imagine Witty and Valance onboard with that. They were really clear today they wanted much more limited interactions between different households.
It’s a massive relief TBH.
My day at the pub on Saturday with five mates is saved.
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
They’d have to continue with furlough and/or provide further support. They don’t want to do that.
If you don't mind me asking, can your daughter's business be viable with a 10pm last orders?
I hope it can be.
So do I and so does she!
It is better than being closed, especially if there is no support. She has effectively turned herself into a restaurant since reopening and has complied with all the restrictions. Autumn is usually a quieter time but if she can keep her regular clientele eating there that will help. She has had requests for table bookings already over the Xmas period. And people around here tend to eat early. So she can also open a bit earlier.
The real loss is people who stay late and have lots of shots etc while chatting with friends - that is where a lot of money can be made - but that has not been possible since reopening.
The difficulties will come with three things:-
1. Getting people who know each other not mingling when they are in the pub. Easy enough to book tables for 6 but harder to stop people who are good friends from wandering over and talking.
2. People becoming scared again and not going to the pub at all. So that her business is effectively killed by this latest announcement but done at arm’s length so that the government avoids shutting down and providing any support. This is her greatest fear.
3. The length of time this will go on for. The Xmas party trade will be lost. But she - like every other hospitality venue - badly needs a full proper season starting next March. If this half-life continues until next summer, the government is not going to kill just the hospitality sector but a whole load of other businesses as well. And the unemployment and welfare costs will be astronomical.
So she will try her best. But who has much hope these days, frankly?
Yeah. I edited it. That is one of my favourite political cartoons btw. Past performance is no guide to the future. In 1987 I thought the Tories would rule forever. They won only one tiny majority in the next 28 years. In 92 I doubted Labour would ever win again. They were in the lead, often massively, for the vast majority of the next 15 years.
Given the coverage of tomorrow's announcement in the press and on Twitter, we clearly still have government policies being leaked out to the favoured press in dribs and drabs, despite the Speaker insisting that such announcements should be made in the House of Commons. I wonder what the source of the leaks is? It's a poor way to govern, whatever. They (the government and advisors) should shut up until BJ addresses the Commons and then has his press conference in the evening.
I am also not really sure what it achieves. Leaking the budget is about getting some positive news cycles. You don't get extra brownie points for saying you will close the boozer an hour early.
This is about public health and people already get confused from hearing this, then that. You need the message to be clear and concise.
Lots of pubs (most?) open later than 11pm and have done for several years. Why do people still go on about pubs closing at 11pm? Those licensing rules ended years and years ago.
Yeah. I edited it. That is one of my favourite political cartoons btw. Past performance is no guide to the future. In 1987 I thought the Tories would rule forever. They won only one tiny majority in the next 28 years. In 92 I doubted Labour would ever win again. They were in the lead, often massively, for the vast majority of the next 15 years.
I see your edit and he means 2001 to 2024, not 2005 to 2024.
2001 was the last time Labour won the English popular vote. 2005 Labour won the election, but the Tories won the English popular vote. Didn't hear as much objections to that election vs popular vote outcome from the left that year.
I fear the government hasn’t had a COVID policy for a while. It seemed to con itself into believing that it had gone away by itself.
There are three possible policies...
1) Minimise disruption, do nothing/herd immunity 2) Minimise economic and social impact, manage it to within NHS capacity 3) Minimise casualties, aim for eradication
That’s about it. You have to pick either 1,2 or 3.
What we need are clear aims. Stay home, save lives, protect the NHS was brilliant. Everyone can still quote it. Unfortunately, like Brexit, it seems the Tory coalition is negotiating with itself. There are probably advocates for all 3 positions within Cabinet. And no majority for any. So we don't get clear aims.
It may have been a brilliant slogan, but it was a truly dismal time. Months spent without a pint despite endless sunkissed evenings, the beating heart of Merrie England ripped out.
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
Can you imagine a British winter without British pubs?? It is unthinkable. We might as well commit suicide.
There was a survey quoted here which showed that more than half the population NEVER go into a pub. There must be lots more like me who pop into one now and then. The proportion who go regularly (i.e. several times a week) is I'd guess about 20%? The proportion who couldn't live without them for one winter must be smaller than that.
I'm not advocating shutting them down - pubs with space and air and precautions like Cyclefree's daughter's pub don't sound very risky. But in the same way as the barber that I go to has precautions by the bucketload while his competitor up the road has zilch, it seems fair to have strict rules and close the pubs that don't abide by them and undercut the responsible ones.
Labour is doing everything right to win in 2024 - but it isn't enough, yet
Labour has started to fix some of the issues as to why it lost in 2019.
What has it done yet to identify and fix why they lost in 2015?
Yes, ideologically Starmer is basically a more telegenic version of Ed Miliband or Gordon Brown, he may not be Corbyn but he is certainly not Blair either
Yeah. I edited it. That is one of my favourite political cartoons btw. Past performance is no guide to the future. In 1987 I thought the Tories would rule forever. They won only one tiny majority in the next 28 years. In 92 I doubted Labour would ever win again. They were in the lead, often massively, for the vast majority of the next 15 years.
I see your edit and he means 2001 to 2024, not 2005 to 2024.
2001 was the last time Labour won the English popular vote. 2005 Labour won the election, but the Tories won the English popular vote. Didn't hear as much objections to that election vs popular vote outcome from the left that year.
My point was that there was no poll between 2001 and 5. Just as there won't be from 2019 to 24. Difficult indeed to top any poll that doesn't take place. And. I thought we were a United Kingdom? Under your ideal system FPTP you lost in 2005. It wasn't an English election. I, who favours PR, believe 2005 was a bad outcome for the country and Labour to win on such a small vote share.
Yeah. I edited it. That is one of my favourite political cartoons btw. Past performance is no guide to the future. In 1987 I thought the Tories would rule forever. They won only one tiny majority in the next 28 years. In 92 I doubted Labour would ever win again. They were in the lead, often massively, for the vast majority of the next 15 years.
I see your edit and he means 2001 to 2024, not 2005 to 2024.
2001 was the last time Labour won the English popular vote. 2005 Labour won the election, but the Tories won the English popular vote. Didn't hear as much objections to that election vs popular vote outcome from the left that year.
My point was that there was no poll between 2001 and 5. Just as there won't be from 2019 to 24. Difficult indeed to top any poll that doesn't take place. And. I thought we were a United Kingdom? Under your ideal system FPTP you lost in 2005. It wasn't an English election. I, who favours PR, believe 2005 was a bad outcome for the country and Labour to win on such a small vote share.
It was Goodwin not me making the point. I agree with you that it wasn't that strong a point which is why I posted the xkcd comic.
I have no qualms about losing the election because of FPTP if that is how people voted. Same advice I'd give to the Democrats applied to the Tories. The Tories were in 2005 piling up massive majorities in safe rural seats while not appealing to the swing towns. Rather than complain about the system, the Tories fixed the issue and appealed to the voters. Good.
The one thing that was bad in 2005 and a distortion of FPTP was the imbalanced seat sizes etc which got fixed since then.
The knowledge of the pub industry on PB is generally woeful, thanks to the large proportion of people on here who never or only rarely visit them.
There was a particularly embarrassing episode recently when several PBers announced the death warrant of pubs as an service in terminal decline, only to then be informed that their numbers were actually growing before the pandemic hit.
In that same thread, the very same PBers dismissed successful pubs as “glorified restaurants” - otherwise known as fantastic pubs with great kitchens, which are female friendly and are a massive British success story.
Around my home in the countryside, 11PM does seem to be a common closing time, I have often been kicked out at this time
Sure. One of my country pub faves shuts at 10pm, but it’s not the norm or the law. Thousands of pubs are licensed until 12, some until 1, some later or even 24 hour!
Around my home in the countryside, 11PM does seem to be a common closing time, I have often been kicked out at this time
Sure. One of my country pub faves shuts at 10pm, but it’s not the norm or the law. Thousands of pubs are licensed until 12, some until 1, some later or even 24 hour!
I wasn't wishing to contradict. In London I've been in past 12:30
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
Can you imagine a British winter without British pubs?? It is unthinkable. We might as well commit suicide.
