Hartlepool is the 44th target seat for the Tories at the next election.
So if they manage to hold it, they're saying, 'ok, we'll still be above 150 seats'.
What a demise for a once great party.
What a bizarre response, wasn't aware there were any other by-elections going on?
It's not bizarre at all: to put it another way, if the Tories were to take all of their targets at the next election up to and including Hartlepool, they'd have a majority of 168 (!)
We all know it isn't as simple as that. Just because the Tories might win Hartlepool doesn't mean they're going to win all of the seats below it on the "target list" and it also doesn't mean Labour won't win seats off the Tories.
That's true. What is your view @Gallowgate you are closer to where things are.
Teesside is very different to Tyneside so I can't really offer anything valuable.
If @RochdalePioneers who used to live on Teesside and was very involved in local politics thinks the Cons will win then I believe him.
But I do know that Ben Houchen (Teesside's Mayor) is very popular. He's very popular throughout the North East generally to be honest, especially within business, engineering, and industry. I wish the "North of Tyne" mayor was half as good as him.
Frankly I am embarrassed for Paul that he has put this out. Aside from the shite production quality (I used to make him do multiple takes so that he wasn't falling over the material and had the Key Points committed to memory), he knows that the main attack is A Lie.
Pools A&E was shut in 2011 as a result of a review done under the Labour government as part of a Labour councils plural plan to build a super-hospital at Wynyard to replace Hartlepool and North Tees in Stockton (which is a disgusting hovel of a hospital). Paul - as a former CEO of a GP's Co-op in the area - knows this fully well.
He also knows that we can't have a full hospital in every town, especially where they are as close together as they are. Its only when you move out to the countryside that you appreciate how absurd the "my town not your town" arguments are of suburban neighbouring towns. My (younger) son was born in North Tees - an awful experience. His sister was born Out of Town at the closer to where we lived James Cook hospital in Boro. Pools to either North Tees or James Cook is a far shorter journey than it is from here in New Pitsligo down to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, my "closest" A&E now.
Hartlepool is the 44th target seat for the Tories at the next election.
So if they manage to hold it, they're saying, 'ok, we'll still be above 150 seats'.
What a demise for a once great party.
What a bizarre response, wasn't aware there were any other by-elections going on?
It's not bizarre at all: to put it another way, if the Tories were to take all of their targets at the next election up to and including Hartlepool, they'd have a majority of 168 (!)
You have a very one dimensional view on politics don't you?
Hartlepool lost for Labour, perhaps Chingford and Woodford Green won by Labour.
Given that is target 13 for Labour and a semi-metropolitan seat, they'd almost certainly be going backwards nationally if they managed that swap.
I drew a random constituency out of the ether. I wasn't expecting it to be thrust down my throat. There is nothing to say Labour won't lose the by election and retake it at the GE.
BTW thanks for your comment on my header. It was less about preparation for anotner pandemic and more about whether Britain really will take the opportunity provided by Covid to become a science superpower.
In the past, the biggest obstacle to "Science Super-powerdom" has been our govts and Civil Servants' penny pinching and short-sightedness. There was also a factor in the past that you had to be the "right sort" of person but hopefully that particular snobbishness is largely gone.
From John Harrison onwards, scientists and engineers have struggled in the UK. Those who have succeeded have been in spite of the system, not because of it.
The rhetoric and the reality of our government on science:
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
You do realise it is impossible to get to 100% vaccinated?
We are basically at herd immunity now. No one around here is sticking to the rules, and R is below 1...
I know I'm repeating myself, but in israel both the nightclubs and the borders are now open.
And cases continue to fall.
Also the fact every man and his dog are breaking the COVID rules now and going round to see people in each other's houses, etc, and our cases and deaths continue to fall.
The Govt don't realise how behind the curve they are on this.
They are relying on polling and focus groups where people signal their virtue.
Not the cold hard reality of human behaviour.
Sadly I rather suspect people are completely in favour of very strict rules for other people.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
I'm finding myself agreeing with you more and more. Which one of us needs to be worried?
Another thing that hasn't been addressed at all is that on the one hand the government is saying they want a domestic vaccine passport system but has said nothing about insisting on vaccinations to enter the country. Once again the government is putting restrictions on our lives and doing nothing about incoming travellers. The whole thing stinks and the whole lot deserve to be sacked over the failure to close the border and now not insisting on vaccine status to enter.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
You do realise it is impossible to get to 100% vaccinated?
We are basically at herd immunity now. No one around here is sticking to the rules, and R is below 1...
I know I'm repeating myself, but in israel both the nightclubs and the borders are now open.
And cases continue to fall.
Also the fact every man and his dog are breaking the COVID rules now and going round to see people in each other's houses, etc, and our cases and deaths continue to fall.
The Govt don't realise how behind the curve they are on this.
They are relying on polling and focus groups where people signal their virtue.
Not the cold hard reality of human behaviour.
Sadly I rather suspect people are completely in favour of very strict rules for other people.
It's like the tax question.
Some day soon, the tax rises are going to fall on normal people and then we'll see how popular the Tory economic plan really is
Anyway whatever happens I just hope our vaccination programme continues to provide us with reassurance and I doubt that these pilot schemes will cause much of a stir with the public
Good news tonight is our 49 year old daughter receives her first vaccine on Tuesday, our 45 year old son had his first last week along with our 60 year old son in law
There remains our youngest sons partner/fiancee (38) as the only unvaccinated adult in out family group here in the UK
Bunch of old people here (some of whom who seem to spend their lives posting) who have very little going on in their lives, have put young people on hold for a year, now want to reward themselves with a passport to do anything whilst young people get locked inside more.
Hope the young will come out to vote next time and make their feelings known - I doubt it will happen of course but it should.
I genuinely don't know how to get marked improvement in youth turnout. Certainly just lowering the voting age won't do it - if 18 year olds are not voting en masse, that problem is not improved simply by letting 16 year olds vote too.
Given overall turnout it must have been great youth turnout in the 2014 Sindy ref, but obviously those don't come along every year (yet). It's not hard to vote, so I don't buy that electronic voting would improve it significantly even were it not beset with other problems. And the youth are supposedly angry about things every election but we don't get youthquakes every time, so merely there being things they are interested in won't help either.
Would another voting system help? Maybe, but I don't know that youth turnout is necessarily great in places with other systems and the big two here have no reason to support it (Labour would likely do a Trudeau if they won). Compulsory voting? I'm inherently against the idea.
I saw a paper which suggested, as first step, doing voter registration at school like a rite of passage like becoming an adult, civic workshops, trips to polling stations etc, but it feels a bit like leading a horse to water.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
I'm finding myself agreeing with you more and more. Which one of us needs to be worried?
Rook is always sensible, I value their posts extremely highly.
Anyway whatever happens I just hope our vaccination programme continues to provide us with reassurance and I doubt that these pilot schemes will cause much of a stir with the public
Good news tonight is our 49 year old daughter receives her first vaccine on Tuesday, our 45 year old son had his first last week along with our 60 year old son in law
There remains our youngest sons partner/fiancee (38) as the only unvaccinated adult in out family group here in the UK
Good night everyone
Indeed. Almost everywhere I have been this week, I have been the only one not vaccinated. Dorset is a good place to be right now.
BTW thanks for your comment on my header. It was less about preparation for anotner pandemic and more about whether Britain really will take the opportunity provided by Covid to become a science superpower.
In the past, the biggest obstacle to "Science Super-powerdom" has been our govts and Civil Servants' penny pinching and short-sightedness. There was also a factor in the past that you had to be the "right sort" of person but hopefully that particular snobbishness is largely gone.
From John Harrison onwards, scientists and engineers have struggled in the UK. Those who have succeeded have been in spite of the system, not because of it.
The rhetoric and the reality of our government on science:
Seems a no brainer to take a risk of spending more than you need on scientific matters. Not all gambles will pay off but some will, and it probably won't be a massive amount compared to overall spending anyway.
But that may be a result of playing too many basic strategy games telling me the value of developing technologically. Much easier to dominate with a machine gun up against bow and arrow.
Bunch of old people here (some of whom who seem to spend their lives posting) who have very little going on in their lives, have put young people on hold for a year, now want to reward themselves with a passport to do anything whilst young people get locked inside more.
Hope the young will come out to vote next time and make their feelings known - I doubt it will happen of course but it should.
I genuinely don't know how to get marked improvement in youth turnout. Certainly just lowering the voting age won't do it - if 18 year olds are not voting en masse, that problem is not improved simply by letting 16 year olds vote too.
Given overall turnout it must have been great youth turnout in the 2014 Sindy ref, but obviously those don't come along every year (yet). It's not hard to vote, so I don't buy that electronic voting would improve it significantly even were it not beset with other problems. And the youth are supposedly angry about things every election but we don't get youthquakes every time, so merely there being things they are interested in won't help either.
Would another voting system help? Maybe, but I don't know that youth turnout is necessarily great in places with other systems and the big two here have no reason to support it (Labour would likely do a Trudeau if they won). Compulsory voting? I'm inherently against the idea.
I saw a paper which suggested, as first step, doing voter registration at school like a rite of passage like becoming an adult, civic workshops, trips to polling stations etc, but it feels a bit like leading a horse to water.
Young people should come out to vote, because they could actually have a huge impact and get rid of this awful Government. Alas every time they tacitly support their re-election.
