What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
"the estimates suggest that the eat-out-to-help-out scheme may have been responsible for between 8%–17% of all newly detected COVID-19 infections (and likely many more non-detected asymptomatic infections) in late summer."
Would be interested in a study from an actual scientist, not an economist.
Sounds plausible though. On the plus side the policy gave a very welcome fillip to the sector and created much joy - I remember that time well it was so special to go out again, pub bookings were in high demand.
The country is bored with these parties story seems to be the line if WATO is anything to go by. I beg to differ.
Well we can be bored with it and still expect the right action to be taken and judge those who squat in power with contempt. I am bored of it to be fair, and wish it would come to a swift end for the PM.
One of the most distasteful elements (for me) of both the No10 party story and the Djokovic story is the arrogance. Both smack of "rules are for little people". Djokovic clearly thinks he is so important that he can behave by a different set of rules to others and so does Johnson.
He clearly lied on his visa application. And now almost every border guard in the world knows he lied on his visa application. He's not going to have a fun time travelling...
What was the lie on his visa application.
That he hadn't traveled to any other country in the 14 days prior to his arrival in Australia, he'd been to Spain as his social media feeds show, supposedly after having tested positive for COVID too which is potentially breaking the law in Spain.
Banned from Spain too? Oh dear.
Think it was actually Serbia he went to, but either way that's the lie and Spain has got pretty tough isolation rules for people who have tested positive.
Serbia also has strict isolation rules for unvaxxed nationals entering the country. You have to commit to 10 days self isolation if you are unvaxxed.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
At my suggestion, supported by others, the service company for the Faculty paid back several hundred thousand from that scheme when income fell considerably less than expected. For which we got no positive publicity at all, so far as I could see. Should probably have kept it.
I doubt many self-employed people who carried on working yet claimed the support monies (as they were perfectly entitled to do) paid it back (though they will pay tax of course).
As I say £2,500 pm (I think totting it up this came to over £25k in total) while others who didn't qualify due to insufficient time S/E or had a separate source of income which was higher than their net profit got nothing.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
"the estimates suggest that the eat-out-to-help-out scheme may have been responsible for between 8%–17% of all newly detected COVID-19 infections (and likely many more non-detected asymptomatic infections) in late summer."
Would be interested in a study from an actual scientist, not an economist.
Sounds plausible though. On the plus side the policy gave a very welcome fillip to the sector and created much joy - I remember that time well it was so special to go out again, pub bookings were in high demand.
People were arguing both ways at the time - some that there was a link, others that there wasn't. I thought it wasn't proven, myself.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
"the estimates suggest that the eat-out-to-help-out scheme may have been responsible for between 8%–17% of all newly detected COVID-19 infections (and likely many more non-detected asymptomatic infections) in late summer."
Would be interested in a study from an actual scientist, not an economist.
Sounds plausible though. On the plus side the policy gave a very welcome fillip to the sector and created much joy - I remember that time well it was so special to go out again, pub bookings were in high demand.
People were arguing both ways at the time - some that there was a link, others that there wasn't. I thought it wasn't proven, myself.
Most people on here supported it - I was critical due to the amount of money it was costing the Exchequer.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
The furlough scheme was OK I think given it had to be put together in a hurry. But it wasn't a unique achievement. All major European countries had something similar with some of them better targeted than the UK one.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
At my suggestion, supported by others, the service company for the Faculty paid back several hundred thousand from that scheme when income fell considerably less than expected. For which we got no positive publicity at all, so far as I could see. Should probably have kept it.
I doubt many self-employed people who carried on working yet claimed the support monies (as they were perfectly entitled to do) paid it back (though they will pay tax of course).
As I say £2,500 pm (I think totting it up this came to over £25k in total) while others who didn't qualify due to insufficient time S/E or had a separate source of income which was higher than their net profit got nothing.
The claims were for furlough for our staff who were paid full wages throughout.
Individual counsel made their own applications but again the result was slightly perverse in that those who were somewhat underemployed got the money whist those who had actually lost business were disqualified from the scheme because they earned too much.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
At my suggestion, supported by others, the service company for the Faculty paid back several hundred thousand from that scheme when income fell considerably less than expected. For which we got no positive publicity at all, so far as I could see. Should probably have kept it.
I doubt many self-employed people who carried on working yet claimed the support monies (as they were perfectly entitled to do) paid it back (though they will pay tax of course).
As I say £2,500 pm (I think totting it up this came to over £25k in total) while others who didn't qualify due to insufficient time S/E or had a separate source of income which was higher than their net profit got nothing.
An accountant friend says some of her clients did better than usual, they got SEISS but work was only deferred until later in the year. Others didn't of course as their work pattern doesn't work that way.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
"the estimates suggest that the eat-out-to-help-out scheme may have been responsible for between 8%–17% of all newly detected COVID-19 infections (and likely many more non-detected asymptomatic infections) in late summer."
Would be interested in a study from an actual scientist, not an economist.
Sounds plausible though. On the plus side the policy gave a very welcome fillip to the sector and created much joy - I remember that time well it was so special to go out again, pub bookings were in high demand.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
The furlough scheme was OK I think given it had to be put together in a hurry. But it wasn't a unique achievement. All major European countries had something similar with some of them better targeted than the UK one.
I don't think anyone was claiming it was unique, just that it is his best known policy.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
The furlough scheme was OK I think given it had to be put together in a hurry. But it wasn't a unique achievement. All major European countries had something similar with some of them better targeted than the UK one.
Given the staggering incompetence that is the default assumption in the UK for HMRC or any other government department (tax credits anyone) the scheme was remarkably quickly set up and got money to people really fast. It gave a lot of confidence when it was needed that demand was not about to fall off a cliff. How much Rishi had to do with it I don't know but I think he is due some credit.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
"the estimates suggest that the eat-out-to-help-out scheme may have been responsible for between 8%–17% of all newly detected COVID-19 infections (and likely many more non-detected asymptomatic infections) in late summer."
Would be interested in a study from an actual scientist, not an economist.