There was a survey quoted here which showed that more than half the population NEVER go into a pub. There must be lots more like me who pop into one now and then. The proportion who go regularly (i.e. several times a week) is I'd guess about 20%? The proportion who couldn't live without them for one winter must be smaller than that.
I'm not advocating shutting them down - pubs with space and air and precautions like Cyclefree's daughter's pub don't sound very risky. But in the same way as the barber that I go to has precautions by the bucketload while his competitor up the road has zilch, it seems fair to have strict rules and close the pubs that don't abide by them and undercut the responsible ones.
So this is one of the things I'm finding mysterious about the British response as I understand it. Britain has world-beating infrastructure when it comes to interfering busybodies micromanaging detailed elfin safety rules for small businesses. Yet they seem to be treating businesses only in broad categories, and instead trying to micromanage *individuals*.
The table service thing (if i’m Understanding it correctly) is going to be a complete disaster for some pubs. There is a pub near me, very popular who takes its responsibilities very seriously, which is operating extremely strict rules as follows (under what is effectively a takeaway service for anyone drinking outside). They have table service for anyone inside the pub. Many tables out of action to ensure 2m between parties. For anyone drinking on the nearby terrace (public land - where rule of six etc kicks in) they enforce strict rules for bar service - 3 people inside the pub queueing at 2 m distance. And they enforce it.
I don’t see how they can operate under new rules. And it’s completely unjust.
Just saying “people can do without the pub” is just stupid. There will still be huge numbers on the terrace. It is an extremely popular spot. It is the view from Richmond Hill.
Anyone considered than table service (no compulsory masks for staff) is also potentially worse? All those waiters potentially taking Covid from group to group?
Anyone considered than table service (no compulsory masks for staff) is also potentially worse? All those waiters potentially taking Covid from group to group?
That doesn't seem to be happening much in practice, there are a bunch of clusters in restaurants where nearly everyone at the table with the spreader and sometimes adjacent tables got infected but the waiting staff didn't. They're only with the customers for a short time. But obviously the waiting staff should be wearing masks, and so should the customers apart from when they're actually eating.
Which would get us to where those countries currently doing better, such as Germany and Italy, currently are. Numbers are creeping up even here, though.
To be fair to HMG, every government in the WEst is making these mad choices. Cf Paris and the Tour de France.
Tour de France was just insane...with Macron riding along in the officials car waving.
I am genuinely surprised a rider didn't test positive after somebody screaming in their face as they went up a mountain.
And yet they didn't. There is still no confirmed case of outdoor transmission...
Well that isn't true. For starters, there was a large outbreak at a pub in Stone. The "super spreader" attended twice, once drinking in the beer garden (they set up a bar out there) and once for a party. 10s of people from both those nights were infected.
In which case I withdraw as I am obviously mistaken. Am now trying to remember where I heard that. Sounded very convincing at the time.
And evidence that Cheltenham did cause some spreading.
For outdoors, the risk factors appear to be prolonged proximity and a lot of exercised talking, shouting or singing.
I don’t think anyone has been infected by passing someone on the street.
I can't imagine Witty and Valance onboard with that. They were really clear today they wanted much more limited interactions between different households.
It’s a massive relief TBH.
My day at the pub on Saturday with five mates is saved.
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
They’d have to continue with furlough and/or provide further support. They don’t want to do that.
If you don't mind me asking, can your daughter's business be viable with a 10pm last orders?
I hope it can be.
So do I and so does she!
It is better than being closed, especially if there is no support. She has effectively turned herself into a restaurant since reopening and has complied with all the restrictions. Autumn is usually a quieter time but if she can keep her regular clientele eating there that will help. She has had requests for table bookings already over the Xmas period. And people around here tend to eat early. So she can also open a bit earlier.
The real loss is people who stay late and have lots of shots etc while chatting with friends - that is where a lot of money can be made - but that has not been possible since reopening.
The difficulties will come with three things:-
1. Getting people who know each other not mingling when they are in the pub. Easy enough to book tables for 6 but harder to stop people who are good friends from wandering over and talking.
2. People becoming scared again and not going to the pub at all. So that her business is effectively killed by this latest announcement but done at arm’s length so that the government avoids shutting down and providing any support. This is her greatest fear.
3. The length of time this will go on for. The Xmas party trade will be lost. But she - like every other hospitality venue - badly needs a full proper season starting next March. If this half-life continues until next summer, the government is not going to kill just the hospitality sector but a whole load of other businesses as well. And the unemployment and welfare costs will be astronomical.
So she will try her best. But who has much hope these days, frankly?
Yes, my brother’s position is similar. A big flaw in the UK restaurant model is pricing that ensures the profit is all in the drink. So staying open late, hosting large parties and events, and specials like Xmas and a New Year provide a disproportionate amount of the profit.
We would be better off with the Italian model where drinks are priced reasonably - none of the doubling or trebling the price of a bottle of wine we get here - but you pay relatively a bit more for the meal, topped up with small cover charges and the like.
Anyone considered than table service (no compulsory masks for staff) is also potentially worse? All those waiters potentially taking Covid from group to group?
That doesn't seem to be happening much in practice, there are a bunch of clusters in restaurants where nearly everyone at the table with the spreader and sometimes adjacent tables got infected but the waiting staff didn't. They're only with the customers for a short time. But obviously the waiting staff should be wearing masks, and so should the customers apart from when they're actually eating.
Very few things happen “much”. Once you get away from the scary looking projections, the actual numbers of people infected are tiny. At the end of the day if you are in a pub/restaurant that pays no attention to the rules whatsoever, packs people in like sardines, the virus still can’t get transmitted unless one person actually has it. When the Govt are setting “risk levels” at 20 cases per 100,000 just think what the actual chances of bumping into it at that level are...
Now that’s obviously not a reason not to have any rules, but it does seem something that is forgotten from time to time. A picture is published of people apparently not taking precautions and many people seem to automatically assume that they’ll all have Covid by the morning.
The table service thing (if i’m Understanding it correctly) is going to be a complete disaster for some pubs. There is a pub near me, very popular who takes its responsibilities very seriously, which is operating extremely strict rules as follows (under what is effectively a takeaway service for anyone drinking outside). They have table service for anyone inside the pub. Many tables out of action to ensure 2m between parties. For anyone drinking on the nearby terrace (public land - where rule of six etc kicks in) they enforce strict rules for bar service - 3 people inside the pub queueing at 2 m distance. And they enforce it.
I don’t see how they can operate under new rules. And it’s completely unjust.
Just saying “people can do without the pub” is just stupid. There will still be huge numbers on the terrace. It is an extremely popular spot. It is the view from Richmond Hill.
I suppose they could get round it by having a table placed conveniently at the bar...
September 21st - London numbers fall - “Govt don’t trust the figures”.
If ever there was an example of those in charge bending, or dismissing figures to fit a narrative...
And between these two points the Government even put in place new restrictions which they are just assuming couldn’t possibly have had any effect.
It’s been the same throughout this crisis. Government put in place measures which they claim are carefully proportioned to deliver good outcomes (“based on the science”). And before the ink has even dried on them, and without any meaningful time period elapsing and related attempt to assess their effectiveness, they’ve moved on to the next level.
So they will introduce 10pm curfews, and then a few days later some numbers will go up again somewhere (probably somewhere without much of a pub culture). And before the ink has dried on those measures they will bring in some more. And then if case numbers happen to come down they will suddenly focus on other “lagging” indicators (hospitalisations or deaths) and claim that despite the case numbers improving, they are not giving a true picture. And so more measures introduced. And so on.
Anyone considered than table service (no compulsory masks for staff) is also potentially worse? All those waiters potentially taking Covid from group to group?
That doesn't seem to be happening much in practice, there are a bunch of clusters in restaurants where nearly everyone at the table with the spreader and sometimes adjacent tables got infected but the waiting staff didn't. They're only with the customers for a short time. But obviously the waiting staff should be wearing masks, and so should the customers apart from when they're actually eating.
Very few things happen “much”. Once you get away from the scary looking projections, the actual numbers of people infected are tiny. At the end of the day if you are in a pub/restaurant that pays no attention to the rules whatsoever, packs people in like sardines, the virus still can’t get transmitted unless one person actually has it. When the Govt are setting “risk levels” at 20 cases per 100,000 just think what the actual chances of bumping into it at that level are...