As somebody relatively young, every time I am disappointed.
Thanks for the kind post @MrEd, hope you are well too. Unlike so many you are always polite to those you disagree with. We could all learn a lot from you Sir. Sending best wishes.
BTW thanks for your comment on my header. It was less about preparation for anotner pandemic and more about whether Britain really will take the opportunity provided by Covid to become a science superpower.
In the past, the biggest obstacle to "Science Super-powerdom" has been our govts and Civil Servants' penny pinching and short-sightedness. There was also a factor in the past that you had to be the "right sort" of person but hopefully that particular snobbishness is largely gone.
From John Harrison onwards, scientists and engineers have struggled in the UK. Those who have succeeded have been in spite of the system, not because of it.
The rhetoric and the reality of our government on science:
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
Well said.
In addition to uproar from the backbenches, am firmly expecting some significant donor pressure on the Tory party on this matter, too.
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
Daughter remarked to me that if all these new restrictions come in, include Covid ID cards, hospitality will become impossible - or only for the big chains - and unpleasant. She does not want to become the government's internal border guard. In consequence she is thinking hard about whether she wants to continue in this sector at all.
One of this government's legacies will - if these stupid and illiberal policies are enacted - will be the destruction of our civil liberties and of much of the best of our hospitality sector - certainly the small individual venues.
What is the point of getting vaccinated if we then have to be subject to all these controls - with the government determining what is or is not an essential venue, none of which seem to bear any relation to the risk they claim to want to protect us from.
Restrictions are not, IMO, being lifted at all. They are simply being replaced by other forms of restrictions and controls. The illiberal authoritarians are winning.
I hope I am proved wrong. I fear not.
BTW thanks for your comment on my header. It was less about preparation for anotner pandemic and more about whether Britain really will take the opportunity provided by Covid to become a science superpower.
I still have the 'its all a ruse to get a few more people vaccinated' crumb of comfort.
But the other one is every sensible person that I talk to knows it is utterly unworkable.
Just as track and trace in restaurants and caffs is.
So it won't happen.
I don't share your crumb of comfort.
The government has been captured by the authoritarians who have been desperate to impose ID cards on us ever since they were removed. They now have a golden opportunity to do so under the Covid pretext and will continue unless resisted very firmly. I certainly will not use one
Bunch of old people here (some of whom who seem to spend their lives posting) who have very little going on in their lives, have put young people on hold for a year, now want to reward themselves with a passport to do anything whilst young people get locked inside more.
Hope the young will come out to vote next time and make their feelings known - I doubt it will happen of course but it should.
I am very firmly on the side of the young in this debate. And this will determine my vote.
The interesting thing for the Pool by-election are the fringe parties and their potential impact. John Prescott is running again for Brexit/Reform as he did against Paul Williams in Stockton South in 2019. I expect his vote to be a collapse in the vote that Richard Tice got 2 years ago.
On the other side you have the Northern Independence Party who seem to be picking up support from foaming Corbynites. Also in the mix we have the North East party (splitters!) who are represented here on PB by [redacted] who could do well from the people who vote for the various independents.
I'm standing by this being a Tory gain. The joy of politics is that all scenarios are not just possible by do happen, so I will be quite happy to be proven wrong...
Agree but (1) the victim is not a white middle class woman living in Zones 1-2 London and working in a media industry job and (2) the perpetrator is an illegal asylum seeker who should have been kicked out of the country but wasn't so both the authorities and the left are not too keen on having the story being publicised.
Point 1 is the first half of the explanation, but the second is that Sarah Everard was abducted. Lorraine Cox appears to have been persuaded to go back to her killer's home. Both were cruel murders, but the former involved, from the point of view of the media and the wider public that consume it, a more sympathetic victim and far more sensational circumstances.
If point 2 had anything to do with it then why would the majority of the press that is NOT particularly forgiving of failed asylum seekers being left at liberty to commit horrendous crimes not pick up the ball and run with this?
Whilst we are fortunate not to live in an atypically brutal society, people are nonetheless murdered regularly, and killings therefore need to be exceptional to achieve notoriety. The depressing monotony of young men stabbed to death on the streets, and women bludgeoned to death by violent partners at home, goes mostly unnoticed because society is used to it. Like deaths from Winter flu or road traffic accidents, if it doesn't involve you personally, it's just background noise. One column at the bottom of page 14 of a newspaper. Statistics.
I think the fact that Lorraine Cox went back might be part of the reason but only a small part. The bigger part I would argue is the victim is of a similar profile to many of the journalists that would be writing about her. Journalists tend to focus on what they recognise most. How many pictures did we have of North London residents clapping during the lockdowns?
As for Point 2, simple question (and this one is for @stodge as well). Let's say this was a Kurdish woman killed by a white man. Do we think The Guardian would have similarly relegated the story (ps try finding it on their website)?
You had to go to the UK section, then you had to scroll down to near the bottom.
When you read the story, also no mention of the fact that he was an illegal asylum seeker.
Stop embarrassing yourself, from The Guardian article.
Mangori insisted Cox had died from drink and drugs and said he did not call for help because a claim he made for asylum in the UK had been rejected and he was facing deportation.
ASYLUM SEEKER murders woman. Page one.
Anything else a lefty cover up.
Funnily enough, neither you nor @TSE have answered the question before of let's say this was a Kurdish woman killed by a white man, that we wouldn't be hearing cries of systemic racism and something must be done.
So let's rephrase your headline for the NYT, Guardian et al:
WHITE PERSON kills person of colour: Page one
Anything else, systemic racism silencing victims of oppression
You don't seem to understand how modern internet news works.
Media companies promote stories that get the most engagement, because that's what maximizes profits. It's why the Mail Online has the sidebar of shame and why Fox News is a huge success.
If a story isn't being run with the prominence you'd like, it's because it's not generating as much advertising revenue as a story about a pig who can whistle Dixie or the latest EU vaccine debacle.
Now, partly that will be because of outrage fatigue. People just read about one gruesome murder, and they are satiated.
But what it isn't, is a big conspiracy by lefty publications to hide crimes by asylum seekers. Because even those lefty publications (with the exception of the BBC) are run by nasty rapacious capitalists, and if the story generated engagement it would be promoted.
A couple of points here.
Firstly, I mentioned two factors, not one. I would actually say the fact Lorraine Cox was not from the same background as Sarah Everard was a bigger factor in way the two stories were not reported similarly. A murder of a woman graduate living in Zones 1-2 London will attract more media attention - it should not but it does,
Secondly, I think you are being slightly innocent about media companies and pushing stories, and it goes for both the Daily Mail and Fox news types as well as the NYT and the Guardian. Both news organisations appeal to their base and push stories that they want to promote. Conversely, they also don't push stories that they feel are against their view. It is not just an advertising decision. If that was the case, the George Floyd case would not have dominated the news. Even if you would get the audiences it is not exactly a story that advertisers want to have their adverts shown next to. Contextual advertising technology would block out a lot of the coverage as not be
The fact is the decision to push stories is an editorial one. The more liberal media is, on the whole, more wrong on this than the likes of the Daily Mail (I will exclude Fox and the further right wing ones - they are as biased as the liberal side and commit the same sins). Look at the comments today from a leading NBC journalist that the media should abandon objectivity.
If you want an example of that (and you know your US politics), look at the recent coverage over the IA-2 disputed result. Do you really believe that, if it was the Republicans trying that trick on the Democrats under the same circumstances, that there would not have more coverage of that on the national networks?
Or look at what happened in Miami Beach and the "largely peaceful" rioting there and that two black men raped a white woman in a hotel room when she was passed out, stole her phone and her mobile and left her there where she died afterwards. The NYT barely mentioned it in their reporting and had it as a side issue. If it was two white men who did a similar thing to a black woman in the same circumstances, are you really saying that it would have not been pushed more aggressively by the NYT.
Because they were less 'people like us' to the media types than Sarah Everard was.
A rough rule of thumb would give for media prominence:
London is more important than non-London. White is more important than non-white. British is more important than non British. Middle class is more important than working class. Female is more important than male. Young adults are more important than old.
Now compare the people murdered in London in 2021 and see who ticks the most boxes.
Greensill Capital’s administrator has failed to verify invoices underpinning loans to Sanjeev Gupta, after companies listed on the documents denied that they had ever done business with the metals magnate.
If this is true, then things are likely to end very poorly for GFG, Liberty, and for various politicians who guaranteed GFG loans.
Bloody hell, this is Wirecard level of awful. The auditor is going to be in big trouble too.
According to the FT article, there are invoices to firms that do not even have trading relationships with GFG.
That's a major, major issue. Because auditors should check pretty much all major trading relationships actually exist, and then should spot check invoices.
(I don't personally think this is quite as bad as Wirecard, because GFG/Greensill didn't get the UK regulator to threaten journalists who asked awkward questions.)
You might want to clarify that the *UK* regulator did no such thing in the Wirecard situation
Ah yes, I meant BaFin went around threatening journalists who asked awkward questions about Wirecard.
One might note that Greensill also had a German bank regulated by... BaFin. Who failed (once again) to notice any wrongdoing.