Sounds plausible though. On the plus side the policy gave a very welcome fillip to the sector and created much joy - I remember that time well it was so special to go out again, pub bookings were in high demand.
People were arguing both ways at the time - some that there was a link, others that there wasn't. I thought it wasn't proven, myself.
I remember that time on PB well. Several examples of our more puritanical brethren criticising the policy, having taken advantage of it.
For once @Chris and I agree. There are several valid reasons to criticise Sunak. His height is not one of them.
It is, frankly, moronic.
It is, but we see in America, generally the taller candidate wins the Presidency.
Like baldness, these things matter.
Oh yes, I'm sure it happens. Just as candidates with Asian surnames often do significantly worse than candidates with English surnames standing for the same party in the same ward on the same day in English council elections,
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
"the estimates suggest that the eat-out-to-help-out scheme may have been responsible for between 8%–17% of all newly detected COVID-19 infections (and likely many more non-detected asymptomatic infections) in late summer."
Would be interested in a study from an actual scientist, not an economist.
For once @Chris and I agree. There are several valid reasons to criticise Sunak. His height is not one of them.
It is, frankly, moronic.
It is, but we see in America, generally the taller candidate wins the Presidency.
Like baldness, these things matter.
While we're on about factors which candidates cannot help but may have a minor negative impact on their political success, the fact that Jeremy Hunt's surname rhymes with 'c*nt' is unfortunate for him. As is the fact that his first name is Jeremy (sorry to any Jeremies. But it's a) reminiscent of Corbyn and b) sounds a bit posh.)
Very interesting. Wychavon is one of the most competently run Conservative local authorities. If I were a Tory local councillor I would be worried looking at that.
Looks like there was no LD last time, but they had one this time? And they took more votes from the Tories than the Greens.
For once @Chris and I agree. There are several valid reasons to criticise Sunak. His height is not one of them.
It is, frankly, moronic.
It is, but we see in America, generally the taller candidate wins the Presidency.
Like baldness, these things matter.
Is there any evidence that such things (which might reasonably be correlation and not causation in any case) translate to the UK?
I think correlation vs causation is a distinction without a difference in this case, if you're only worried about who might be most likely to win a GE, and less concerned about why that's the case.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
Quite a few people *said* it would, though.
Quite a few were also convinced only I would come up with an innuendo campaign name like 'Eat out to help out.'
Why, are you a cunning linguist?
I am, I have a very talented tongue, I can speak seven languages.
1) English 2) Urdu 3) Punjabi 4) Latin 5) Greek 6) German 7) French
One of the most distasteful elements (for me) of both the No10 party story and the Djokovic story is the arrogance. Both smack of "rules are for little people". Djokovic clearly thinks he is so important that he can behave by a different set of rules to others and so does Johnson.
He clearly lied on his visa application. And now almost every border guard in the world knows he lied on his visa application. He's not going to have a fun time travelling...
What was the lie on his visa application.
That he didn't travel 14 days before coming to Australia. He's even admitted it was wrong.
The tennis star also admitted to a mistake on his Australian travel declaration, in which a box was ticked indicating that he had not, or would not, travel in the 14 days before flying to Melbourne.
He blamed his underlings for that - which given his decision to attend press conferences while infected, seems mildly unconvincing.
Penalty of perjury only applies to the person filling out the form, even if they are a designate?
Presumably Mr Novax had to sign the form, though; and at least in the UK such forms generally have express warnings.
'Boris Johnson has less probity and self awareness than Chris Huhne.'
Both Chris Huhne and Boris Johnson were felled by their disloyalty to a friend.
Vicky and Dom had enough information to bring them down.
And both had enough of a streak of vindictiveness to want to do it.
At least in Huhne's case, he could argue that his (ex-)wife should have had enough sense to realise she couldn't bring him down without shooting herself in the foot at the same time..
For once @Chris and I agree. There are several valid reasons to criticise Sunak. His height is not one of them.
It is, frankly, moronic.
It is, but we see in America, generally the taller candidate wins the Presidency.
Like baldness, these things matter.
Oh yes, I'm sure it happens. Just as candidates with Asian surnames often do significantly worse than candidates with English surnames standing for the same party in the same ward on the same day in English council elections,
So list the recent leaders of whichever party you support so that we can see diversity in word and deed.
Very interesting. Wychavon is one of the most competently run Conservative local authorities. If I were a Tory local councillor I would be worried looking at that.
Looks like there was no LD last time, but they had one this time? And they took more votes from the Tories than the Greens.
If intentional, that's a similar tactic to Batley & Spen, where the LibDems stood a candidate but only campaigned in a couple of wards where they had councillors - thereby taking enough votes off the Conservatives to hand the victory to Labour.
FPTP working against the Tories is a new development I am 100% here for.
One of the most distasteful elements (for me) of both the No10 party story and the Djokovic story is the arrogance. Both smack of "rules are for little people". Djokovic clearly thinks he is so important that he can behave by a different set of rules to others and so does Johnson.
He clearly lied on his visa application. And now almost every border guard in the world knows he lied on his visa application. He's not going to have a fun time travelling...
What was the lie on his visa application.
That he didn't travel 14 days before coming to Australia. He's even admitted it was wrong.
The tennis star also admitted to a mistake on his Australian travel declaration, in which a box was ticked indicating that he had not, or would not, travel in the 14 days before flying to Melbourne.
He blamed his underlings for that - which given his decision to attend press conferences while infected, seems mildly unconvincing.
Penalty of perjury only applies to the person filling out the form, even if they are a designate?
Presumably Mr Novax had to sign the form, though; and at least in the UK such forms generally have express warnings.
Of course. Rather than being any kind of excuse, it does not speak well of him that he tried to pass on the blame. A bit like our PM.
Yougov now has the Tories in 3rd place with 2016 Remain voters on 12%, with Labour on 53% and the LDs on 18%.
However 52% of Leave voters still back the Tories, with 22% now backing Labour and 13% backing RefUK.