Now that’s obviously not a reason not to have any rules, but it does seem something that is forgotten from time to time. A picture is published of people apparently not taking precautions and many people seem to automatically assume that they’ll all have Covid by the morning.
A good point that is often forgotten. You have almost to be both foolish and unlucky to get the virus, although sometimes just unlucky is enough.
I watched the briefing live on Sky. When that slide came up, we were specifically told that the red (future) bars were "not a forecast" but an indication of what *might* happen if no action is taken. I knew then that all the press would talk about was tens of thousands of more deaths coming. In my view this is because this is a science story being reported on by political journalists. It's rubbish.
Completely right. There’s still dozens of political and opinion pieces in this morning’s papers questioning the government scientists, yet very few pieces written by anyone with a scientific background.
We are entering a critical stage in how this crisis evolves over the winder, yet most of the idiots in the Lobby and those paid to have an ‘opinion’ still haven’t realised that sometimes it’s better to stay silent and be thought a fool...
Anyone considered than table service (no compulsory masks for staff) is also potentially worse? All those waiters potentially taking Covid from group to group?
That doesn't seem to be happening much in practice, there are a bunch of clusters in restaurants where nearly everyone at the table with the spreader and sometimes adjacent tables got infected but the waiting staff didn't. They're only with the customers for a short time. But obviously the waiting staff should be wearing masks, and so should the customers apart from when they're actually eating.
Very few things happen “much”. Once you get away from the scary looking projections, the actual numbers of people infected are tiny. At the end of the day if you are in a pub/restaurant that pays no attention to the rules whatsoever, packs people in like sardines, the virus still can’t get transmitted unless one person actually has it. When the Govt are setting “risk levels” at 20 cases per 100,000 just think what the actual chances of bumping into it at that level are...
Now that’s obviously not a reason not to have any rules, but it does seem something that is forgotten from time to time. A picture is published of people apparently not taking precautions and many people seem to automatically assume that they’ll all have Covid by the morning.
A good point that is often forgotten. You have almost to be both foolish and unlucky to get the virus, although sometimes just unlucky is enough.
Pertinent to last night’s discussion about why people in Italy appear to be taking it more seriously than elsewhere, an extract from Bergamo’s local paper:
My city, Bergamo, is no longer the same, I no longer recognize it. And this is not right. "In the living room of Verissimo ", hosted by Silvia Toffanin, Roby Facchinetti tells with emotion the terrible months lived by his city, Bergamo, tormented by the coronavirus pandemic. Thousands of deaths, the sad images of military trucks loaded with coffins leaving the city cemetery. "They are wounds that will never go away. There are decimated families. I myself have lost seven people, including three relatives and two family friends, "explains the former keyboardist of Pooh." Now things are better, but, I must say, I no longer recognize my city. When people meet, you can't talk about anything else ". The terrible images of March 18 - those trucks loaded with dead leaving the Bergamo cemetery - went around the world." I was terrified of Covid ", Facchinetti reveals. "Every day I went to get the newspaper, our newspaper, all wrapped up. Bergamo is a big village, we all know each other. The obituary pages had gone from one and a half to ten. This virus is such an incredible beast that it can affect anyone ".
Given the coverage of tomorrow's announcement in the press and on Twitter, we clearly still have government policies being leaked out to the favoured press in dribs and drabs, despite the Speaker insisting that such announcements should be made in the House of Commons. I wonder what the source of the leaks is? It's a poor way to govern, whatever. They (the government and advisors) should shut up until BJ addresses the Commons and then has his press conference in the evening.
Those actually involved won’t be the ones leaking, it’ll be those who hear about things from the inside and are opposed to the measures, whether they be ministers, spads or civil servants.
We are in agreement that the media would be best shutting up about things that haven’t been announced formally by the appropriate minister, this is not a time for politics as usual and the general public - people who need clarity - are instead being deliberately confused.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/09/supreme-court-packing-alternatives.html ... Perhaps the most powerful argument for jurisdiction stripping is that the Constitution clearly permits it. Article III, section 1 of the Constitution gives Congress complete discretion on whether to create the lower federal courts, a power that Congress has used from the founding to limit lower courts’ jurisdiction. And Article III, section 2, clause 2 explicitly empowers Congress to make “exceptions” to the Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction—that is, to pick and choose for approximately 99 percent of the Supreme Court’s total docket what cases the Court has the power to hear. As I explain in a law review article, to be published in December in the New York University Law Review, under its Article III authority, Congress can remove the Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction over particular cases, or particular issues, largely without constraint....
Given the coverage of tomorrow's announcement in the press and on Twitter, we clearly still have government policies being leaked out to the favoured press in dribs and drabs, despite the Speaker insisting that such announcements should be made in the House of Commons. I wonder what the source of the leaks is? It's a poor way to govern, whatever. They (the government and advisors) should shut up until BJ addresses the Commons and then has his press conference in the evening.
Those actually involved won’t be the ones leaking, it’ll be those who hear about things from the inside and are opposed to the measures, whether they be ministers, spads or civil servants.
We are in agreement that the media would be best shutting up about things that haven’t been announced formally by the appropriate minister, this is not a time for politics as usual and the general public - people who need clarity - are instead being deliberately confused.
CNN says it is all ” according to a Downing Street statement ahead of the speech.”
On topic - perhaps my favourite Christopher Hitchen's quote of all time talking about the death of 'Pastor' Jerry Falwell: "If you gave Falwell an enema he could be buried in a matchbox".
The table service thing (if i’m Understanding it correctly) is going to be a complete disaster for some pubs. There is a pub near me, very popular who takes its responsibilities very seriously, which is operating extremely strict rules as follows (under what is effectively a takeaway service for anyone drinking outside). They have table service for anyone inside the pub. Many tables out of action to ensure 2m between parties. For anyone drinking on the nearby terrace (public land - where rule of six etc kicks in) they enforce strict rules for bar service - 3 people inside the pub queueing at 2 m distance. And they enforce it.
I don’t see how they can operate under new rules. And it’s completely unjust.
Just saying “people can do without the pub” is just stupid. There will still be huge numbers on the terrace. It is an extremely popular spot. It is the view from Richmond Hill.
I suppose they could get round it by having a table placed conveniently at the bar...
Genius! A small high table and chair right up against the bar. Very short occupancy. And what will you be having, sir? With a suitably spaced out queue for the table.
It didn’t take diners long to work out you could get Rishi’s discount several times over if you paid for each course of a meal separately. So I expect we will see this table trick somewhere quite soon.
I watched the briefing live on Sky. When that slide came up, we were specifically told that the red (future) bars were "not a forecast" but an indication of what *might* happen if no action is taken. I knew then that all the press would talk about was tens of thousands of more deaths coming. In my view this is because this is a science story being reported on by political journalists. It's rubbish.
Completely right. There’s still dozens of political and opinion pieces in this morning’s papers questioning the government scientists, yet very few pieces written by anyone with a scientific background.
We are entering a critical stage in how this crisis evolves over the winder, yet most of the idiots in the Lobby and those paid to have an ‘opinion’ still haven’t realised that sometimes it’s better to stay silent and be thought a fool...
It was not “a forecast” as such. Although whether there was much “scientific” about it was another matter. It was a projection based on a convenient manipulation of existing data. Had they so wished they could have used the existing data to produce any number of alternative graphs, of various degrees of severity.
Now to some extent I have no problem with people using “scary graphs”/“bad case scenarios” to reinforce and encourage people to follow existing law and Government guidance. But this was being used deliberately to argue for and justify new countrywide restrictions (with all the negative impacts that this will have). And argued to some extent from a viewpoint as if we have no mitigation measures in place already (including some which are so recent they won’t have had a chance to impact on existing figures).
Professor Ferguson (of the model) has been all over the media again recently telling us we are having case numbers now as they were at the end of February. The implication being obvious. But at the end of February we had no social distancing, no masks, no quarantine for foreign travel, no rule of six, no regulations for businesses, pubs and restaurants, nightclubs open, no widespread WFH, no protection for Care Homes, no vulnerable people taking themselves out of general circulation to protect themselves...