The government has been captured by the authoritarians who have been desperate to impose ID cards on us ever since they were removed. They now have a golden opportunity to do so under the Covid pretext and will continue unless resisted very firmly. I certainly will not use one
I don't like to blame officials, but it does seem to be one of those ideas that just hangs around until a government of whatever stripe can be persuaded to take it up. It is no conspiracy to say that Covid had provided an opportunity for some things to happen, good and bad, which many people may have wanted to do for a while (virtual meetings for local authorities being one example), but not everything proposed as a consequence of Covid is a necessary consequence.
Like most, I have little doubt I will follow the requirement if it becomes law, but I won't be happy about it.
BTW thanks for your comment on my header. It was less about preparation for anotner pandemic and more about whether Britain really will take the opportunity provided by Covid to become a science superpower.
In the past, the biggest obstacle to "Science Super-powerdom" has been our govts and Civil Servants' penny pinching and short-sightedness. There was also a factor in the past that you had to be the "right sort" of person but hopefully that particular snobbishness is largely gone.
From John Harrison onwards, scientists and engineers have struggled in the UK. Those who have succeeded have been in spite of the system, not because of it.
The rhetoric and the reality of our government on science:
Thanks for the kind post @MrEd, hope you are well too. Unlike so many you are always polite to those you disagree with. We could all learn a lot from you Sir. Sending best wishes.
Thank you very much @CorrectHorseBattery much appreciated, all good here thanks and hope to see many more posts from you.
Thanks for the kind post @MrEd, hope you are well too. Unlike so many you are always polite to those you disagree with. We could all learn a lot from you Sir. Sending best wishes.
And you too are also very polite to those who you disagree with politically, even if they do not show the same courtesy
Bunch of old people here (some of whom who seem to spend their lives posting) who have very little going on in their lives, have put young people on hold for a year, now want to reward themselves with a passport to do anything whilst young people get locked inside more.
Hope the young will come out to vote next time and make their feelings known - I doubt it will happen of course but it should.
I genuinely don't know how to get marked improvement in youth turnout. Certainly just lowering the voting age won't do it - if 18 year olds are not voting en masse, that problem is not improved simply by letting 16 year olds vote too.
Given overall turnout it must have been great youth turnout in the 2014 Sindy ref, but obviously those don't come along every year (yet). It's not hard to vote, so I don't buy that electronic voting would improve it significantly even were it not beset with other problems. And the youth are supposedly angry about things every election but we don't get youthquakes every time, so merely there being things they are interested in won't help either.
Would another voting system help? Maybe, but I don't know that youth turnout is necessarily great in places with other systems and the big two here have no reason to support it (Labour would likely do a Trudeau if they won). Compulsory voting? I'm inherently against the idea.
I saw a paper which suggested, as first step, doing voter registration at school like a rite of passage like becoming an adult, civic workshops, trips to polling stations etc, but it feels a bit like leading a horse to water.
Young people should come out to vote, because they could actually have a huge impact and get rid of this awful Government. Alas every time they tacitly support their re-election.
As somebody relatively young, every time I am disappointed.
Being disappointed with the young will probably increase more as you age!
Next thing you know, BAM, you're shaking your cane at those hoody wearers near the skatepark.
Agree but (1) the victim is not a white middle class woman living in Zones 1-2 London and working in a media industry job and (2) the perpetrator is an illegal asylum seeker who should have been kicked out of the country but wasn't so both the authorities and the left are not too keen on having the story being publicised.
Point 1 is the first half of the explanation, but the second is that Sarah Everard was abducted. Lorraine Cox appears to have been persuaded to go back to her killer's home. Both were cruel murders, but the former involved, from the point of view of the media and the wider public that consume it, a more sympathetic victim and far more sensational circumstances.
If point 2 had anything to do with it then why would the majority of the press that is NOT particularly forgiving of failed asylum seekers being left at liberty to commit horrendous crimes not pick up the ball and run with this?
Whilst we are fortunate not to live in an atypically brutal society, people are nonetheless murdered regularly, and killings therefore need to be exceptional to achieve notoriety. The depressing monotony of young men stabbed to death on the streets, and women bludgeoned to death by violent partners at home, goes mostly unnoticed because society is used to it. Like deaths from Winter flu or road traffic accidents, if it doesn't involve you personally, it's just background noise. One column at the bottom of page 14 of a newspaper. Statistics.
I think the fact that Lorraine Cox went back might be part of the reason but only a small part. The bigger part I would argue is the victim is of a similar profile to many of the journalists that would be writing about her. Journalists tend to focus on what they recognise most. How many pictures did we have of North London residents clapping during the lockdowns?
As for Point 2, simple question (and this one is for @stodge as well). Let's say this was a Kurdish woman killed by a white man. Do we think The Guardian would have similarly relegated the story (ps try finding it on their website)?
You had to go to the UK section, then you had to scroll down to near the bottom.
When you read the story, also no mention of the fact that he was an illegal asylum seeker.
Stop embarrassing yourself, from The Guardian article.
Mangori insisted Cox had died from drink and drugs and said he did not call for help because a claim he made for asylum in the UK had been rejected and he was facing deportation.
I'll do that if you also stop embarrassing yourself by pretending that the Lorraine Cox has been handled differently to Sarah Everard.
I haven't said that, I've said it is different because the alleged perpetrator is a copper.
You keep on saying stuff that turns out to be bollocks.
As @kle4 has already pointed out, the Sarah Everard case was already dominating headlines before it was known the alleged perpetrator was a copper. It is a very easy thing to go back and fact check.
So, may I humbly suggest, you stop sprouting bollocks yourself in trying to suggest that the only reason why the Sarah Everard got attention was because of the Police Officer factor. It is not borne out by the evidence.
Because she was missing, there were appeals to find her.
As there have been for Richard Okorogheye in recent days.
As far I am aware there were plenty of appeals for Ms Cox at the time, not my fault if people like you can't remember it.
Jesus, you are right @TSE, the Plymouth Herald - a national media giant with the same range and national reach as the BBC and The Guardian. God, how could I have overlooked that.
Did the appeals for Lorraine Cox ever get the same coverage on the national sites?
Are we seriously suggesting us oldies can go out and enjoy ourselves, waited on by a bunch of youngsters, on, or often, below, the minimum wage? Whilst saying that these same youngsters aren't allowed to spend their meagre income enjoying themselves in similar places on their days off? Really?
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
You do realise it is impossible to get to 100% vaccinated?
We are basically at herd immunity now. No one around here is sticking to the rules, and R is below 1...
I know I'm repeating myself, but in israel both the nightclubs and the borders are now open.
And cases continue to fall.
Also the fact every man and his dog are breaking the COVID rules now and going round to see people in each other's houses, etc, and our cases and deaths continue to fall.
The Govt don't realise how behind the curve they are on this.
They are relying on polling and focus groups where people signal their virtue.
Not the cold hard reality of human behaviour.
Everyone breaking the rules might be both of your experience. It is not mine. Therefore let’s work off the polling and other numbers shall we?
Have you not heard the middle class definition of a bubble? 'Everyone you want to invite around for a cuppa in your kitchen'.
I thought that the middle class had coffee mornings, not a humble cuppa? Or am I a generation behind the times?
Perhaps they could aquire a Thermos and go wild tea drinking?
Are we seriously suggesting us oldies can go out and enjoy ourselves, waited on by a bunch of youngsters, on, or often, below, the minimum wage? Whilst saying that these same youngsters aren't allowed to spend their meagre income enjoying themselves in similar places on their days off? Really?
Yes, that is exactly what some prats here are suggesting.
Another reason why the vaccine passport is a stupid idea — no one will use it. People might say they support the idea in the polling but look at the pathetic uptake of the NHS COVID tracking app.
Nobody bothers with any of the checking in anymore because it's a right faff on.
...Maybe it would have been better to keep the pubs closed for a few more weeks...
Nurse!
If you have two rubbish options you have to choose the least worst one. Doesn't mean you like either of them.
I’m pulling your leg!
That said, it’s hard to see how shuttering pubs for even longer would be anything other than the worst option!
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
You are in a much better place about all this than a few weeks ago. Happy for you.
The last thing that really derailed me was the panic over the SA variant. Once it became apparent that (a) the Kent plague had effectively already crowded it out, (b) that (according to my limited understanding of the science, at any rate) something even worse was unlikely to emerge any time soon, and (c) deaths and hospitalisations continued to drop like a stone (and are still doing so,) I gradually began to feel more comfortable about the situation.
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
On topic, the polling discussed above certainly confirms that direct support for Alba in Scotland is about three times that of local membership of Hell's Angels & other outlaw motorcycle gangs (1%ers).
Or in other words, the Salmond extended family + our Malcolm + folks to who Sturgeon was exceptionally and personally "nippy".
HOWEVER, methinks that the poll does NOT get to the heart of the matter in this instance.
Which appears to be, how many Scots are likely to give Alba their LIST vote, after having voted for an SNPer with their constituency vote?
Reckon that THAT number plus the hard-core Albanians amounts to more than 3%. BUT how much more?
One of the sad things about the vaccine ID cards proposal is that I have been personally a bit extra cautious over the last year. I didn't take advantage of the loosening of restrictions last summer to go back to hotels and restaurants. We considered it, and we decided that the theatre of wearing a mask and disinfecting our hands was going to introduce a sense of peril that wouldn't make the experience enjoyable.
So I have fallen completely out of the habit of going anywhere, which will make it a lot easier to not start again if I have to show a stupid ID card to do so. That doesn't mean I'll be locked away at home on my own. I'd still be able to visit friends and family.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
You do realise it is impossible to get to 100% vaccinated?