In London Labour have a huge 33% lead compared to only a 15% Labour lead in London in 2018, suggesting a bloodbath for the Tories in the capital in May where all London council seats are up but may not be quite as bad in the few other English councils up nor in Wales. In Scotland the Tories are also still holding up on 21% in the subsample, so the Scottish locals may be OK for the blues https://docs.cdn.yougov.com/48dfh8v55q/TheTimes_VI_220113_W.pdf
This nation bows to no one in taking the piss. Makes you proud to be British.
Practically every meeting I have attended over the last few days has had some sort of comment along the lines of 'who has brought the wine?' or 'this can't be a proper work meeting as no one is drunk'. Even my Mum's WI meeting on Wednesday had people making similar comments. This has seeped into every corner of British life at the moment.
We don’t want the police investigating because it will halt Gray, and the Conservative MPs have signalled to the nation they will use a gray report as their cover to move. But in a fair world the law should apply the same. And to be fair to the police, I think they are merely waiting for the Gray report too. We don’t live in that corrupt a country.
First, PMs had survived far worse. Even after the death of David Kelly, Blair survived another 4 years. To get to be PM, you must have ample stores of self-belief or self-delusion to think you can turn things around.
Second, it is not in the interests of his successor in the Tory party for Boris to go ... yet. Everyone gets a honeymoon as leader which lasts ~ 1 year. So, the potential successors will wait their time. I expect the Tory party will undergo another transmogrification before GE 24.
But -- like Tony after Iraq -- it is now over for Boris. The old tricks don't work anymore.
Sure, Boris can flap around like an over-weight sparrow for another year or so. He can talk of relaunch and reform and new initiatives. He will explain himself over and over. But -- like Tony -- Boris can never really change.
And I expect Boris -- like Tony -- will have a similar post-PM trajectory of cosying up to vast, unscrupulous wealth.
God, I hate middle class wankers who pretend to be working class/poor so they can get a sympathetic hearing/opportunities.
A woman who won a coveted scholarship in the US to study at Oxford after claiming she was poor, overcame childhood abuse and grew up in foster care lost the opportunity after it emerged she was middle-class and went to a $30,000-a-year private school.
Very interesting. Wychavon is one of the most competently run Conservative local authorities. If I were a Tory local councillor I would be worried looking at that.
Looks like there was no LD last time, but they had one this time? And they took more votes from the Tories than the Greens.
If intentional, that's a similar tactic to Batley & Spen, where the LibDems stood a candidate but only campaigned in a couple of wards where they had councillors - thereby taking enough votes off the Conservatives to hand the victory to Labour.
FPTP working against the Tories is a new development I am 100% here for.
I think that's a really rash assumption, and personally suspect Greens would have won by a much bigger margin without Lib Dems standing (although don't know local dynamics).
It's always a huge mistake to assume that the change figures are straight switch. Quite like in this case that both Greens and Lib Dems gained ex-Tory votes, and Lib Dems (having not stood last time) also took Green votes. You simply cannot tell from the result whether their 24% came mainly from Tory, Green, or indeed non-voters (perhaps people who didn't bother when there was no LD candidate standing).
'Boris Johnson has less probity and self awareness than Chris Huhne.'
Both Chris Huhne and Boris Johnson were felled by their disloyalty to a friend.
Vicky and Dom had enough information to bring them down.
And both had enough of a streak of vindictiveness to want to do it.
At least in Huhne's case, he could argue that his (ex-)wife should have had enough sense to realise she couldn't bring him down without shooting herself in the foot at the same time..
Is it clear that Dom can?
I mean, both Boris and Dom know plenty of dirt on each other. That is the definition of friendship
This nation bows to no one in taking the piss. Makes you proud to be British.
Practically every meeting I have attended over the last few days has had some sort of comment along the lines of 'who has brought the wine?' or 'this can't be a proper work meeting as no one is drunk'. Even my Mum's WI meeting on Wednesday had people making similar comments. This has seeped into every corner of British life at the moment.
Johnson has moved from being a popular figure of fun to an unpopular figure of ridicule.
'Boris Johnson has less probity and self awareness than Chris Huhne.'
Both Chris Huhne and Boris Johnson were felled by their disloyalty to a friend.
Vicky and Dom had enough information to bring them down.
And both had enough of a streak of vindictiveness to want to do it.
At least in Huhne's case, he could argue that his (ex-)wife should have had enough sense to realise she couldn't bring him down without shooting herself in the foot at the same time..
Is it clear that Dom can?
I mean, both Boris and Dom know plenty of dirt on each other. That is the definition of friendship
Cummings clearly wants to bring the PM down. If he incurs a minor fine for a Covid breach along the way, I'm sure he'll consider that a price worth paying. That's a different kettle of fish from landing yourself with a jail term.
We don’t want the police investigating because it will halt Gray, and the Conservative MPs have signalled to the nation they will use a gray report as their cover to move. But in a fair world the law should apply the same. And to be fair to the police, I think they are merely waiting for the Gray report too. We don’t live in that corrupt a country.
The issue with the police is that they were present at the parties, and also had other officers watching it live on cctv. After the first party, even if they didnt want to fine anyone one, they could have had a word and said this must not be repeated.
Forget the Met investigating No 10 or the PM for now, the first thing that should be happening is another force investigating the Met for failing in basic duties of policing. Perhaps one of those extreme forces that arrested people for sitting too close together on a bench, or that think a coffee is a picnic.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
Probably furlough. He was paying half the country to stay at home.
"Eat Out to Help Out" didn't cause a spike in cases, IIRC.
"the estimates suggest that the eat-out-to-help-out scheme may have been responsible for between 8%–17% of all newly detected COVID-19 infections (and likely many more non-detected asymptomatic infections) in late summer."
Would be interested in a study from an actual scientist, not an economist.
Week 2 Admissions are projected to be down 18% week-on-week Week 2 Deaths I am now projecting to be falling, by a tiny 3.5% but still a clear fall suggesting that deaths have peaked or at the very least are peaking.