And now we have even more blanket laws coming in which will unjustly kill off perfectly safe and viable businesses who have carried out full risk assessments and reasonable risk mitigation, just because they can’t quite fit their business models exactly to fit the blunt instrument of blanket Government restrictions.
I watched the briefing live on Sky. When that slide came up, we were specifically told that the red (future) bars were "not a forecast" but an indication of what *might* happen if no action is taken. I knew then that all the press would talk about was tens of thousands of more deaths coming. In my view this is because this is a science story being reported on by political journalists. It's rubbish.
Completely right. There’s still dozens of political and opinion pieces in this morning’s papers questioning the government scientists, yet very few pieces written by anyone with a scientific background.
We are entering a critical stage in how this crisis evolves over the winder, yet most of the idiots in the Lobby and those paid to have an ‘opinion’ still haven’t realised that sometimes it’s better to stay silent and be thought a fool...
It was not “a forecast” as such. Although whether there was much “scientific” about it was another matter. It was a projection based on a convenient manipulation of existing data. Had they so wished they could have used the existing data to produce any number of alternative graphs, of various degrees of severity.
Now to some extent I have no problem with people using “scary graphs”/“bad case scenarios” to reinforce and encourage people to follow existing law and Government guidance. But this was being used deliberately to argue for and justify new countrywide restrictions (with all the negative impacts that this will have). And argued to some extent from a viewpoint as if we have no mitigation measures in place already (including some which are so recent they won’t have had a chance to impact on existing figures).
Professor Ferguson (of the model) has been all over the media again recently telling us we are having case numbers now as they were at the end of February. The implication being obvious. But at the end of February we had no social distancing, no masks, no quarantine for foreign travel, no rule of six, no regulations for businesses, pubs and restaurants, nightclubs open, no widespread WFH, no protection for Care Homes, no vulnerable people taking themselves out of general circulation to protect themselves...
And now we have even more blanket laws coming in which will unjustly kill off perfectly safe and viable businesses who have carried out full risk assessments and reasonable risk mitigation, just because they can’t quite fit their business models exactly to fit the blunt instrument of blanket Government restrictions.
Yet still many PBers will agitate for more and more, and assure us we can do without the pub for a winter (and presumably the publicans and their staff can do without a livelihood)
I watched the briefing live on Sky. When that slide came up, we were specifically told that the red (future) bars were "not a forecast" but an indication of what *might* happen if no action is taken. I knew then that all the press would talk about was tens of thousands of more deaths coming. In my view this is because this is a science story being reported on by political journalists. It's rubbish.
Completely right. There’s still dozens of political and opinion pieces in this morning’s papers questioning the government scientists, yet very few pieces written by anyone with a scientific background.
We are entering a critical stage in how this crisis evolves over the winder, yet most of the idiots in the Lobby and those paid to have an ‘opinion’ still haven’t realised that sometimes it’s better to stay silent and be thought a fool...
It was not “a forecast” as such. Although whether there was much “scientific” about it was another matter. It was a projection based on a convenient manipulation of existing data. Had they so wished they could have used the existing data to produce any number of alternative graphs, of various degrees of severity.
Now to some extent I have no problem with people using “scary graphs”/“bad case scenarios” to reinforce and encourage people to follow existing law and Government guidance. But this was being used deliberately to argue for and justify new countrywide restrictions (with all the negative impacts that this will have). And argued to some extent from a viewpoint as if we have no mitigation measures in place already (including some which are so recent they won’t have had a chance to impact on existing figures).
Professor Ferguson (of the model) has been all over the media again recently telling us we are having case numbers now as they were at the end of February. The implication being obvious. But at the end of February we had no social distancing, no masks, no quarantine for foreign travel, no rule of six, no regulations for businesses, pubs and restaurants, nightclubs open, no widespread WFH, no protection for Care Homes, no vulnerable people taking themselves out of general circulation to protect themselves...
And now we have even more blanket laws coming in which will unjustly kill off perfectly safe and viable businesses who have carried out full risk assessments and reasonable risk mitigation, just because they can’t quite fit their business models exactly to fit the blunt instrument of blanket Government restrictions.
Yet still many PBers will agitate for more and more, and assure us we can do without the pub for a winter (and presumably the publicans and their staff can do without a livelihood)
I suspect the issue here, as with our politics more widely, is the number of people (myself included, I confess) who are essentially isolated (except in some very worse case scenarios) from the economic fallout of the crisis and not giving sufficient priority to the desperate circumstances it is leaving many employees and businesses.
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
Can you imagine a British winter without British pubs?? It is unthinkable. We might as well commit suicide.
There was a survey quoted here which showed that more than half the population NEVER go into a pub. There must be lots more like me who pop into one now and then. The proportion who go regularly (i.e. several times a week) is I'd guess about 20%? The proportion who couldn't live without them for one winter must be smaller than that.
I'm not advocating shutting them down - pubs with space and air and precautions like Cyclefree's daughter's pub don't sound very risky. But in the same way as the barber that I go to has precautions by the bucketload while his competitor up the road has zilch, it seems fair to have strict rules and close the pubs that don't abide by them and undercut the responsible ones.
Pubs were declining rapidly even before the pandemic, and it will doubtless have killed many off. More than 7,000 closed between 2010 and 2017. They will never disappear completely, but many will mutate into restaurants with bars and many more will shut as their ageing clientele disappears.
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
Can you imagine a British winter without British pubs?? It is unthinkable. We might as well commit suicide.
There was a survey quoted here which showed that more than half the population NEVER go into a pub. There must be lots more like me who pop into one now and then. The proportion who go regularly (i.e. several times a week) is I'd guess about 20%? The proportion who couldn't live without them for one winter must be smaller than that.
I'm not advocating shutting them down - pubs with space and air and precautions like Cyclefree's daughter's pub don't sound very risky. But in the same way as the barber that I go to has precautions by the bucketload while his competitor up the road has zilch, it seems fair to have strict rules and close the pubs that don't abide by them and undercut the responsible ones.
So this is one of the things I'm finding mysterious about the British response as I understand it. Britain has world-beating infrastructure when it comes to interfering busybodies micromanaging detailed elfin safety rules for small businesses. Yet they seem to be treating businesses only in broad categories, and instead trying to micromanage *individuals*.
This is an excellent point. There is another approach to broad brush laws, with often arbitrary unscientific requirements, that every business has to attempt to squeeze itself into (and which many will not be able to and go out of business as a result). Others on the other hand may find loopholes which place them within the letter but not the spirit of the law (the wrong way around!)
Require every business to produce a COVID risk assessment, and operational plan to be signed off by the local authority. Underpinning this can be Government guidance on recommended operating practice (like table service in pubs). Where precise compliance with Government guidance is impractical/impossible allow flexibility to show how alternative arrangements are being put in place to comply with the spirit of the guidance, if not the letter. (Eg. a highly social distanced queuing system at the bar)
And reinforce this with checks from local authority officers/police to ensure compliance with the agreed plan.
Agreed. Most of the contact/transmission detail is what we already know, but it does bring out how much easier it is for those with more money and space to take the necessary precautions, and argue that more should be done to support the poor. Good luck with that in the US.
Another key point is that it spreads more readily within than between households, and one person out of a household becoming infected is bad news for the rest.
Once again it flags the superspreader phenomenon - that many infected people don’t go on to infect anyone while a few infect very many more. It doesn’t fully resolve why but suggests infectious people may have a shorter period of time when they are especially infectious. This seems to suggest that a lot infected people may have potential to be superspreaders for a short period during their infection? Making timely test and trace absolutely critical, I’d have thought.
Anyone considered than table service (no compulsory masks for staff) is also potentially worse? All those waiters potentially taking Covid from group to group?
That doesn't seem to be happening much in practice, there are a bunch of clusters in restaurants where nearly everyone at the table with the spreader and sometimes adjacent tables got infected but the waiting staff didn't. They're only with the customers for a short time. But obviously the waiting staff should be wearing masks, and so should the customers apart from when they're actually eating.
Very few things happen “much”. Once you get away from the scary looking projections, the actual numbers of people infected are tiny. At the end of the day if you are in a pub/restaurant that pays no attention to the rules whatsoever, packs people in like sardines, the virus still can’t get transmitted unless one person actually has it. When the Govt are setting “risk levels” at 20 cases per 100,000 just think what the actual chances of bumping into it at that level are...