We are basically at herd immunity now. No one around here is sticking to the rules, and R is below 1...
I know I'm repeating myself, but in israel both the nightclubs and the borders are now open.
And cases continue to fall.
Also the fact every man and his dog are breaking the COVID rules now and going round to see people in each other's houses, etc, and our cases and deaths continue to fall.
The Govt don't realise how behind the curve they are on this.
They are relying on polling and focus groups where people signal their virtue.
Not the cold hard reality of human behaviour.
Everyone breaking the rules might be both of your experience. It is not mine. Therefore let’s work off the polling and other numbers shall we?
Have you not heard the middle class definition of a bubble? 'Everyone you want to invite around for a cuppa in your kitchen'.
I thought that the middle class had coffee mornings, not a humble cuppa? Or am I a generation behind the times?
Perhaps they could aquire a Thermos and go wild tea drinking?
Weren't coffee mornings something people who aspired to be middle class did in 1970s sitcoms ?
Are we seriously suggesting us oldies can go out and enjoy ourselves, waited on by a bunch of youngsters, on, or often, below, the minimum wage? Whilst saying that these same youngsters aren't allowed to spend their meagre income enjoying themselves in similar places on their days off? Really?
I wonder why the young think that boomers are self-centred c*nts.
If as a govt your every policy to restrict liberty (for good reason or bad) has been rewarded by an increase in your polling lead why on earth would you not continue with illiberal policies?
"The public aren’t fools. They know that there is clear evidence of racism amongst certain sections of the press and degrees of institutionalised racism and unconscious bias across the industry."
Hmm. Surely that poll shows that 51% of the public are fools, since they did not agree with the statement that the press has a problem with racism. "The public' do not know there is clear evidence, a plurality of them know it.
That said I'd have answered slightly agree to the question, though I don't know how the commentator presumed stuff about unconscious bias when that wasn't part of the question unless there's info they are not quoting.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
You are in a much better place about all this than a few weeks ago. Happy for you.
The last thing that really derailed me was the panic over the SA variant. Once it became apparent that (a) the Kent plague had effectively already crowded it out, (b) that (according to my limited understanding of the science, at any rate) something even worse was unlikely to emerge any time soon, and (c) deaths and hospitalisations continued to drop like a stone (and are still doing so,) I gradually began to feel more comfortable about the situation.
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
I know three people in their 40s who have been vaccinated in the last week.
So you might be getting yours sooner than you expected.
Greensill Capital’s administrator has failed to verify invoices underpinning loans to Sanjeev Gupta, after companies listed on the documents denied that they had ever done business with the metals magnate.
If this is true, then things are likely to end very poorly for GFG, Liberty, and for various politicians who guaranteed GFG loans.
Bloody hell, this is Wirecard level of awful. The auditor is going to be in big trouble too.
According to the FT article, there are invoices to firms that do not even have trading relationships with GFG.
That's a major, major issue. Because auditors should check pretty much all major trading relationships actually exist, and then should spot check invoices.
(I don't personally think this is quite as bad as Wirecard, because GFG/Greensill didn't get the UK regulator to threaten journalists who asked awkward questions.)
You might want to clarify that the *UK* regulator did no such thing in the Wirecard situation
Ah yes, I meant BaFin went around threatening journalists who asked awkward questions about Wirecard.
One might note that Greensill also had a German bank regulated by... BaFin. Who failed (once again) to notice any wrongdoing.
BaFin doesn’t have the best track record...
Depends on perspective, they have an excellent track record for the businesses under their oversight
Hartlepool is the 44th target seat for the Tories at the next election.
So if they manage to hold it, they're saying, 'ok, we'll still be above 150 seats'.
What a demise for a once great party.
What a bizarre response, wasn't aware there were any other by-elections going on?
It's not bizarre at all: to put it another way, if the Tories were to take all of their targets at the next election up to and including Hartlepool, they'd have a majority of 168 (!)
You have a very one dimensional view on politics don't you?
Hartlepool lost for Labour, perhaps Chingford and Woodford Green won by Labour.
Any election in which Labour loses Hartlepool is indeed going to be very one-dimensional for them - mainly because they'll be squashed as flat as a pancake...
It's a by election in a pandemic. It may be significant in the long term, it may be insignificant.
As a snapshot it is important because it tells us where we are with the blue/red wall. For what it's worth I think the red wall remains solidly behind Johnson (not necessarily the Conservatives) for the moment at least.
Fair choice, though a law they passed in 1998 may not really speak to what a party is like now. The big two already get too much of a pass for past accomplishments as it is.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
You are in a much better place about all this than a few weeks ago. Happy for you.
The last thing that really derailed me was the panic over the SA variant. Once it became apparent that (a) the Kent plague had effectively already crowded it out, (b) that (according to my limited understanding of the science, at any rate) something even worse was unlikely to emerge any time soon, and (c) deaths and hospitalisations continued to drop like a stone (and are still doing so,) I gradually began to feel more comfortable about the situation.
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
Masks are a weird thing, aren’t they? On my walk to the shops earlier to buy steak and wine, I saw three or four people walking alone, with nobody anywhere near them, wearing masks. I’ve done it myself several times, albeit briefly, when I’ve plain forgotten to take my mask off. But I wondered, did all these people forget? Or were they wearing a mask deliberately, alone, outdoors in the freshening breeze? Dunno.
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
If as a govt your every policy to restrict liberty (for good reason or bad) has been rewarded by an increase in your polling lead why on earth would you not continue with illiberal policies?
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
What I find particularly frustrating is the only agitation I find for this illiberal nonsense is from the older generation who have already asked too much of the younger generation. For a year.
I am wary of that accusation, especially as my wife and I are elderly pensioners, but we all need to recognise a responsible and monitored return to normal is in everyone’s interests and it has to be said, I do believe the population at large are on this page but not on this forum which seems to want to go back to normal and risk further variants and serious issues
It is fair to say none of this will effect us directly as attendance at sporting events, restaurants and pubs are not on our agenda
However, it does not stop us seeing the broader picture and I am not making selfish comments against our very precious young who include our grandchildren
I am 34. Not a single person I know of (aged 15-80) is in favour of tightening restrictions and becoming a papers please type of society. They all have a decent understanding of how science works. They also enjoy the freedoms that this country usually stands for.
I enjoy sports events, gigs, bars and restaurants. Perhaps let my generation, who have suffered a lot to save the older generation, take the lead on this. If for no other reason than we are the likely customers, and also those whose civil liberties will be infringed.
I understand the cry for freedom but a sensible opening of the economy benefits everyone and it is not going to be for longer than necessary, though I do think vaccine passports will become compulsory for all foreign travel possibly for years
"Not going to be for longer than necessary"?
I'm sorry, I just don't believe it.
As has been discussed at length, the 'necessary' length of time is zero days. It's already unnecessary.
And government's track record of 'temporary' measures - particularly with regard to the last twelve months - has been discouraging to say the least.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
You are in a much better place about all this than a few weeks ago. Happy for you.
The last thing that really derailed me was the panic over the SA variant. Once it became apparent that (a) the Kent plague had effectively already crowded it out, (b) that (according to my limited understanding of the science, at any rate) something even worse was unlikely to emerge any time soon, and (c) deaths and hospitalisations continued to drop like a stone (and are still doing so,) I gradually began to feel more comfortable about the situation.
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
I know three people in their 40s who have been vaccinated in the last week.
So you might be getting yours sooner than you expected.
Don't forget the switch to focus on second doses in April. Fair number of first doses happening at present, but it will still likely be down on recent months.
Greensill Capital’s administrator has failed to verify invoices underpinning loans to Sanjeev Gupta, after companies listed on the documents denied that they had ever done business with the metals magnate.
If this is true, then things are likely to end very poorly for GFG, Liberty, and for various politicians who guaranteed GFG loans.
Bloody hell, this is Wirecard level of awful. The auditor is going to be in big trouble too.
According to the FT article, there are invoices to firms that do not even have trading relationships with GFG.
That's a major, major issue. Because auditors should check pretty much all major trading relationships actually exist, and then should spot check invoices.
(I don't personally think this is quite as bad as Wirecard, because GFG/Greensill didn't get the UK regulator to threaten journalists who asked awkward questions.)
You might want to clarify that the *UK* regulator did no such thing in the Wirecard situation
Ah yes, I meant BaFin went around threatening journalists who asked awkward questions about Wirecard.
One might note that Greensill also had a German bank regulated by... BaFin. Who failed (once again) to notice any wrongdoing.
BaFin doesn’t have the best track record...
Depends on perspective, they have an excellent track record for the businesses under their oversight
Don't you mean "the businesses over their undersight"?
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
Thanks! Point of order though - I'm a bloke
Oh sorry! I don’t know why I thought that. Apologies.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
You are in a much better place about all this than a few weeks ago. Happy for you.
The last thing that really derailed me was the panic over the SA variant. Once it became apparent that (a) the Kent plague had effectively already crowded it out, (b) that (according to my limited understanding of the science, at any rate) something even worse was unlikely to emerge any time soon, and (c) deaths and hospitalisations continued to drop like a stone (and are still doing so,) I gradually began to feel more comfortable about the situation.