In Hospital numbers are clearly trending down.
If you take week 47 as OMICRON START WEEK then it's taken 7 weeks for SA to get to this point.
We don’t want the police investigating because it will halt Gray, and the Conservative MPs have signalled to the nation they will use a gray report as their cover to move. But in a fair world the law should apply the same. And to be fair to the police, I think they are merely waiting for the Gray report too. We don’t live in that corrupt a country.
Longitudinal analysis reveals high prevalence of Epstein-Barr virus associated with multiple sclerosis https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abj8222 Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory demyelinating disease of the central nervous system of unknown etiology. We tested the hypothesis that MS is caused by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in a cohort comprising more than 10 million young adults on active duty in the US military, 955 of whom were diagnosed with MS during their period of service. Risk of MS increased 32-fold after infection with EBV but was not increased after infection with other viruses, including the similarly transmitted cytomegalovirus. Serum levels of neurofilament light chain, a biomarker of neuroaxonal degeneration, increased only after EBV seroconversion. These findings cannot be explained by any known risk factor for MS and suggest EBV as the leading cause of MS.
Note that something like 90% of adults will have had EBV.
'Boris Johnson has less probity and self awareness than Chris Huhne.'
Both Chris Huhne and Boris Johnson were felled by their disloyalty to a friend.
Vicky and Dom had enough information to bring them down.
And both had enough of a streak of vindictiveness to want to do it.
At least in Huhne's case, he could argue that his (ex-)wife should have had enough sense to realise she couldn't bring him down without shooting herself in the foot at the same time..
Is it clear that Dom can?
I mean, both Boris and Dom know plenty of dirt on each other. That is the definition of friendship
Cummings clearly wants to bring the PM down. If he incurs a minor fine for a Covid breach along the way, I'm sure he'll consider that a price worth paying. That's a different kettle of fish from landing yourself with a jail term.
That rather assumes there is nothing worse to come out about the Dom -- aside from a minor Covid breach.
It confirms that Cummings is infuriatingly clever and cunning - if you are his enemy
This is superbly bang-on:
“Cummings thinks remainers are invariably fools, above all the better-educated ones, because they are incapable of accepting that they might be wrong. His shorthand for these people is Jolyons (after the remainer lawyer Jolyon Maugham) or, as he says of Keir Starmer, the ones who can’t resist giving “the London idiot answer” to any difficult question because they daren’t think for themselves. When Starmer got himself tangled up over the question of whether “only women have a cervix”, it was, Cummings says, because “he’s a dead player working off a script” – and the voters can smell that a mile off.”
Remainers are invariably fools, ESPECIALLY the posher ones. Absolutely right
The article also contains the brilliant revelation that the only reason Cummings and Boris prorogued parliament was to drive their opponents crazy (it worked), get them to talk about nothing else, until they eventually went so mad they provoked an election
I guess Cummings could be lying, but if it’s true it’s genius. It all went wrong for Boris when he lost this guy
I like that one! I am going to the pub tonight to get completely suitcased!
I’m very proud that thanks to Brexit and the end of metric tyranny we are finally able to serve wine by the suitcase once again. These are the ancient liberties Nelson and Wellington fought to defend. https://twitter.com/David_K_Clark/status/1481764398012243968
One of the most distasteful elements (for me) of both the No10 party story and the Djokovic story is the arrogance. Both smack of "rules are for little people". Djokovic clearly thinks he is so important that he can behave by a different set of rules to others and so does Johnson.
He clearly lied on his visa application. And now almost every border guard in the world knows he lied on his visa application. He's not going to have a fun time travelling...
What was the lie on his visa application.
That he didn't travel 14 days before coming to Australia. He's even admitted it was wrong.
The tennis star also admitted to a mistake on his Australian travel declaration, in which a box was ticked indicating that he had not, or would not, travel in the 14 days before flying to Melbourne.
He blamed his underlings for that - which given his decision to attend press conferences while infected, seems mildly unconvincing.
Penalty of perjury only applies to the person filling out the form, even if they are a designate?
Presumably Mr Novax had to sign the form, though; and at least in the UK such forms generally have express warnings.
Shades of Mr Yentob saying that just because he was a legally responsible director of Kids Company, he couldn't be expected to know what was going on.
Definitely a fan of the new "getting suitcased" euphamism.
In other news the video doing the rounds on my various whatsapp groups and other social media is the apparently Tory MP coughing and calling Boris a wanker in the house when he was "apologising" for the garden party.
The Instagram Index rates this is the most engaging political topic of the pandemic so far.
First, PMs had survived far worse. Even after the death of David Kelly, Blair survived another 4 years. To get to be PM, you must have ample stores of self-belief or self-delusion to think you can turn things around.
Second, it is not in the interests of his successor in the Tory party for Boris to go ... yet. Everyone gets a honeymoon as leader which lasts ~ 1 year. So, the potential successors will wait their time. I expect the Tory party will undergo another transmogrification before GE 24.
But -- like Tony after Iraq -- it is now over for Boris. The old tricks don't work anymore.
Sure, Boris can flap around like an over-weight sparrow for another year or so. He can talk of relaunch and reform and new initiatives. He will explain himself over and over. But -- like Tony -- Boris can never really change.
And I expect Boris -- like Tony -- will have a similar post-PM trajectory of cosying up to vast, unscrupulous wealth.
But the timing isn't in the hands of Johnson, or his potential successors*; it's in the hands of the Tory MPs - and they may well decide this year that Johnson's time is up. Indeed, I think it's very likely that they will.
* Unless one or more of them engages in a resignation spectacular, but that would probably terminate their own career as well.
It confirms that Cummings is infuriatingly clever and cunning - if you are his enemy
This is superbly bang-on:
“Cummings thinks remainers are invariably fools, above all the better-educated ones, because they are incapable of accepting that they might be wrong. His shorthand for these people is Jolyons (after the remainer lawyer Jolyon Maugham) or, as he says of Keir Starmer, the ones who can’t resist giving “the London idiot answer” to any difficult question because they daren’t think for themselves. When Starmer got himself tangled up over the question of whether “only women have a cervix”, it was, Cummings says, because “he’s a dead player working off a script” – and the voters can smell that a mile off.”