Now that’s obviously not a reason not to have any rules, but it does seem something that is forgotten from time to time. A picture is published of people apparently not taking precautions and many people seem to automatically assume that they’ll all have Covid by the morning.
I don't know who you think is forgetting that. The point of the rules and the changes in behaviour is to reduce the average number of people each infected person infects. If that gets above 1, even if it starts at a level where it isn't a big problem, it'll grow until it becomes a big problem.
So what the policy needs to do is to work out the least disruptive set of changes that can get the average below 1. Right now it seems like there's a strong argument for why it's very harmful to have kids out of school, especially for disadvantaged children, so if there's some leeway, it seems better to use it in places like that, rather than in trying to bring restaurants back to high occupancy.
The knowledge of the pub industry on PB is generally woeful, thanks to the large proportion of people on here who never or only rarely visit them.
There was a particularly embarrassing episode recently when several PBers announced the death warrant of pubs as an service in terminal decline, only to then be informed that their numbers were actually growing before the pandemic hit.
In that same thread, the very same PBers dismissed successful pubs as “glorified restaurants” - otherwise known as fantastic pubs with great kitchens, which are female friendly and are a massive British success story.
Where do you get the "numbers actually growing"? There were 61,000 in 2000, now there are about 47,000.
Labour is doing everything right to win in 2024 - but it isn't enough, yet
Labour has started to fix some of the issues as to why it lost in 2019.
What has it done yet to identify and fix why they lost in 2015?
Yes, ideologically Starmer is basically a more telegenic version of Ed Miliband or Gordon Brown, he may not be Corbyn but he is certainly not Blair either
The knowledge of the pub industry on PB is generally woeful, thanks to the large proportion of people on here who never or only rarely visit them.
There was a particularly embarrassing episode recently when several PBers announced the death warrant of pubs as an service in terminal decline, only to then be informed that their numbers were actually growing before the pandemic hit.
In that same thread, the very same PBers dismissed successful pubs as “glorified restaurants” - otherwise known as fantastic pubs with great kitchens, which are female friendly and are a massive British success story.
Where do you get the "numbers actually growing"? There were 61,000 in 2000, now there are about 47,000.
We are in agreement that the media would be best shutting up about things that haven’t been announced formally by the appropriate minister, this is not a time for politics as usual and the general public - people who need clarity - are instead being deliberately confused.
I'm sure the tories would be calling for a halt to politics as usual if it were Corbo fucking this up instead of the Perugia Playboy. They would be putting the hoof in 24x7.
The knowledge of the pub industry on PB is generally woeful, thanks to the large proportion of people on here who never or only rarely visit them.
There was a particularly embarrassing episode recently when several PBers announced the death warrant of pubs as an service in terminal decline, only to then be informed that their numbers were actually growing before the pandemic hit.
In that same thread, the very same PBers dismissed successful pubs as “glorified restaurants” - otherwise known as fantastic pubs with great kitchens, which are female friendly and are a massive British success story.
Where do you get the "numbers actually growing"? There were 61,000 in 2000, now there are about 47,000.
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
Can you imagine a British winter without British pubs?? It is unthinkable. We might as well commit suicide.
There was a survey quoted here which showed that more than half the population NEVER go into a pub. There must be lots more like me who pop into one now and then. The proportion who go regularly (i.e. several times a week) is I'd guess about 20%? The proportion who couldn't live without them for one winter must be smaller than that.
I'm not advocating shutting them down - pubs with space and air and precautions like Cyclefree's daughter's pub don't sound very risky. But in the same way as the barber that I go to has precautions by the bucketload while his competitor up the road has zilch, it seems fair to have strict rules and close the pubs that don't abide by them and undercut the responsible ones.
So this is one of the things I'm finding mysterious about the British response as I understand it. Britain has world-beating infrastructure when it comes to interfering busybodies micromanaging detailed elfin safety rules for small businesses. Yet they seem to be treating businesses only in broad categories, and instead trying to micromanage *individuals*.
This is an excellent point. There is another approach to broad brush laws, with often arbitrary unscientific requirements, that every business has to attempt to squeeze itself into (and which many will not be able to and go out of business as a result). Others on the other hand may find loopholes which place them within the letter but not the spirit of the law (the wrong way around!)
Require every business to produce a COVID risk assessment, and operational plan to be signed off by the local authority. Underpinning this can be Government guidance on recommended operating practice (like table service in pubs). Where precise compliance with Government guidance is impractical/impossible allow flexibility to show how alternative arrangements are being put in place to comply with the spirit of the guidance, if not the letter. (Eg. a highly social distanced queuing system at the bar)
And reinforce this with checks from local authority officers/police to ensure compliance with the agreed plan.
The problem is the good being tarred with the bad. A lot of restaurants and pubs are acting quite responsibly, and others are giving lip service to the rules, and not even that later at night.
Oadby briefly became the second hottest spot in the country a week or so ago, relating it seems to activity like this non socially distanced wedding with 200 guests:
The problem is that to break the virus we need pretty universal following of the rules, and those rules to be enforced before rather than after the fact.
The knowledge of the pub industry on PB is generally woeful, thanks to the large proportion of people on here who never or only rarely visit them.
There was a particularly embarrassing episode recently when several PBers announced the death warrant of pubs as an service in terminal decline, only to then be informed that their numbers were actually growing before the pandemic hit.
In that same thread, the very same PBers dismissed successful pubs as “glorified restaurants” - otherwise known as fantastic pubs with great kitchens, which are female friendly and are a massive British success story.
Where do you get the "numbers actually growing"? There were 61,000 in 2000, now there are about 47,000.
Probably a freak year in an overall declining trend.
Like 2002.
Or, a long term decline *might* have levelled off (pre Covid) because the decline in going out for a drink is being balanced off by the rise in going out for a meal.
The public are being taken for fools . Any business has a strategy for justification for doing certain actions. i think we are entitled to be told directly by government what the strategy on covid-19 is ? What is the end game? Is it complete elimination ? (why when flu is not treated the same) , is it to get a vaccine (that will take years to be effective if ever) . If its not either of these then why the ruinous restrictions ? Maybe the strategy of this pathetic government is to never admit they were wrong on Covid -19 and thus keep up pretending they can control a virus (nobody can ) . Covid-19 has a 99.8 % survival rate FFS (at least)- the same as flu
"And evidence that Cheltenham did cause some spreading."
I have heard this repeatedly on here but despite asking several times for evidence I have seen none. Do you have any? I am particularly interested because I attended and live in the area.
The town of Cheltenham, in common with the Cotswolds and Gloucestershire generally, have very low Covid numbers now. If there was a Festival spike the region has certainly recovered well.
We are in agreement that the media would be best shutting up about things that haven’t been announced formally by the appropriate minister, this is not a time for politics as usual and the general public - people who need clarity - are instead being deliberately confused.
I'm sure the tories would be calling for a halt to politics as usual if it were Corbo fucking this up instead of the Perugia Playboy. They would be putting the hoof in 24x7.
Sandpit is missing the point that this info came to the media directly from Downing Street with the intention that they publish it.
"And evidence that Cheltenham did cause some spreading."
I have heard this repeatedly on here but despite asking several times for evidence I have seen none. Do you have any? I am particularly interested because I attended and live in the area.
The town of Cheltenham, in common with the Cotswolds and Gloucestershire generally, have very low Covid numbers now. If there was a Festival spike the region has certainly recovered well.
I am not sure whether it was ‘proven’ (nor that it ever could be, or disproven) but there was this:
"And evidence that Cheltenham did cause some spreading."
I have heard this repeatedly on here but despite asking several times for evidence I have seen none. Do you have any? I am particularly interested because I attended and live in the area.
The town of Cheltenham, in common with the Cotswolds and Gloucestershire generally, have very low Covid numbers now. If there was a Festival spike the region has certainly recovered well.
i went as well and it was nice to see 60000 a day people having a good time .Something that seems to be increasingly frowned upon by Covid Kevins and Karens. We have become a miserable puritan society
Agreed. Most of the contact/transmission detail is what we already know, but it does bring out how much easier it is for those with more money and space to take the necessary precautions, and argue that more should be done to support the poor. Good luck with that in the US.