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
Masks are a weird thing, aren’t they? On my walk to the shops earlier to buy steak and wine, I saw three or four people walking alone, with nobody anywhere near them, wearing masks. I’ve done it myself several times, albeit briefly, when I’ve plain forgotten to take my mask off. But I wondered, did all these people forget? Or were they wearing a mask deliberately, alone, outdoors in the freshening breeze? Dunno.
Hard to say in these cases. I don't generally see people out in them, though I did leave mine on when I was walking home from shopping this afternoon - realised I'd left it about a third of the way back and then couldn't be bothered.
More generally, I'm content to put up with the things as we come out of the emergency, and I can envisage limited circumstances in which they might be retained or come back (am thinking here about public transport journeys during the Winter illness season,) but the widespread, mandatory deployment of the things should be stopped soon. The performance where one has to arrive at a pub or restaurant in one, taking it off to sit down at the table but having to use it again if you need to get up to go to the flipping loo, is particularly irksome and ridiculous.
As expected Alba is a damp squib. I predicted as much.
It is REALLY hard to get over 5% as a new party, especially when your leader is a known (but legally unblemished) sex pest.
What is disappointing from a Unionist perspective is no obvious “bounce” for Anas Sarwar and little damage to the SNP. And the Greens appear completely unscathed.
No, it's gravy for unionists. The Nationalist cause is schismatized, and seems bitterly divided, and Boris can dismiss the new Holyrood as a gamed system
If Alba do this badly, Salmond has done terrible damage to indy. We shall see
The way this poll in the header looks, the embarrassing and degrading mess over the last months has not dampened enthusiasm for an SNP majority. The SNP are through the worst too and are likely to get stronger.
Schisms are bad. I know you want the SNP to win so Scotland goes indy to punish us for voting Brexit, but, schisms are bad. They generally hinder the cause
It would be surprising, but not impossible, if this were an exception, but so far it looks like proving the rule
I readily admit that if Alba gets 15 seats on the List (and the SNP gets zillions of constituency seats) then that will boost the indy cause. Boris will still refuse a vote, but there is then a chance that Scotland will surge into passive mass resistance and Mahatama Gandhi stylee bullshit.
And then, after five years, the YES vote could be consistently over 60% and Britain is done for. Certainly possible
It was only Attlee's Labour Party who granted Gandhi Indian independence, Churchill's Tory led government ignored him on the whole
Churchill’s Tory led government that locked him in prison for two years?
The point being they certainly did not concede him anything, it was only Attlee's Labour Party winning the 1945 election that led to Indian independence in 1947
It was an awful lot more complicated than that. True. Churchill refused to consider anything while the war was on, but between American support for decolonisation, the concession of a stated goal of Dominion status in 1935, the weak economic position of Britain, unrest elsewhere spreading the army very thin and the situation in India itself, there was no realistic way that India would have remained a British colony much beyond 1947 even if the ghosts of F E Smith and Clive had been leading the government.
It might have been postponed to 1949-50, but realistically not later. The French couldn’t even hold Vietnam beyond 1954 and they wasted an awful lot of men, time and effort trying.
Of course, if it had been delayed to 1949 there might have been no partition as the death of Jinnah would have removed a key obstacle. But don’t delude yourself* that Churchill would somehow have clung on for a significant length of time more than Attlee did.
* Admittedly this would be a break with a fine PB traidition.
Britain would probably have been able to hold on in some form or another for quite a long time if WW2 had not broken out. The Princely States would have backed them (generally) and the composition of the Indian Army pre-WW2 meant they had a reliable force to suppress disorder.
And Churchill would never have been PM if WWII had not broken out, the succession remaining in the hands of the Chamberlain group who wrote the Government of India Act, so the point is moot.
That is true for this particular discussion but there is the wider question of how long the British would have stayed on in India if WW2 had not broken out. Commitment to India was strong amongst a lot of elements and there was also the realisation of how important Indian Army firepower would be in a military conflict. It is hard to imagine the UK Government would have let India follow the path of the Irish Free State.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
You are in a much better place about all this than a few weeks ago. Happy for you.
The last thing that really derailed me was the panic over the SA variant. Once it became apparent that (a) the Kent plague had effectively already crowded it out, (b) that (according to my limited understanding of the science, at any rate) something even worse was unlikely to emerge any time soon, and (c) deaths and hospitalisations continued to drop like a stone (and are still doing so,) I gradually began to feel more comfortable about the situation.
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
I know three people in their 40s who have been vaccinated in the last week.
So you might be getting yours sooner than you expected.
Don't forget the switch to focus on second doses in April. Fair number of first doses happening at present, but it will still likely be down on recent months.
But there are a few good signs.
First doses this week have been higher than expected.
Northern Ireland are officially now vaccinating the 45-49 group.
Reports from Scotland about Moderna arriving next week.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
Well said.
In addition to uproar from the backbenches, am firmly expecting some significant donor pressure on the Tory party on this matter, too.
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
His conviction was he didn’t know! I was just going to ask if anyone wanted to price up, just for fun, whether Labour would
Greensill Capital’s administrator has failed to verify invoices underpinning loans to Sanjeev Gupta, after companies listed on the documents denied that they had ever done business with the metals magnate.
If this is true, then things are likely to end very poorly for GFG, Liberty, and for various politicians who guaranteed GFG loans.
Bloody hell, this is Wirecard level of awful. The auditor is going to be in big trouble too.
According to the FT article, there are invoices to firms that do not even have trading relationships with GFG.
That's a major, major issue. Because auditors should check pretty much all major trading relationships actually exist, and then should spot check invoices.
(I don't personally think this is quite as bad as Wirecard, because GFG/Greensill didn't get the UK regulator to threaten journalists who asked awkward questions.)
You might want to clarify that the *UK* regulator did no such thing in the Wirecard situation
Ah yes, I meant BaFin went around threatening journalists who asked awkward questions about Wirecard.
One might note that Greensill also had a German bank regulated by... BaFin. Who failed (once again) to notice any wrongdoing.
BaFin doesn’t have the best track record...
It is by some margin the worst financial regulator in Europe.
Are we seriously suggesting us oldies can go out and enjoy ourselves, waited on by a bunch of youngsters, on, or often, below, the minimum wage? Whilst saying that these same youngsters aren't allowed to spend their meagre income enjoying themselves in similar places on their days off? Really?
Yes.I have been making this point ad nauseam on here for days. Then the government says "oh no they won't be brought in until everyone's been vaccinated". At which point there is no point to them.
That's why it's obvious to me that Covid is simply being used as a pretext for ID cards and a Chinese-style social credit system.
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
Thanks! Point of order though - I'm a bloke
Oh sorry! I don’t know why I thought that. Apologies.
Probably because I mention my husband at regular intervals, which would result in inevitable assumptions. The rainbow flag brigades are not *that* numerous (though it'll be interesting to see what the census returns have to say about that.)
If as a govt your every policy to restrict liberty (for good reason or bad) has been rewarded by an increase in your polling lead why on earth would you not continue with illiberal policies?
Letting people with vaccine passports into pubs is probably more liberal than refusing to allow pubs to open at all!
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
What I find particularly frustrating is the only agitation I find for this illiberal nonsense is from the older generation who have already asked too much of the younger generation. For a year.
I am wary of that accusation, especially as my wife and I are elderly pensioners, but we all need to recognise a responsible and monitored return to normal is in everyone’s interests and it has to be said, I do believe the population at large are on this page but not on this forum which seems to want to go back to normal and risk further variants and serious issues
It is fair to say none of this will effect us directly as attendance at sporting events, restaurants and pubs are not on our agenda
However, it does not stop us seeing the broader picture and I am not making selfish comments against our very precious young who include our grandchildren
I am 34. Not a single person I know of (aged 15-80) is in favour of tightening restrictions and becoming a papers please type of society. They all have a decent understanding of how science works. They also enjoy the freedoms that this country usually stands for.
I enjoy sports events, gigs, bars and restaurants. Perhaps let my generation, who have suffered a lot to save the older generation, take the lead on this. If for no other reason than we are the likely customers, and also those whose civil liberties will be infringed.
I understand the cry for freedom but a sensible opening of the economy benefits everyone and it is not going to be for longer than necessary, though I do think vaccine passports will become compulsory for all foreign travel possibly for years
"Not going to be for longer than necessary"?
I'm sorry, I just don't believe it.
As has been discussed at length, the 'necessary' length of time is zero days. It's already unnecessary.
And government's track record of 'temporary' measures - particularly with regard to the last twelve months - has been discouraging to say the least.
Indeed. I have said several times before, it’s a truly bizarre world where I see Steve Baker on the telly of a Sunday morning and find myself nodding in agreement. One cannot and should not assume that the government will willingly relinquish the powers it has gained. History teaches us that powerful is rarely if ever relinquished voluntarily.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
Well said.
In addition to uproar from the backbenches, am firmly expecting some significant donor pressure on the Tory party on this matter, too.
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
His conviction was he didn’t know! I was just going to ask if anyone wanted to price up, just for fun, whether Labour would
Back Oppose Or Abstain
When this is put to the vote
They'll make some feeble criticisms of it then vote in such a way that the measures pass.
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
Well said.
In addition to uproar from the backbenches, am firmly expecting some significant donor pressure on the Tory party on this matter, too.