Remainers are invariably fools, ESPECIALLY the posher ones. Absolutely right
The article also contains the brilliant revelation that the only reason Cummings and Boris prorogued parliament was to drive their opponents crazy (it worked), get them to talk about nothing else, until they eventually went so mad they provoked an election
I guess Cummings could be lying, but if it’s true it’s genius. It all went wrong for Boris when he lost this guy
A government that exists mainly to piss off the people who earn the bulk of the money for the country is not a particularly sustainable form of government, even if you find it entertaining.
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
The furlough scheme was OK I think given it had to be put together in a hurry. But it wasn't a unique achievement. All major European countries had something similar with some of them better targeted than the UK one.
Given the staggering incompetence that is the default assumption in the UK for HMRC or any other government department (tax credits anyone) the scheme was remarkably quickly set up and got money to people really fast. It gave a lot of confidence when it was needed that demand was not about to fall off a cliff. How much Rishi had to do with it I don't know but I think he is due some credit.
Using the PAYE system in reverse was a real piece of genius. I would be interested to know who came up with that.
Very interesting. Wychavon is one of the most competently run Conservative local authorities. If I were a Tory local councillor I would be worried looking at that.
Looks like there was no LD last time, but they had one this time? And they took more votes from the Tories than the Greens.
If intentional, that's a similar tactic to Batley & Spen, where the LibDems stood a candidate but only campaigned in a couple of wards where they had councillors - thereby taking enough votes off the Conservatives to hand the victory to Labour.
FPTP working against the Tories is a new development I am 100% here for.
I think that's a really rash assumption, and personally suspect Greens would have won by a much bigger margin without Lib Dems standing (although don't know local dynamics).
It's always a huge mistake to assume that the change figures are straight switch. Quite like in this case that both Greens and Lib Dems gained ex-Tory votes, and Lib Dems (having not stood last time) also took Green votes. You simply cannot tell from the result whether their 24% came mainly from Tory, Green, or indeed non-voters (perhaps people who didn't bother when there was no LD candidate standing).
That really doesn't stack up. I think we can safely assume the Greens were actively campaigning, as they won. So your scenario would require the Green campaign to be simultaneously good enough to take a big chunk of Tory votes and bad enough to lose a big chunk to the LibDems. The LibDem vote in past elections wasn't sufficiently high that the Green>LibDem movement could be taken as LibDem voters returning home. The most likely scenario is that there was some churn between the Greens and LibDems, but that the major movement was a combination of past non-voters voting this time, and Greens and LibDems taking votes from the Tories, but the Greens taking fewer because they had already begun absorbing Con-Grn switchers last time.
It confirms that Cummings is infuriatingly clever and cunning - if you are his enemy
This is superbly bang-on:
“Cummings thinks remainers are invariably fools, above all the better-educated ones, because they are incapable of accepting that they might be wrong. His shorthand for these people is Jolyons (after the remainer lawyer Jolyon Maugham) or, as he says of Keir Starmer, the ones who can’t resist giving “the London idiot answer” to any difficult question because they daren’t think for themselves. When Starmer got himself tangled up over the question of whether “only women have a cervix”, it was, Cummings says, because “he’s a dead player working off a script” – and the voters can smell that a mile off.”
Remainers are invariably fools, ESPECIALLY the posher ones. Absolutely right
The article also contains the brilliant revelation that the only reason Cummings and Boris prorogued parliament was to drive their opponents crazy (it worked), get them to talk about nothing else, until they eventually went so mad they provoked an election
I guess Cummings could be lying, but if it’s true it’s genius. It all went wrong for Boris when he lost this guy
Cummings wasn't smart enough to realize that a leading spin doctor the papers loved to cover shouldn't go walkabout during a lockdown.
Definitely a fan of the new "getting suitcased" euphamism.
In other news the video doing the rounds on my various whatsapp groups and other social media is the apparently Tory MP coughing and calling Boris a wanker in the house when he was "apologising" for the garden party.
The Instagram Index rates this is the most engaging political topic of the pandemic so far.
This is pretty interesting, on Cummings and his blog. I still wouldn't give the toe-rag a penny of my hard-earned cash to read it myself, mind.
Cummings despises Guardian-reading lefties above all others, it turns out, so I can understand your reluctance
For me, it was slightly unnerving to discover that he is mildly obsessed with the super-efficient governance of Singapore, as I share the same modest obsession (I had no idea of his). Cummings is also convinced that he is nearly always right about everything
Longitudinal analysis reveals high prevalence of Epstein-Barr virus associated with multiple sclerosis https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abj8222 Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory demyelinating disease of the central nervous system of unknown etiology. We tested the hypothesis that MS is caused by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in a cohort comprising more than 10 million young adults on active duty in the US military, 955 of whom were diagnosed with MS during their period of service. Risk of MS increased 32-fold after infection with EBV but was not increased after infection with other viruses, including the similarly transmitted cytomegalovirus. Serum levels of neurofilament light chain, a biomarker of neuroaxonal degeneration, increased only after EBV seroconversion. These findings cannot be explained by any known risk factor for MS and suggest EBV as the leading cause of MS.
Note that something like 90% of adults will have had EBV.
God, I hate middle class wankers who pretend to be working class/poor so they can get a sympathetic hearing/opportunities.
A woman who won a coveted scholarship in the US to study at Oxford after claiming she was poor, overcame childhood abuse and grew up in foster care lost the opportunity after it emerged she was middle-class and went to a $30,000-a-year private school.
God, I hate middle class wankers who pretend to be working class/poor so they can get a sympathetic hearing/opportunities.
A woman who won a coveted scholarship in the US to study at Oxford after claiming she was poor, overcame childhood abuse and grew up in foster care lost the opportunity after it emerged she was middle-class and went to a $30,000-a-year private school.