Another key point is that it spreads more readily within than between households, and one person out of a household becoming infected is bad news for the rest.
Once again it flags the superspreader phenomenon - that many infected people don’t go on to infect anyone while a few infect very many more. It doesn’t fully resolve why but suggests infectious people may have a shorter period of time when they are especially infectious. This seems to suggest that a lot infected people may have potential to be superspreaders for a short period during their infection? Making timely test and trace absolutely critical, I’d have thought.
No, what it suggests is what has been obvious for 6 months now. That government messaging that if you test positive you must stay at home is perhaps the most stupid policy of recent decades.
About a third of millennials in the UK live with their parents. Some portion of these also live with a grandparent. I would hazard a guess this is particularly so in the areas of the country with higher rates of South Asian immigration, which also coincides with areas of the country where work from home is more of a challenge.
Upon getting symptoms and pending a test, or following a positive test, you should be given the option of a tax payer sponsored stay in a local hotel until the required number of days has passed. You’d stop the main source of new infections in its tracks, arrest the upward slide of infection along the age curve, and give a shot in the arm to the hospitality sector.
China had good success with this model but their “hotels” were more like army prisons and you were taken at gunpoint. Singapore adopted a similar model ages ago. There, if you leave the country and come back you have to quarantine in a hotel at your own expense.
I don’t understand why people are prepared to cut the government slack for such a litany of failure. This stuff really isn’t hard.
The knowledge of the pub industry on PB is generally woeful, thanks to the large proportion of people on here who never or only rarely visit them.
There was a particularly embarrassing episode recently when several PBers announced the death warrant of pubs as an service in terminal decline, only to then be informed that their numbers were actually growing before the pandemic hit.
In that same thread, the very same PBers dismissed successful pubs as “glorified restaurants” - otherwise known as fantastic pubs with great kitchens, which are female friendly and are a massive British success story.
Where do you get the "numbers actually growing"? There were 61,000 in 2000, now there are about 47,000.
Probably a freak year in an overall declining trend.
Like 2002.
Or, a long term decline *might* have levelled off (pre Covid) because the decline in going out for a drink is being balanced off by the rise in going out for a meal.
Either are possible from the evidence. I'm sure people were saying the same thing after 2002 though. In time series, you often see freak years though. And it is also worth noting that the BBPA numbers showed continuing declines.
The public are being taken for fools . Any business has a strategy for justification for doing certain actions. i think we are entitled to be told directly by government what the strategy on covid-19 is ? What is the end game? Is it complete elimination ? (why when flu is not treated the same) , is it to get a vaccine (that will take years to be effective if ever) . If its not either of these then why the ruinous restrictions ? Maybe the strategy of this pathetic government is to never admit they were wrong on Covid -19 and thus keep up pretending they can control a virus (nobody can ) . Covid-19 has a 99.8 % survival rate FFS (at least)- the same as flu
At least a 99.8% survival rate?
That means with over 45k dead in this country that over 22.5 million have already had the virus at least here. Over a quarter of a million excess deaths in the USA, so over 125 million have already had the virus at least there.
Are you sure about that?
What irritates me most about the people wanting to argue against restrictions is the complete disregard for facts. I find a libertarian argument against restrictions quite compelling but this statistical bulls**t just makes it look like you're not understanding the facts.
Anyone considered than table service (no compulsory masks for staff) is also potentially worse? All those waiters potentially taking Covid from group to group?
That doesn't seem to be happening much in practice, there are a bunch of clusters in restaurants where nearly everyone at the table with the spreader and sometimes adjacent tables got infected but the waiting staff didn't. They're only with the customers for a short time. But obviously the waiting staff should be wearing masks, and so should the customers apart from when they're actually eating.
Very few things happen “much”. Once you get away from the scary looking projections, the actual numbers of people infected are tiny. At the end of the day if you are in a pub/restaurant that pays no attention to the rules whatsoever, packs people in like sardines, the virus still can’t get transmitted unless one person actually has it. When the Govt are setting “risk levels” at 20 cases per 100,000 just think what the actual chances of bumping into it at that level are...
Now that’s obviously not a reason not to have any rules, but it does seem something that is forgotten from time to time. A picture is published of people apparently not taking precautions and many people seem to automatically assume that they’ll all have Covid by the morning.
I don't know who you think is forgetting that. The point of the rules and the changes in behaviour is to reduce the average number of people each infected person infects. If that gets above 1, even if it starts at a level where it isn't a big problem, it'll grow until it becomes a big problem.
So what the policy needs to do is to work out the least disruptive set of changes that can get the average below 1. Right now it seems like there's a strong argument for why it's very harmful to have kids out of school, especially for disadvantaged children, so if there's some leeway, it seems better to use it in places like that, rather than in trying to bring restaurants back to high occupancy.
Rules on things like table service - if as trailed - are not minor inconveniences to businesses. They will simply force many to close. The costs for many of mandatory table service, in staffing alone are impossible. Pubs and restaurants (think eg. McDonalds). It is being billed as not a big deal. And yet there are many other alternatives possible with a bit of flexibility allowed. Allow pubs to put in place “safe” queuing systems instead. Require mask wearing when not seated at the table. Other things. Don’t theoretically allow pubs to remain open, but under conditions where it is impossible to trade viably.
The public are being taken for fools . Any business has a strategy for justification for doing certain actions. i think we are entitled to be told directly by government what the strategy on covid-19 is ? What is the end game? Is it complete elimination ? (why when flu is not treated the same) , is it to get a vaccine (that will take years to be effective if ever) . If its not either of these then why the ruinous restrictions ? Maybe the strategy of this pathetic government is to never admit they were wrong on Covid -19 and thus keep up pretending they can control a virus (nobody can ) . Covid-19 has a 99.8 % survival rate FFS (at least)- the same as flu
At least a 99.8% survival rate?
That means with over 45k dead in this country that over 22.5 million have already had the virus at least here. Over a quarter of a million excess deaths in the USA, so over 125 million have already had the virus at least there.
Are you sure about that?
What irritates me most about the people wanting to argue against restrictions is the complete disregard for facts. I find a libertarian argument against restrictions quite compelling but this statistical bulls**t just makes it look like you're not understanding the facts.
that 45k dead figure is wrong for a start as it is people dying who have covid -19 not because of it. It is people like you who twist the facts (and government) and this stat is the best example of it. Dot tell me you or the government have never used this to pretend 45K have actually died because of covid -19 because they clearly did use it that way. Wake up FFS especially if you think you are a libertarian at heart
"And evidence that Cheltenham did cause some spreading."
I have heard this repeatedly on here but despite asking several times for evidence I have seen none. Do you have any? I am particularly interested because I attended and live in the area.
The town of Cheltenham, in common with the Cotswolds and Gloucestershire generally, have very low Covid numbers now. If there was a Festival spike the region has certainly recovered well.
The first two people in my parents' home town to get Covid developed symptoms shortly after returning from Cheltenham.
The public are being taken for fools . Any business has a strategy for justification for doing certain actions. i think we are entitled to be told directly by government what the strategy on covid-19 is ? What is the end game? Is it complete elimination ? (why when flu is not treated the same) , is it to get a vaccine (that will take years to be effective if ever) . If its not either of these then why the ruinous restrictions ? Maybe the strategy of this pathetic government is to never admit they were wrong on Covid -19 and thus keep up pretending they can control a virus (nobody can ) . Covid-19 has a 99.8 % survival rate FFS (at least)- the same as flu
At least a 99.8% survival rate?
That means with over 45k dead in this country that over 22.5 million have already had the virus at least here. Over a quarter of a million excess deaths in the USA, so over 125 million have already had the virus at least there.
Are you sure about that?
What irritates me most about the people wanting to argue against restrictions is the complete disregard for facts. I find a libertarian argument against restrictions quite compelling but this statistical bulls**t just makes it look like you're not understanding the facts.
that 45 dead figure is wrong for a start as it is people dying who have covid -19 not because of it.
Its people who died within 28 days and its also the excess deaths figure for year to date so try again.