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
His conviction was he didn’t know! I was just going to ask if anyone wanted to price up, just for fun, whether Labour would
Back Oppose Or Abstain
When this is put to the vote
Well you are right in your implication, it is hard to say (and I certainly wouldn’t want to bet on it). I just hope he stands up against it!
Covid passport trials to begin at UK events this month
FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part in pilot schemes
Covid passports are set to be trialled at events in Britain within weeks, The Telegraph can reveal, as the Government pushes ahead with the idea despite a growing rebellion by MPs.
New details of around a dozen pilot schemes for safely opening large events will be announced in the coming days, with plans to trial Covid certification checks. The FA Cup final, an FA Cup semi-final, the League Cup final and the World Snooker Championship are taking part, with the Brit Awards also in discussions.
People going to the events will be asked to take a Covid test to gain entry and another after attendance so that any spreading of the virus can be monitored. Government scientists are closely involved in designing the pilots and will watch everything from crowd flows to ventilation systems to learn lessons about running large events.
Multiple Government sources involved in the planning told The Telegraph it is hoped that Covid passports – producing a certificate showing your virus status – will feature in some pilots.
The events will run throughout April and May, and ministers want enough conclusions to be drawn for the reopening of large events to be able to happen from as early as mid-June.
While events in April will require a negative Covid test to gain entry, it is hoped some of the pilots in May can trial an updated NHS app which shows whether someone has had a jab, negative test or antibodies – what has been described a Covid passport.
I think on this issue Johnson is right and both Starmer and all the posters here on PB are wrong. What's the problem with carrying ID? I had to pull out my driving licence to claim a pre ordered packet of hinges from Screwfix today.
I also have a Chinese mobile phone so President Xi, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos all know where I am, so I don't suppose a vaccine passport will make much difference.
First rule of politics.
Learn how to count.
Boris doesn't have the votes for this.
I think you will find he has even if it goes to a vote
Nope. I expect a Tory rebellion of around 70 on this.
This is a pilot to open the economy and no, I do not believe this will not get through, even if it is voted on
Herd immunity solves the problem, not kowtowing to fearties (who almost certainly won't be there anyway, because frit).
We are some way off herd immunity and the public are highly risk averse
This policy will be very popular as people see it as the start of a way back to more normal times
This is ridiculous @Big_G_NorthWales . You still haven't explained what the benefit of these vaccine passports are. All you say is "they are coming". I know they are coming but I asked what the benefit of them is.
The vaccine is the way back to normal times. Not this distraction.
I agree once we are 100% vaccinated and the pandemic is largely under control in Europe and elsewhere
However, we need to start up the economy long before then in a way that has public support and is not seen as reckless
The pandemic is almost over in the UK, and you solve the problem of large-scale importation from abroad with travel restrictions. Small-scale importation (e.g. through truck drivers) isn't going to be prevented by these mechanisms and will only cause serious harm if a variant that completely escapes the vaccines gets into the country. In that (AIUI very unlikely) scenario we'll all end up back in lockdown before very long and vaccine passports will be of no useful effect in stopping that.
A sophisticated system of vaccine passports obviously isn't going to be in place for the re-opening on April 12th, and even if it can somehow be got up and running by May 17th the virus will be heavily suppressed by that point, the Covid wards nearly empty, deaths almost down to nothing, and quite likely all the over 40s will have been vaccinated to boot. The only use it has under those circumstances is to impose divisive discrimination upon the young that will, in any event, do almost nothing to protect the middle aged or elderly.
We don't need these mechanisms to re-open the economy safely. The unlocking timetable is cautious in the extreme as it is: any notion that it's somehow reckless, when we are waiting five full weeks between each of these little baby steps (with SAGE nervously poring over every fresh scrap of data in the meantime, just in case they discover justification for slowing down even more,) is laughable. Moreover, by the time we get to mid-May, it's going to be virtually as safe as it is ever going to get for all the most vulnerable groups: everyone over 50 bar a handful of anti-vaxxers will have long since been jabbed by that point, and the over 70s and shielders will have been done twice.
Vaccine passports are a pointless imposition which will do nothing but impose costly burdens on businesses, in the form of the extra effort and expense needed to police their proper usage. The UK hospitality sector doesn't want vaccine passports, any more than the Spanish tourism sector wants state-enforced masking on beaches. They are a nuisance and deleterious to trade. They've nothing to do with economic renewal and everything to do with authoritarianism and the expansion of state power.
You are in a much better place about all this than a few weeks ago. Happy for you.
The last thing that really derailed me was the panic over the SA variant. Once it became apparent that (a) the Kent plague had effectively already crowded it out, (b) that (according to my limited understanding of the science, at any rate) something even worse was unlikely to emerge any time soon, and (c) deaths and hospitalisations continued to drop like a stone (and are still doing so,) I gradually began to feel more comfortable about the situation.
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
Originally we were told the lockdown was only necessary to prevent NHS beds being oversubscribed (if that is the right word to use). How long has it been since that has been a problem in hospitals?
Anyway whatever happens I just hope our vaccination programme continues to provide us with reassurance and I doubt that these pilot schemes will cause much of a stir with the public
Good news tonight is our 49 year old daughter receives her first vaccine on Tuesday, our 45 year old son had his first last week along with our 60 year old son in law
There remains our youngest sons partner/fiancee (38) as the only unvaccinated adult in out family group here in the UK
As expected Alba is a damp squib. I predicted as much.
It is REALLY hard to get over 5% as a new party, especially when your leader is a known (but legally unblemished) sex pest.
What is disappointing from a Unionist perspective is no obvious “bounce” for Anas Sarwar and little damage to the SNP. And the Greens appear completely unscathed.
No, it's gravy for unionists. The Nationalist cause is schismatized, and seems bitterly divided, and Boris can dismiss the new Holyrood as a gamed system
If Alba do this badly, Salmond has done terrible damage to indy. We shall see
The way this poll in the header looks, the embarrassing and degrading mess over the last months has not dampened enthusiasm for an SNP majority. The SNP are through the worst too and are likely to get stronger.
Schisms are bad. I know you want the SNP to win so Scotland goes indy to punish us for voting Brexit, but, schisms are bad. They generally hinder the cause
It would be surprising, but not impossible, if this were an exception, but so far it looks like proving the rule
I readily admit that if Alba gets 15 seats on the List (and the SNP gets zillions of constituency seats) then that will boost the indy cause. Boris will still refuse a vote, but there is then a chance that Scotland will surge into passive mass resistance and Mahatama Gandhi stylee bullshit.
And then, after five years, the YES vote could be consistently over 60% and Britain is done for. Certainly possible
It was only Attlee's Labour Party who granted Gandhi Indian independence, Churchill's Tory led government ignored him on the whole
Churchill’s Tory led government that locked him in prison for two years?
He should count himself lucky he wasn't hanged, amiright @HYUFD ?
Quite a few Tories - including Terry Dicks MP - wished to see Nelson Mandela suffer the same fate.
If as a govt your every policy to restrict liberty (for good reason or bad) has been rewarded by an increase in your polling lead why on earth would you not continue with illiberal policies?
Letting people with vaccine passports into pubs is probably more liberal than refusing to allow pubs to open at all!
Greensill Capital’s administrator has failed to verify invoices underpinning loans to Sanjeev Gupta, after companies listed on the documents denied that they had ever done business with the metals magnate.
If this is true, then things are likely to end very poorly for GFG, Liberty, and for various politicians who guaranteed GFG loans.
Bloody hell, this is Wirecard level of awful. The auditor is going to be in big trouble too.
According to the FT article, there are invoices to firms that do not even have trading relationships with GFG.
That's a major, major issue. Because auditors should check pretty much all major trading relationships actually exist, and then should spot check invoices.
(I don't personally think this is quite as bad as Wirecard, because GFG/Greensill didn't get the UK regulator to threaten journalists who asked awkward questions.)
You might want to clarify that the *UK* regulator did no such thing in the Wirecard situation
Ah yes, I meant BaFin went around threatening journalists who asked awkward questions about Wirecard.
One might note that Greensill also had a German bank regulated by... BaFin. Who failed (once again) to notice any wrongdoing.
BaFin doesn’t have the best track record...
It is by some margin the worst financial regulator in Europe.
Take that, er, Maltese Financial Services Authority.
As expected Alba is a damp squib. I predicted as much.
It is REALLY hard to get over 5% as a new party, especially when your leader is a known (but legally unblemished) sex pest.
What is disappointing from a Unionist perspective is no obvious “bounce” for Anas Sarwar and little damage to the SNP. And the Greens appear completely unscathed.
No, it's gravy for unionists. The Nationalist cause is schismatized, and seems bitterly divided, and Boris can dismiss the new Holyrood as a gamed system
If Alba do this badly, Salmond has done terrible damage to indy. We shall see
The way this poll in the header looks, the embarrassing and degrading mess over the last months has not dampened enthusiasm for an SNP majority. The SNP are through the worst too and are likely to get stronger.
Schisms are bad. I know you want the SNP to win so Scotland goes indy to punish us for voting Brexit, but, schisms are bad. They generally hinder the cause
It would be surprising, but not impossible, if this were an exception, but so far it looks like proving the rule
I readily admit that if Alba gets 15 seats on the List (and the SNP gets zillions of constituency seats) then that will boost the indy cause. Boris will still refuse a vote, but there is then a chance that Scotland will surge into passive mass resistance and Mahatama Gandhi stylee bullshit.