It confirms that Cummings is infuriatingly clever and cunning - if you are his enemy
This is superbly bang-on:
“Cummings thinks remainers are invariably fools, above all the better-educated ones, because they are incapable of accepting that they might be wrong. His shorthand for these people is Jolyons (after the remainer lawyer Jolyon Maugham) or, as he says of Keir Starmer, the ones who can’t resist giving “the London idiot answer” to any difficult question because they daren’t think for themselves. When Starmer got himself tangled up over the question of whether “only women have a cervix”, it was, Cummings says, because “he’s a dead player working off a script” – and the voters can smell that a mile off.”
Remainers are invariably fools, ESPECIALLY the posher ones. Absolutely right
The article also contains the brilliant revelation that the only reason Cummings and Boris prorogued parliament was to drive their opponents crazy (it worked), get them to talk about nothing else, until they eventually went so mad they provoked an election
I guess Cummings could be lying, but if it’s true it’s genius. It all went wrong for Boris when he lost this guy
Cummings wasn't smart enough to realize that a leading spin doctor the papers loved to cover shouldn't go walkabout during a lockdown.
Yes, a very fair point. He’s an extremely clever man who can nonetheless make idiotic decisions that more ordinary intellects would know to avoid. A lack of regular common sense goes hand-in-hand with ultra-high IQs, as we have discussed on PB previously
Week 2 Admissions are projected to be down 18% week-on-week Week 2 Deaths I am now projecting to be falling, by a tiny 3.5% but still a clear fall suggesting that deaths have peaked or at the very least are peaking.
In Hospital numbers are clearly trending down.
If you take week 47 as OMICRON START WEEK then it's taken 7 weeks for SA to get to this point.
We've seen similar from previous peaks - cases up and down, then a long, fat tail
It confirms that Cummings is infuriatingly clever and cunning - if you are his enemy
This is superbly bang-on:
“Cummings thinks remainers are invariably fools, above all the better-educated ones, because they are incapable of accepting that they might be wrong. His shorthand for these people is Jolyons (after the remainer lawyer Jolyon Maugham) or, as he says of Keir Starmer, the ones who can’t resist giving “the London idiot answer” to any difficult question because they daren’t think for themselves. When Starmer got himself tangled up over the question of whether “only women have a cervix”, it was, Cummings says, because “he’s a dead player working off a script” – and the voters can smell that a mile off.”
Remainers are invariably fools, ESPECIALLY the posher ones. Absolutely right
The article also contains the brilliant revelation that the only reason Cummings and Boris prorogued parliament was to drive their opponents crazy (it worked), get them to talk about nothing else, until they eventually went so mad they provoked an election
I guess Cummings could be lying, but if it’s true it’s genius. It all went wrong for Boris when he lost this guy
Na, it is just that he like you, wants to rebut the idea that Leavers are generally thick, so it remains an obsession of his, like it is yours. It is OK @Leon, you aren't all thick. Obsessed about a trivial and pointless thing, yes, but not all of you are stupid. That feel better now?
It confirms that Cummings is infuriatingly clever and cunning - if you are his enemy
This is superbly bang-on:
“Cummings thinks remainers are invariably fools, above all the better-educated ones, because they are incapable of accepting that they might be wrong. His shorthand for these people is Jolyons (after the remainer lawyer Jolyon Maugham) or, as he says of Keir Starmer, the ones who can’t resist giving “the London idiot answer” to any difficult question because they daren’t think for themselves. When Starmer got himself tangled up over the question of whether “only women have a cervix”, it was, Cummings says, because “he’s a dead player working off a script” – and the voters can smell that a mile off.”
Remainers are invariably fools, ESPECIALLY the posher ones. Absolutely right
The article also contains the brilliant revelation that the only reason Cummings and Boris prorogued parliament was to drive their opponents crazy (it worked), get them to talk about nothing else, until they eventually went so mad they provoked an election
I guess Cummings could be lying, but if it’s true it’s genius. It all went wrong for Boris when he lost this guy
Na, it is just that he like you, wants to rebut the idea that Leavers are generally thick, so it remains an obsession of his, like it is yours. It is OK @Leon, you aren't all thick. Obsessed about a trivial and pointless thing, yes, but not all of you are stupid. That feel better now?
God, I hate middle class wankers who pretend to be working class/poor so they can get a sympathetic hearing/opportunities.
A woman who won a coveted scholarship in the US to study at Oxford after claiming she was poor, overcame childhood abuse and grew up in foster care lost the opportunity after it emerged she was middle-class and went to a $30,000-a-year private school.
You know everything about this individuals experience, or just via the papers?
As a relative newcomer you will quite reasonably be unaware of the long-running joke TSE, a self-proclaimed 'working-class, northern lad', is plying here.
God, I hate middle class wankers who pretend to be working class/poor so they can get a sympathetic hearing/opportunities.
A woman who won a coveted scholarship in the US to study at Oxford after claiming she was poor, overcame childhood abuse and grew up in foster care lost the opportunity after it emerged she was middle-class and went to a $30,000-a-year private school.
One of the most distasteful elements (for me) of both the No10 party story and the Djokovic story is the arrogance. Both smack of "rules are for little people". Djokovic clearly thinks he is so important that he can behave by a different set of rules to others and so does Johnson.
That doesn't explain why the Australians clearly gave him the impression he would be able to play despite knowing he wasn't vaccinated.
Longitudinal analysis reveals high prevalence of Epstein-Barr virus associated with multiple sclerosis https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abj8222 Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory demyelinating disease of the central nervous system of unknown etiology. We tested the hypothesis that MS is caused by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in a cohort comprising more than 10 million young adults on active duty in the US military, 955 of whom were diagnosed with MS during their period of service. Risk of MS increased 32-fold after infection with EBV but was not increased after infection with other viruses, including the similarly transmitted cytomegalovirus. Serum levels of neurofilament light chain, a biomarker of neuroaxonal degeneration, increased only after EBV seroconversion. These findings cannot be explained by any known risk factor for MS and suggest EBV as the leading cause of MS.