Covid-19 has a 99.8 % survival rate FFS (at least)- the same as flu
Err, no!
In the UK we have had 41 788 deaths in 398 625 cases. That is a mortality rate of just over 10%.
While clearly we have undercounted cases, it is not by a factor of 2 orders of magnitude.
I am sorry bu that stat you have used as a starting point is beyond absurd. It is worrying that people are still thinking in terms of a fatality rate of 10% due to this crass stat that the government and media did not discourage.
I don't understand the 10pm thing. It would make more sense to close down pubs altogether.
Can you imagine a British winter without British pubs?? It is unthinkable. We might as well commit suicide.
There was a survey quoted here which showed that more than half the population NEVER go into a pub. There must be lots more like me who pop into one now and then. The proportion who go regularly (i.e. several times a week) is I'd guess about 20%? The proportion who couldn't live without them for one winter must be smaller than that.
I'm not advocating shutting them down - pubs with space and air and precautions like Cyclefree's daughter's pub don't sound very risky. But in the same way as the barber that I go to has precautions by the bucketload while his competitor up the road has zilch, it seems fair to have strict rules and close the pubs that don't abide by them and undercut the responsible ones.
So this is one of the things I'm finding mysterious about the British response as I understand it. Britain has world-beating infrastructure when it comes to interfering busybodies micromanaging detailed elfin safety rules for small businesses. Yet they seem to be treating businesses only in broad categories, and instead trying to micromanage *individuals*.
This is an excellent point. There is another approach to broad brush laws, with often arbitrary unscientific requirements, that every business has to attempt to squeeze itself into (and which many will not be able to and go out of business as a result). Others on the other hand may find loopholes which place them within the letter but not the spirit of the law (the wrong way around!)
Require every business to produce a COVID risk assessment, and operational plan to be signed off by the local authority. Underpinning this can be Government guidance on recommended operating practice (like table service in pubs). Where precise compliance with Government guidance is impractical/impossible allow flexibility to show how alternative arrangements are being put in place to comply with the spirit of the guidance, if not the letter. (Eg. a highly social distanced queuing system at the bar)
And reinforce this with checks from local authority officers/police to ensure compliance with the agreed plan.
The problem is the good being tarred with the bad. A lot of restaurants and pubs are acting quite responsibly, and others are giving lip service to the rules, and not even that later at night.
Oadby briefly became the second hottest spot in the country a week or so ago, relating it seems to activity like this non socially distanced wedding with 200 guests:
The problem is that to break the virus we need pretty universal following of the rules, and those rules to be enforced before rather than after the fact.
Places that don’t follow the rules, won’t follow the rules. Regardless of the level that they are set. All tightening the rules does (in a blanket way, rather than as I am suggesting) is put the responsible places out of business and drive more people into the irresponsible ones.
Furthermore, my suggested approach would mandate much more local authority involvement. They would have the authority to monitor and immediately shut non compliant pubs, without risk of legal challenge. Because part of the legal framework would be local authority sign off.
"And evidence that Cheltenham did cause some spreading."
I have heard this repeatedly on here but despite asking several times for evidence I have seen none. Do you have any? I am particularly interested because I attended and live in the area.
The town of Cheltenham, in common with the Cotswolds and Gloucestershire generally, have very low Covid numbers now. If there was a Festival spike the region has certainly recovered well.
The first two people in my parents' home town to get Covid developed symptoms shortly after returning from Cheltenham.
Thanks Alistair. Which town was that?
As locals and Festival-goers know, the whole of Gloucestershire is awash with visitors during the Festival. I would have expected a clear increase in the number of Covid cases following the event. Obviously some of the infected would return home but you would expect the locals to take a hit too.
I'm not saying there wasn't one, but I just haven't seen the evidence. In fact Gloucestershire's near Covid-free status suggests otherwise, which I find strange.
Comments
A New Labour approach indeed.
His hopes 'bove wisdom, grace, and fear.
And you all know, security
Is mortals' chiefest enemy...'
I hope it can be.
Unfortunately, like Brexit, it seems the Tory coalition is negotiating with itself.
There are probably advocates for all 3 positions within Cabinet. And no majority for any.
So we don't get clear aims.
My day at the pub on Saturday with five mates is saved.
Thank god.
By next election he means between 2005 and 2024. Which is 19.
Though its a rather meaningless statistic too.
https://xkcd.com/1122/
What has it done yet to identify and fix why they lost in 2015?
It is better than being closed, especially if there is no support. She has effectively turned herself into a restaurant since reopening and has complied with all the restrictions. Autumn is usually a quieter time but if she can keep her regular clientele eating there that will help. She has had requests for table bookings already over the Xmas period. And people around here tend to eat early. So she can also open a bit earlier.
The real loss is people who stay late and have lots of shots etc while chatting with friends - that is where a lot of money can be made - but that has not been possible since reopening.
The difficulties will come with three things:-
1. Getting people who know each other not mingling when they are in the pub. Easy enough to book tables for 6 but harder to stop people who are good friends from wandering over and talking.
2. People becoming scared again and not going to the pub at all. So that her business is effectively killed by this latest announcement but done at arm’s length so that the government avoids shutting down and providing any support. This is her greatest fear.
3. The length of time this will go on for. The Xmas party trade will be lost. But she - like every other hospitality venue - badly needs a full proper season starting next March. If this half-life continues until next summer, the government is not going to kill just the hospitality sector but a whole load of other businesses as well. And the unemployment and welfare costs will be astronomical.
So she will try her best. But who has much hope these days, frankly?
In 1987 I thought the Tories would rule forever. They won only one tiny majority in the next 28 years.
In 92 I doubted Labour would ever win again.
They were in the lead, often massively, for the vast majority of the next 15 years.
2001 was the last time Labour won the English popular vote. 2005 Labour won the election, but the Tories won the English popular vote. Didn't hear as much objections to that election vs popular vote outcome from the left that year.
I'm not advocating shutting them down - pubs with space and air and precautions like Cyclefree's daughter's pub don't sound very risky. But in the same way as the barber that I go to has precautions by the bucketload while his competitor up the road has zilch, it seems fair to have strict rules and close the pubs that don't abide by them and undercut the responsible ones.
ME2: 0.2%
North Carolina: 0.8%
Florida: 1.8%
NE2: 2.3%
Arizona: 3.6%
Pennsylvania: 4.3%
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/
In other words, Trump needs a swingback of 2.2%.
Difficult indeed to top any poll that doesn't take place.
And. I thought we were a United Kingdom? Under your ideal system FPTP you lost in 2005. It wasn't an English election.
I, who favours PR, believe 2005 was a bad outcome for the country and Labour to win on such a small vote share.
I have no qualms about losing the election because of FPTP if that is how people voted. Same advice I'd give to the Democrats applied to the Tories. The Tories were in 2005 piling up massive majorities in safe rural seats while not appealing to the swing towns. Rather than complain about the system, the Tories fixed the issue and appealed to the voters. Good.
The one thing that was bad in 2005 and a distortion of FPTP was the imbalanced seat sizes etc which got fixed since then.
There was a particularly embarrassing episode recently when several PBers announced the death warrant of pubs as an service in terminal decline, only to then be informed that their numbers were actually growing before the pandemic hit.
In that same thread, the very same PBers dismissed successful pubs as “glorified restaurants” - otherwise known as fantastic pubs with great kitchens, which are female friendly and are a massive British success story.
I don’t see how they can operate under new rules. And it’s completely unjust.
Just saying “people can do without the pub” is just stupid. There will still be huge numbers on the terrace. It is an extremely popular spot. It is the view from Richmond Hill.
For outdoors, the risk factors appear to be prolonged proximity and a lot of exercised talking, shouting or singing.
I don’t think anyone has been infected by passing someone on the street.
We would be better off with the Italian model where drinks are priced reasonably - none of the doubling or trebling the price of a bottle of wine we get here - but you pay relatively a bit more for the meal, topped up with small cover charges and the like.
Now that’s obviously not a reason not to have any rules, but it does seem something that is forgotten from time to time. A picture is published of people apparently not taking precautions and many people seem to automatically assume that they’ll all have Covid by the morning.
I suppose they could get round it by having a table placed conveniently at the bar...