And then, after five years, the YES vote could be consistently over 60% and Britain is done for. Certainly possible
It was only Attlee's Labour Party who granted Gandhi Indian independence, Churchill's Tory led government ignored him on the whole
Churchill’s Tory led government that locked him in prison for two years?
The point being they certainly did not concede him anything, it was only Attlee's Labour Party winning the 1945 election that led to Indian independence in 1947
It was an awful lot more complicated than that. True. Churchill refused to consider anything while the war was on, but between American support for decolonisation, the concession of a stated goal of Dominion status in 1935, the weak economic position of Britain, unrest elsewhere spreading the army very thin and the situation in India itself, there was no realistic way that India would have remained a British colony much beyond 1947 even if the ghosts of F E Smith and Clive had been leading the government.
It might have been postponed to 1949-50, but realistically not later. The French couldn’t even hold Vietnam beyond 1954 and they wasted an awful lot of men, time and effort trying.
Of course, if it had been delayed to 1949 there might have been no partition as the death of Jinnah would have removed a key obstacle. But don’t delude yourself* that Churchill would somehow have clung on for a significant length of time more than Attlee did.
* Admittedly this would be a break with a fine PB traidition.
Britain would probably have been able to hold on in some form or another for quite a long time if WW2 had not broken out. The Princely States would have backed them (generally) and the composition of the Indian Army pre-WW2 meant they had a reliable force to suppress disorder.
And Churchill would never have been PM if WWII had not broken out, the succession remaining in the hands of the Chamberlain group who wrote the Government of India Act, so the point is moot.
That is true for this particular discussion but there is the wider question of how long the British would have stayed on in India if WW2 had not broken out. Commitment to India was strong amongst a lot of elements and there was also the realisation of how important Indian Army firepower would be in a military conflict. It is hard to imagine the UK Government would have let India follow the path of the Irish Free State.
Dominion Status by 1947, surely?
It is the whole world of counter-factuals but, even if there had been Dominion status by 1947 in a "WW2 didn't happen world", India would have been too important to the UK to let it decide to do it's own thing like Ireland. My guess is there would have been some serious weighting for the Indian Princely States with no partition which would have meant likely continual mistrust between Nehru and Jinnah.
One of the sad things about the vaccine ID cards proposal is that I have been personally a bit extra cautious over the last year. I didn't take advantage of the loosening of restrictions last summer to go back to hotels and restaurants. We considered it, and we decided that the theatre of wearing a mask and disinfecting our hands was going to introduce a sense of peril that wouldn't make the experience enjoyable.
So I have fallen completely out of the habit of going anywhere, which will make it a lot easier to not start again if I have to show a stupid ID card to do so. That doesn't mean I'll be locked away at home on my own. I'd still be able to visit friends and family.
Quite agree. Masks, and hand sanitiser, and vaccine passports, and yellow tape on the floor, and the constant FUCKING hectoring seems to be generally viewed as cost free. It isn't - it makes the whole process of doing anything that much less enjoyable, to the point where - with the exception of buying food to stay alive - nothing is worth doing any more.
By the by, France's covid stats are weird. They've basically been between 300-400 deaths a day since early December as a 7 day average apparently. It's presently at the low end of that, but the case rate suggests that will change, but it is still oddly flat (with slight trend down) for a long time.
If as a govt your every policy to restrict liberty (for good reason or bad) has been rewarded by an increase in your polling lead why on earth would you not continue with illiberal policies?
Letting people with vaccine passports into pubs is probably more liberal than refusing to allow pubs to open at all!
There's certainly no arguing with that!
Ha!
But really, Boris has been criticised quite heavily for opening up too soon a couple of times, he might be being too cautious now on the back of that. One thing I don’t believe for a minute is that Sir Keir is against vaccine passports - he’s just seen his poor his ratings are, how few people have heard of him, so is trying to get some headlines. Fair play I suppose
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
Thanks! Point of order though - I'm a bloke
Oh sorry! I don’t know why I thought that. Apologies.
Probably because I mention my husband at regular intervals, which would result in inevitable assumptions. The rainbow flag brigades are not *that* numerous (though it'll be interesting to see what the census returns have to say about that.)
Ha - I left that question blank - as 'none of your fucking business' wasn't presented as an option.
I do apologies, I'm very sweary today. Feeling properly riled.
I can’t find @Black_Rook ’s OP but want to offer her a honorary like. Spot on.
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
Thanks! Point of order though - I'm a bloke
Oh sorry! I don’t know why I thought that. Apologies.
Probably because I mention my husband at regular intervals, which would result in inevitable assumptions. The rainbow flag brigades are not *that* numerous (though it'll be interesting to see what the census returns have to say about that.)
One of the sad things about the vaccine ID cards proposal is that I have been personally a bit extra cautious over the last year. I didn't take advantage of the loosening of restrictions last summer to go back to hotels and restaurants. We considered it, and we decided that the theatre of wearing a mask and disinfecting our hands was going to introduce a sense of peril that wouldn't make the experience enjoyable.
So I have fallen completely out of the habit of going anywhere, which will make it a lot easier to not start again if I have to show a stupid ID card to do so. That doesn't mean I'll be locked away at home on my own. I'd still be able to visit friends and family.
Quite agree. Masks, and hand sanitiser, and vaccine passports, and yellow tape on the floor, and the constant FUCKING hectoring seems to be generally viewed as cost free. It isn't - it makes the whole process of doing anything that much less enjoyable, to the point where - with the exception of buying food to stay alive - nothing is worth doing any more.
I have no idea if it is national, but our local Tesco's has a Covid announcement that puts you off going in there to shop. It sounds like they hired an Undertaker or Private Fraser from Dad'a Army to read it out. Paraphrasing... "There is a deadly virus. You could be carrying it. You could be passing it on to other shoppers or taking it home to your family. It kills....." The only good thing is it refrained from finishing with either "... you murderer!!!!" or some other guilt-tripping variation.
These days I shop at Sainsburys where they lack that announcement
By the by, France's covid stats are weird. They've basically been between 300-400 deaths a day since early December as a 7 day average apparently. It's presently at the low end of that, but the case rate suggests that will change, but it is still oddly flat (with slight trend down) for a long time.
I think they've been sending some patients abroad, so perhaps there are deaths that haven't been factored into their stats yet?
By the by, France's covid stats are weird. They've basically been between 300-400 deaths a day since early December as a 7 day average apparently. It's presently at the low end of that, but the case rate suggests that will change, but it is still oddly flat (with slight trend down) for a long time.
vaccines are more effacious on death than anything else
Greensill Capital’s administrator has failed to verify invoices underpinning loans to Sanjeev Gupta, after companies listed on the documents denied that they had ever done business with the metals magnate.
If this is true, then things are likely to end very poorly for GFG, Liberty, and for various politicians who guaranteed GFG loans.
Bloody hell, this is Wirecard level of awful. The auditor is going to be in big trouble too.
According to the FT article, there are invoices to firms that do not even have trading relationships with GFG.
That's a major, major issue. Because auditors should check pretty much all major trading relationships actually exist, and then should spot check invoices.
(I don't personally think this is quite as bad as Wirecard, because GFG/Greensill didn't get the UK regulator to threaten journalists who asked awkward questions.)
You might want to clarify that the *UK* regulator did no such thing in the Wirecard situation
Ah yes, I meant BaFin went around threatening journalists who asked awkward questions about Wirecard.
One might note that Greensill also had a German bank regulated by... BaFin. Who failed (once again) to notice any wrongdoing.
BaFin doesn’t have the best track record...
It is by some margin the worst financial regulator in Europe.
Take that, er, Maltese Financial Services Authority.
If as a govt your every policy to restrict liberty (for good reason or bad) has been rewarded by an increase in your polling lead why on earth would you not continue with illiberal policies?
Letting people with vaccine passports into pubs is probably more liberal than refusing to allow pubs to open at all!
There's certainly no arguing with that!
Indeed there is no arguing with that - in the sense that nobody is arguing that.
That's why it's obvious to me that Covid is simply being used as a pretext for ID cards and a Chinese-style social credit system.
Wow, says a lot that Cyclefree is saying this stuff. Not exactly your bog standard message board conspiracy theorist loon.
I do find myself thinking along similar lines, although the fact that I'm not sure the UK government is competent enough to implement this is comforting.
Have mentioned before on here, but I find the fact that there's a reasonable chance we're in this bloody mess is due to a breach of bio-security from a lab carrying out secret research into viruses on behalf the PLA so little remarked upon surprising (ok, I'm aware I may be sounding like the aforementioned conspiracy loon) .
Comments
Pools A&E was shut in 2011 as a result of a review done under the Labour government as part of a Labour councils plural plan to build a super-hospital at Wynyard to replace Hartlepool and North Tees in Stockton (which is a disgusting hovel of a hospital). Paul - as a former CEO of a GP's Co-op in the area - knows this fully well.
He also knows that we can't have a full hospital in every town, especially where they are as close together as they are. Its only when you move out to the countryside that you appreciate how absurd the "my town not your town" arguments are of suburban neighbouring towns. My (younger) son was born in North Tees - an awful experience. His sister was born Out of Town at the closer to where we lived James Cook hospital in Boro. Pools to either North Tees or James Cook is a far shorter journey than it is from here in New Pitsligo down to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, my "closest" A&E now.
https://twitter.com/ScienceShared/status/1377240484708560898?s=19
It's like the tax question.