Note that something like 90% of adults will have had EBV.
God, I hate middle class wankers who pretend to be working class/poor so they can get a sympathetic hearing/opportunities.
A woman who won a coveted scholarship in the US to study at Oxford after claiming she was poor, overcame childhood abuse and grew up in foster care lost the opportunity after it emerged she was middle-class and went to a $30,000-a-year private school.
You know everything about this individuals experience, or just via the papers?
As a relative newcomer you will quite reasonably be unaware of the long-running joke TSE, a self-proclaimed 'working-class, northern lad', is plying here.
You're forgetting the aggressive anti-furriner thing.....
Are we past the days of having peers as PMs, in the sense of it being even legally possible? Though Lord Home got himself a safe seat as a MP pdq if I recall the recent discussion here. I'm sure someone could be persuaded to apply to the Chiltern Hundreds if need be, in a nice safe seat.
Nothing that legally says the PM cannot be in the Lords - although I imagine that there would be no such thing as a safe seat for a by-election these days, if a party tried to force one in such circumstances.
Halifax turned down PMship in 1940 on account of being a Lord
Is that so? I'd always assumed Labour wouldn't support him.
I read a couple of articles that had it as his for taking, but bottled it. He didn’t fancy being a war leader. Didn’t think we could win. Didn’t want to fight. The recent film of Churchill portrayed it like this? Is this revisionist history? It’s been revised and is more accurate?
Labour wanted Halifax and that was the general consensus of the Commons. The King wanted Halifax and was a bit upset when Halifax raised the objection of being a peer and so not able to operate effectively in the House.
That’s where I disagree with you Rottenborough. I can’t do it because I am a Lord buries the truth and distorts true history which needs to be revised, therefore your favourite history books on your shelf you always thought was history are lying to you and you need to get new ones. The truth being “havn’t slept for a week thinking I have to be war PM, I think we should make deal with Germans anyway.”
The whole point of science is you ask questions. History is a social science, you have to question what you are being told.
Any problem with that?
Here’s my question on this one. The problem with the meeting, where Halifax went in as likely PM and Churchill emerged as leader, is that there was only the 3 people there - and should we trust any of their accounts as telling the truth?
What’s Sunak’s best known policy? Perhaps it’s Eat Out to Help Out, which spent a large amount of public money, had limited economic benefit and caused large numbers of COVID cases.
The furlough scheme, undoubtedly.
Which he is widely applauded for but goodness me what inequality resulted from it - doling out £2500 pm of taxpayer cash to some people and zilch for others.
It was a good scheme but clearly it went on for too long. I think if they had the knowledge now of what happened we'd have had our final unlockdown at the end of May and ended furlough in June. We didn't do too badly with the July unlockdown and September end of furlough but there was potentially 1.5% of GDP given up and £20bn in additional business and employee support spent that we could have funded the whole northern rail plan with.
The full HS2 project needs to be restored.
£10bn+ has been spaffed on a Stamp Duty holiday. £12bn is going on restoring the Palace of Westminster. God knows how many billions have gone on tunnels and gold plating to stuff the mouths of Southern HS2 Nimbys.
And they think that "there's no money left because we spent your investment on the Southern part of the HS2" will wash?
Comments
“What sort of suitcase are we talking about? Was it a carry-on? Or the kind a family of four would take on a holiday to Tenerife?”
(Re suitcase of booze for party on eve of Philip funeral)
No10: can’t pre-empt Sue Gray investigation
Reminder: some geniuses in No.10 wanted to televise Lobby briefings. Every day.
https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1481964587675226114
It is, frankly, moronic.
Like baldness, these things matter.
As I say £2,500 pm (I think totting it up this came to over £25k in total) while others who didn't qualify due to insufficient time S/E or had a separate source of income which was higher than their net profit got nothing.
https://twitter.com/wizbates/status/1481979468138885121/video/1
Individual counsel made their own applications but again the result was slightly perverse in that those who were somewhat underemployed got the money whist those who had actually lost business were disqualified from the scheme because they earned too much.
*files nails*
https://twitter.com/katie_martin_fx/status/1481934550888554497
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/prince-philip-downing-street-hackney-party-lockdown-covid-rules-b976690.html
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/59997307
This is pretty interesting, on Cummings and his blog. I still wouldn't give the toe-rag a penny of my hard-earned cash to read it myself, mind.
Anyway, this paper https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-26013-4 supports the conclusions of the Fetzer paper through other work, although they didn't directly assess the question themselves.
Makes you proud to be British.
As is the fact that his first name is Jeremy (sorry to any Jeremies. But it's a) reminiscent of Corbyn and b) sounds a bit posh.)
Vicky and Dom had enough information to bring them down.
And both had enough of a streak of vindictiveness to want to do it.
FPTP working against the Tories is a new development I am 100% here for.
Rather than being any kind of excuse, it does not speak well of him that he tried to pass on the blame. A bit like our PM.
But so many variables, it's impossible to pin down any direct relationship.
This has cut through. It is a matter of great amusement. That is was the Co-op too isn't insignificant.
Edit. I see @Richard_Tyndall has spotted this too.
And BBC were there early this morning, sans suitcase though
We don’t want the police investigating because it will halt Gray, and the Conservative MPs have signalled to the nation they will use a gray report as their cover to move. But in a fair world the law should apply the same. And to be fair to the police, I think they are merely waiting for the Gray report too. We don’t live in that corrupt a country.
On topic, of course, Johnson will survive 2022.
First, PMs had survived far worse. Even after the death of David Kelly, Blair survived another 4 years. To get to be PM, you must have ample stores of self-belief or self-delusion to think you can turn things around.
Second, it is not in the interests of his successor in the Tory party for Boris to go ... yet. Everyone gets a honeymoon as leader which lasts ~ 1 year. So, the potential successors will wait their time. I expect the Tory party will undergo another transmogrification before GE 24.
But -- like Tony after Iraq -- it is now over for Boris. The old tricks don't work anymore.