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/health/london-coronavirus-cases-testing-mystery-cases-fall-virus-spreads-a4552181.html
September 21st - London numbers fall - “Govt don’t trust the figures”.
If ever there was an example of those in charge bending, or dismissing figures to fit a narrative...
And between these two points the Government even put in place new restrictions which they are just assuming couldn’t possibly have had any effect.
It’s been the same throughout this crisis. Government put in place measures which they claim are carefully proportioned to deliver good outcomes (“based on the science”). And before the ink has even dried on them, and without any meaningful time period elapsing and related attempt to assess their effectiveness, they’ve moved on to the next level.
So they will introduce 10pm curfews, and then a few days later some numbers will go up again somewhere (probably somewhere without much of a pub culture). And before the ink has dried on those measures they will bring in some more. And then if case numbers happen to come down they will suddenly focus on other “lagging” indicators (hospitalisations or deaths) and claim that despite the case numbers improving, they are not giving a true picture. And so more measures introduced. And so on.
We are entering a critical stage in how this crisis evolves over the winder, yet most of the idiots in the Lobby and those paid to have an ‘opinion’ still haven’t realised that sometimes it’s better to stay silent and be thought a fool...
My city, Bergamo, is no longer the same, I no longer recognize it. And this is not right. "In the living room of Verissimo ", hosted by Silvia Toffanin, Roby Facchinetti tells with emotion the terrible months lived by his city, Bergamo, tormented by the coronavirus pandemic. Thousands of deaths, the sad images of military trucks loaded with coffins leaving the city cemetery. "They are wounds that will never go away. There are decimated families. I myself have lost seven people, including three relatives and two family friends, "explains the former keyboardist of Pooh." Now things are better, but, I must say, I no longer recognize my city. When people meet, you can't talk about anything else ". The terrible images of March 18 - those trucks loaded with dead leaving the Bergamo cemetery - went around the world." I was terrified of Covid ", Facchinetti reveals. "Every day I went to get the newspaper, our newspaper, all wrapped up. Bergamo is a big village, we all know each other. The obituary pages had gone from one and a half to ten. This virus is such an incredible beast that it can affect anyone ".
We are in agreement that the media would be best shutting up about things that haven’t been announced formally by the appropriate minister, this is not a time for politics as usual and the general public - people who need clarity - are instead being deliberately confused.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/09/supreme-court-packing-alternatives.html
... Perhaps the most powerful argument for jurisdiction stripping is that the Constitution clearly permits it. Article III, section 1 of the Constitution gives Congress complete discretion on whether to create the lower federal courts, a power that Congress has used from the founding to limit lower courts’ jurisdiction. And Article III, section 2, clause 2 explicitly empowers Congress to make “exceptions” to the Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction—that is, to pick and choose for approximately 99 percent of the Supreme Court’s total docket what cases the Court has the power to hear. As I explain in a law review article, to be published in December in the New York University Law Review, under its Article III authority, Congress can remove the Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction over particular cases, or particular issues, largely without constraint....
It didn’t take diners long to work out you could get Rishi’s discount several times over if you paid for each course of a meal separately. So I expect we will see this table trick somewhere quite soon.
Now to some extent I have no problem with people using “scary graphs”/“bad case scenarios” to reinforce and encourage people to follow existing law and Government guidance. But this was being used deliberately to argue for and justify new countrywide restrictions (with all the negative impacts that this will have). And argued to some extent from a viewpoint as if we have no mitigation measures in place already (including some which are so recent they won’t have had a chance to impact on existing figures).
Professor Ferguson (of the model) has been all over the media again recently telling us we are having case numbers now as they were at the end of February. The implication being obvious. But at the end of February we had no social distancing, no masks, no quarantine for foreign travel, no rule of six, no regulations for businesses, pubs and restaurants, nightclubs open, no widespread WFH, no protection for Care Homes, no vulnerable people taking themselves out of general circulation to protect themselves...
And now we have even more blanket laws coming in which will unjustly kill off perfectly safe and viable businesses who have carried out full risk assessments and reasonable risk mitigation, just because they can’t quite fit their business models exactly to fit the blunt instrument of blanket Government restrictions.
https://twitter.com/michaelmina_lab/status/1308211997981306883
https://twitter.com/MartinLandray/status/1306970127619903490
https://twitter.com/mugecevik/status/1308080056384843777
Require every business to produce a COVID risk assessment, and operational plan to be signed off by the local authority. Underpinning this can be Government guidance on recommended operating practice (like table service in pubs). Where precise compliance with Government guidance is impractical/impossible allow flexibility to show how alternative arrangements are being put in place to comply with the spirit of the guidance, if not the letter. (Eg. a highly social distanced queuing system at the bar)
And reinforce this with checks from local authority officers/police to ensure compliance with the agreed plan.
Another key point is that it spreads more readily within than between households, and one person out of a household becoming infected is bad news for the rest.
Once again it flags the superspreader phenomenon - that many infected people don’t go on to infect anyone while a few infect very many more. It doesn’t fully resolve why but suggests infectious people may have a shorter period of time when they are especially infectious. This seems to suggest that a lot infected people may have potential to be superspreaders for a short period during their infection? Making timely test and trace absolutely critical, I’d have thought.
So what the policy needs to do is to work out the least disruptive set of changes that can get the average below 1. Right now it seems like there's a strong argument for why it's very harmful to have kids out of school, especially for disadvantaged children, so if there's some leeway, it seems better to use it in places like that, rather than in trying to bring restaurants back to high occupancy.
Like 2002.
Oadby briefly became the second hottest spot in the country a week or so ago, relating it seems to activity like this non socially distanced wedding with 200 guests:
https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/local-news/oadby-restaurant-temporarily-closed-council-4530103
The problem is that to break the virus we need pretty universal following of the rules, and those rules to be enforced before rather than after the fact.
Covid-19 has a 99.8 % survival rate FFS (at least)- the same as flu
"And evidence that Cheltenham did cause some spreading."
I have heard this repeatedly on here but despite asking several times for evidence I have seen none. Do you have any? I am particularly interested because I attended and live in the area.
The town of Cheltenham, in common with the Cotswolds and Gloucestershire generally, have very low Covid numbers now. If there was a Festival spike the region has certainly recovered well.
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2020/apr/21/experts-inquiry-cheltenham-festival-coronavirus-deaths
About a third of millennials in the UK live with their parents. Some portion of these also live with a grandparent. I would hazard a guess this is particularly so in the areas of the country with higher rates of South Asian immigration, which also coincides with areas of the country where work from home is more of a challenge.
Upon getting symptoms and pending a test, or following a positive test, you should be given the option of a tax payer sponsored stay in a local hotel until the required number of days has passed. You’d stop the main source of new infections in its tracks, arrest the upward slide of infection along the age curve, and give a shot in the arm to the hospitality sector.
China had good success with this model but their “hotels” were more like army prisons and you were taken at gunpoint. Singapore adopted a similar model ages ago. There, if you leave the country and come back you have to quarantine in a hotel at your own expense.
I don’t understand why people are prepared to cut the government slack for such a litany of failure. This stuff really isn’t hard.
Anyway we'll never know.
In the UK we have had 41 788 deaths in 398 625 cases. That is a mortality rate of just over 10%.
While clearly we have undercounted cases, it is not by a factor of 2 orders of magnitude.
That means with over 45k dead in this country that over 22.5 million have already had the virus at least here.
Over a quarter of a million excess deaths in the USA, so over 125 million have already had the virus at least there.
Are you sure about that?
What irritates me most about the people wanting to argue against restrictions is the complete disregard for facts. I find a libertarian argument against restrictions quite compelling but this statistical bulls**t just makes it look like you're not understanding the facts.
Furthermore, my suggested approach would mandate much more local authority involvement. They would have the authority to monitor and immediately shut non compliant pubs, without risk of legal challenge. Because part of the legal framework would be local authority sign off.
As locals and Festival-goers know, the whole of Gloucestershire is awash with visitors during the Festival. I would have expected a clear increase in the number of Covid cases following the event. Obviously some of the infected would return home but you would expect the locals to take a hit too.
I'm not saying there wasn't one, but I just haven't seen the evidence. In fact Gloucestershire's near Covid-free status suggests otherwise, which I find strange.