Good news tonight is our 49 year old daughter receives her first vaccine on Tuesday, our 45 year old son had his first last week along with our 60 year old son in law
There remains our youngest sons partner/fiancee (38) as the only unvaccinated adult in out family group here in the UK
Good night everyone
Given overall turnout it must have been great youth turnout in the 2014 Sindy ref, but obviously those don't come along every year (yet). It's not hard to vote, so I don't buy that electronic voting would improve it significantly even were it not beset with other problems. And the youth are supposedly angry about things every election but we don't get youthquakes every time, so merely there being things they are interested in won't help either.
Would another voting system help? Maybe, but I don't know that youth turnout is necessarily great in places with other systems and the big two here have no reason to support it (Labour would likely do a Trudeau if they won). Compulsory voting? I'm inherently against the idea.
I saw a paper which suggested, as first step, doing voter registration at school like a rite of passage like becoming an adult, civic workshops, trips to polling stations etc, but it feels a bit like leading a horse to water.
But that may be a result of playing too many basic strategy games telling me the value of developing technologically. Much easier to dominate with a machine gun up against bow and arrow.
As somebody relatively young, every time I am disappointed.
Clearly, the govt learned the √FA
I do hope Sir Keir ‘Royale’ Starmer has the courage of his convictions and whips Labour to oppose this, against current public opinion. My view is that - for the reasons others have articulated - people will come to regard vaxports as a nonsense in fair short order.
The government has been captured by the authoritarians who have been desperate to impose ID cards on us ever since they were removed. They now have a golden opportunity to do so under the Covid pretext and will continue unless resisted very firmly. I certainly will not use one I am very firmly on the side of the young in this debate. And this will determine my vote.
On the other side you have the Northern Independence Party who seem to be picking up support from foaming Corbynites. Also in the mix we have the North East party (splitters!) who are represented here on PB by [redacted] who could do well from the people who vote for the various independents.
I'm standing by this being a Tory gain. The joy of politics is that all scenarios are not just possible by do happen, so I will be quite happy to be proven wrong...
I can tell you that when it becomes clear for anyone under the age of 40 what these passports will mean, he is going to get some new voters.
Firstly, I mentioned two factors, not one. I would actually say the fact Lorraine Cox was not from the same background as Sarah Everard was a bigger factor in way the two stories were not reported similarly. A murder of a woman graduate living in Zones 1-2 London will attract more media attention - it should not but it does,
Secondly, I think you are being slightly innocent about media companies and pushing stories, and it goes for both the Daily Mail and Fox news types as well as the NYT and the Guardian. Both news organisations appeal to their base and push stories that they want to promote. Conversely, they also don't push stories that they feel are against their view. It is not just an advertising decision. If that was the case, the George Floyd case would not have dominated the news. Even if you would get the audiences it is not exactly a story that advertisers want to have their adverts shown next to. Contextual advertising technology would block out a lot of the coverage as not be
The fact is the decision to push stories is an editorial one. The more liberal media is, on the whole, more wrong on this than the likes of the Daily Mail (I will exclude Fox and the further right wing ones - they are as biased as the liberal side and commit the same sins). Look at the comments today from a leading NBC journalist that the media should abandon objectivity.
If you want an example of that (and you know your US politics), look at the recent coverage over the IA-2 disputed result. Do you really believe that, if it was the Republicans trying that trick on the Democrats under the same circumstances, that there would not have more coverage of that on the national networks?
Or look at what happened in Miami Beach and the "largely peaceful" rioting there and that two black men raped a white woman in a hotel room when she was passed out, stole her phone and her mobile and left her there where she died afterwards. The NYT barely mentioned it in their reporting and had it as a side issue. If it was two white men who did a similar thing to a black woman in the same circumstances, are you really saying that it would have not been pushed more aggressively by the NYT.
A rough rule of thumb would give for media prominence:
London is more important than non-London.
White is more important than non-white.
British is more important than non British.
Middle class is more important than working class.
Female is more important than male.
Young adults are more important than old.
Now compare the people murdered in London in 2021 and see who ticks the most boxes.
Like most, I have little doubt I will follow the requirement if it becomes law, but I won't be happy about it.
Next thing you know, BAM, you're shaking your cane at those hoody wearers near the skatepark.
Did the appeals for Lorraine Cox ever get the same coverage on the national sites?
Whilst saying that these same youngsters aren't allowed to spend their meagre income enjoying themselves in similar places on their days off?
Really?
Perhaps they could aquire a Thermos and go wild tea drinking?
Just watch the hand.
That said, it’s hard to see how shuttering pubs for even longer would be anything other than the worst option!
Hence the fact that I'm now satisfied that we're through the last lockdown and it's not going to go to crap again, save in the scenario of total vaccine escape, which I view as possible but very unlikely. Hence also my willingness to put up with the cautious unlocking intervals that the non-psychotic wing of the scientific establishment has asked for, but not for lengthy foot-dragging and/or the excessive imposition of counter-measures. The pandemic experience has brought about lasting change and I'm not by any means averse to all of those changes. What I don't accept is the need either for Draconian impositions that result in intrusive, Chinese-style state surveillance, or years of widespread social restrictions and mask wearing edicts that serve no purpose but to grind us all down.
We've all been living in one giant open prison for the last year - and the sacrifices have only been worth it because of the scale of the threat we faced, and the consequences of not deploying countermeasures. Once the threat is crushed the prison walls must be demolished. No excuses.
Or in other words, the Salmond extended family + our Malcolm + folks to who Sturgeon was exceptionally and personally "nippy".
HOWEVER, methinks that the poll does NOT get to the heart of the matter in this instance.
Which appears to be, how many Scots are likely to give Alba their LIST vote, after having voted for an SNPer with their constituency vote?
Reckon that THAT number plus the hard-core Albanians amounts to more than 3%. BUT how much more?
So I have fallen completely out of the habit of going anywhere, which will make it a lot easier to not start again if I have to show a stupid ID card to do so. That doesn't mean I'll be locked away at home on my own. I'd still be able to visit friends and family.
Labour for me.
"The public aren’t fools. They know that there is clear evidence of racism amongst certain sections of the press and degrees of institutionalised racism and unconscious bias across the industry."
Hmm. Surely that poll shows that 51% of the public are fools, since they did not agree with the statement that the press has a problem with racism. "The public' do not know there is clear evidence, a plurality of them know it.
That said I'd have answered slightly agree to the question, though I don't know how the commentator presumed stuff about unconscious bias when that wasn't part of the question unless there's info they are not quoting.
So you might be getting yours sooner than you expected.
As a snapshot it is important because it tells us where we are with the blue/red wall. For what it's worth I think the red wall remains solidly behind Johnson (not necessarily the Conservatives) for the moment at least.
Oh.
Give us a compelling reason now - and no, telling everyone they are racist isn't going to cut it.
I'm sorry, I just don't believe it.
As has been discussed at length, the 'necessary' length of time is zero days. It's already unnecessary.
And government's track record of 'temporary' measures - particularly with regard to the last twelve months - has been discouraging to say the least.
Given the delay between infection and death five or six times higher would be more likely.
More generally, I'm content to put up with the things as we come out of the emergency, and I can envisage limited circumstances in which they might be retained or come back (am thinking here about public transport journeys during the Winter illness season,) but the widespread, mandatory deployment of the things should be stopped soon. The performance where one has to arrive at a pub or restaurant in one, taking it off to sit down at the table but having to use it again if you need to get up to go to the flipping loo, is particularly irksome and ridiculous.
First doses this week have been higher than expected.
Northern Ireland are officially now vaccinating the 45-49 group.
Reports from Scotland about Moderna arriving next week.
Back
Oppose
Or
Abstain
When this is put to the vote
That's why it's obvious to me that Covid is simply being used as a pretext for ID cards and a Chinese-style social credit system.
And thus our freedoms die .....
Masks, and hand sanitiser, and vaccine passports, and yellow tape on the floor, and the constant FUCKING hectoring seems to be generally viewed as cost free. It isn't - it makes the whole process of doing anything that much less enjoyable, to the point where - with the exception of buying food to stay alive - nothing is worth doing any more.
But really, Boris has been criticised quite heavily for opening up too soon a couple of times, he might be being too cautious now on the back of that. One thing I don’t believe for a minute is that Sir Keir is against vaccine passports - he’s just seen his poor his ratings are, how few people have heard of him, so is trying to get some headlines. Fair play I suppose
I do apologies, I'm very sweary today. Feeling properly riled.
These days I shop at Sainsburys where they lack that announcement
Up your game Bozza!
I do find myself thinking along similar lines, although the fact that I'm not sure the UK government is competent enough to implement this is comforting.
Have mentioned before on here, but I find the fact that there's a reasonable chance we're in this bloody mess is due to a breach of bio-security from a lab carrying out secret research into viruses on behalf the PLA so little remarked upon surprising (ok, I'm aware I may be sounding like the aforementioned conspiracy loon) .
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/04/01/keir-starmer-acting-like-tory-superfan-robbing-britain-real/
This isn't a criticism of Fraser Nelson. I'm in the same boat. I might even give the Lib Dems a look if they stop banging on about Europe and transsexuals.