Sure, Boris can flap around like an over-weight sparrow for another year or so. He can talk of relaunch and reform and new initiatives. He will explain himself over and over. But -- like Tony -- Boris can never really change.
And I expect Boris -- like Tony -- will have a similar post-PM trajectory of cosying up to vast, unscrupulous wealth.
Look at this article in Civil Service World after Prince Philip passed away. Simon Case wrote to staff telling them he regretted that because of Covid they couldn’t mark the moment as they might but they must follow Covid guidelines. https://www.civilserviceworld.com/professions/article/departments-go-quiet-amid-mourning-for-prince-philip
A woman who won a coveted scholarship in the US to study at Oxford after claiming she was poor, overcame childhood abuse and grew up in foster care lost the opportunity after it emerged she was middle-class and went to a $30,000-a-year private school.
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/rhodes-scholar-university-of-pennsylvania-loses-place-oxford-b976530.html?amp
https://twitter.com/TheDailyShow/status/1481975888543567875?t=qFM77JSPwV9zXbs70yYnhQ&s=19
It's always a huge mistake to assume that the change figures are straight switch. Quite like in this case that both Greens and Lib Dems gained ex-Tory votes, and Lib Dems (having not stood last time) also took Green votes. You simply cannot tell from the result whether their 24% came mainly from Tory, Green, or indeed non-voters (perhaps people who didn't bother when there was no LD candidate standing).
I mean, both Boris and Dom know plenty of dirt on each other. That is the definition of friendship
https://twitter.com/JohnRentoul/status/1481987357528236034
https://twitter.com/SenatorSinema/status/1284497057365950464
Forget the Met investigating No 10 or the PM for now, the first thing that should be happening is another force investigating the Met for failing in basic duties of policing. Perhaps one of those extreme forces that arrested people for sitting too close together on a bench, or that think a coffee is a picnic.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-26013-4/figures/2
If "Gastronomy" is eating out of all types - it is saying that the effect of closed vs open is 10-to-18% change in R
R for the period in the UK was
Things are suddenly looking good.
Week 2 Admissions are projected to be down 18% week-on-week
Week 2 Deaths I am now projecting to be falling, by a tiny 3.5% but still a clear fall suggesting that deaths have peaked or at the very least are peaking.
In Hospital numbers are clearly trending down.
If you take week 47 as OMICRON START WEEK then it's taken 7 weeks for SA to get to this point.
Longitudinal analysis reveals high prevalence of Epstein-Barr virus associated with multiple sclerosis
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abj8222
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory demyelinating disease of the central nervous system of unknown etiology. We tested the hypothesis that MS is caused by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in a cohort comprising more than 10 million young adults on active duty in the US military, 955 of whom were diagnosed with MS during their period of service. Risk of MS increased 32-fold after infection with EBV but was not increased after infection with other viruses, including the similarly transmitted cytomegalovirus. Serum levels of neurofilament light chain, a biomarker of neuroaxonal degeneration, increased only after EBV seroconversion. These findings cannot be explained by any known risk factor for MS and suggest EBV as the leading cause of MS.
Note that something like 90% of adults will have had EBV.
Perhaps ...
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jan/14/intoxicating-insidery-and-infuriating-everything-i-learned-about-dominic-cummings-from-his-10-a-month-blog?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
It confirms that Cummings is infuriatingly clever and cunning - if you are his enemy
This is superbly bang-on:
“Cummings thinks remainers are invariably fools, above all the better-educated ones, because they are incapable of accepting that they might be wrong. His shorthand for these people is Jolyons (after the remainer lawyer Jolyon Maugham) or, as he says of Keir Starmer, the ones who can’t resist giving “the London idiot answer” to any difficult question because they daren’t think for themselves. When Starmer got himself tangled up over the question of whether “only women have a cervix”, it was, Cummings says, because “he’s a dead player working off a script” – and the voters can smell that a mile off.”
Remainers are invariably fools, ESPECIALLY the posher ones. Absolutely right
The article also contains the brilliant revelation that the only reason Cummings and Boris prorogued parliament was to drive their opponents crazy (it worked), get them to talk about nothing else, until they eventually went so mad they provoked an election
I guess Cummings could be lying, but if it’s true it’s genius. It all went wrong for Boris when he lost this guy
https://twitter.com/David_K_Clark/status/1481764398012243968
In other news the video doing the rounds on my various whatsapp groups and other social media is the apparently Tory MP coughing and calling Boris a wanker in the house when he was "apologising" for the garden party.
The Instagram Index rates this is the most engaging political topic of the pandemic so far.
* Unless one or more of them engages in a resignation spectacular, but that would probably terminate their own career as well.
FTSE100's down 0.5% nonetheless today.
The most likely scenario is that there was some churn between the Greens and LibDems, but that the major movement was a combination of past non-voters voting this time, and Greens and LibDems taking votes from the Tories, but the Greens taking fewer because they had already begun absorbing Con-Grn switchers last time.
For me, it was slightly unnerving to discover that he is mildly obsessed with the super-efficient governance of Singapore, as I share the same modest obsession (I had no idea of his). Cummings is also convinced that he is nearly always right about everything
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2304340-strongest-evidence-yet-that-ms-is-caused-by-epstein-barr-virus/
https://www.drugdiscoverytrends.com/moderna-doses-the-first-patient-with-its-mrna-epstein-barr-virus-vaccine-candidate/
They will need to lower their prices considerably if governments are going to consider mass childhood vaccination (as for HPV) in the future.
Any problem with that?
Here’s my question on this one.
The problem with the meeting, where Halifax went in as likely PM and Churchill emerged as leader, is that there was only the 3 people there - and should we trust any of their accounts as telling the truth?
£10bn+ has been spaffed on a Stamp Duty holiday.
£12bn is going on restoring the Palace of Westminster.
God knows how many billions have gone on tunnels and gold plating to stuff the mouths of Southern HS2 Nimbys.
And they think that "there's no money left because we spent your investment on the Southern part of the HS2" will wash?
In Boris' dreams.