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Coronavirus - the new strain IX

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You can't just "follow the science", you have to balance all of the issues in play (covid-19 transmission, mental health, economy, jobs etc) and make least worst compromise around all of those factors. What the opposition has to do is to show exactly where the balance is wrong in the current announcement and what a better compromise for the UK looks like.

Agreed, but that is such an easy target I don’t understand why Starmer didn’t go for the jugular. Basically the government has been arguing for weeks that with adequate track and trace technology the lockdown can be gradually reduced. They have entirely failed to deliver such functionality and are now suggesting “guts and determination” as an alternative strategy. If this wasn’t a situation that had already killed so many people so unnecessarily their ineptitude would actually be funny.
 
He could have started with David King on 2m - he could have taken the Blackford approach and asked for full publication of the scientific advice - he chose to go belly up I'm afraid.
He did ask for confirmation that the decisions were consistent with SAGE advice, unless I misheard that bit?
 
Starmer's on his back asking Johnson to tickle his tummy - regrettably

"He says, although Labour will look at the details, overall it supports what Johnson has announced. He says he thinks the government is trying to do the right thing."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/l...082875f4490a76#block-5ef1eceb8f082875f4490a76

Johnson said a few months ago in Greenwich that the economy comes before health. This has been the attitude beind the Tory's policies since Covid-19 appeared. It accounts for their tardiness and why so many of the UK's citizens have got the virus and died.

Starmer going along Johnson and the Tories is disgusting. He should be shouting them down.

Jack
 
He did ask for confirmation that the decisions were consistent with SAGE advice, unless I misheard that bit?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-53146191
Posted at 13:0113:01
Starmer: 'Number of questions' about basis of these decisions

Mr Starmer says he has a "number of questions" about the "basis" for these decisions.

On the scientific evidence for changing the 2m social distancing rule, he asks whether the PM can assure MPs that the package of measures he just announced has been agreed with the government's Sage advisers, the chief medical officer and the chief scientific adviser.

He asks what overall assessment has been made about the overall transmission of the virus and on the R rate - the reproduction rate of the virus - "both nationally and regionally".
 
He did ask for confirmation that the decisions were consistent with SAGE advice, unless I misheard that bit?

He did but only after saying he was supportive.

This is the effect - Burgon gets up to say the Johnson is gambling with peoples lives only to be told that he's out of kilter with the Labour front bench, who disagree with him. All dissent is effectively stifled by Starmer's actions. Meanwhile 2m remains in Scotland...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/l...087111a86b6ea6#block-5ef1fd708f087111a86b6ea6
 
He did but only after saying he was supportive.

He really is useless isn't he? Fancy saying he was broadly in favour of the intentions but subject to:

- confirmation of scientific basis.
- adequate funding and resources for local authorities and health services to deal adequately with spikes or increases in infections rates.
- properly functioning track and trace.

None of which I'd bank on Johnson actually being able to deliver.

But heck, he could have said "We don't support the intentions you unspeakable lunatic, you're going to kill us all. There is no evidence that it's any safer than day one and if the PM thinks we're going to go along with any of it, he can swivel on this!"

I'm sure that would have done a lot of good - for Johnson. Not sure it would have helped anyone else.
 
He really is useless isn't he? Fancy saying he was broadly in favour of the intentions but subject to:

- confirmation of scientific basis.
- adequate funding and resources for local authorities and health services to deal adequately with spikes or increases in infections rates.
- properly functioning track and trace.

None of which I'd bank on Johnson actually being able to deliver.

But heck, he could have gone "We don't support the intentions you unspeakable lunatic, you're going to kill us all. There is no evidence that it's any safer than day one and if the PM thinks we're going to go along with any of it, he can swivel on this!"

I'm sure that would have done a lot of good - for Johnson. Not sure it would have helped anyone else.

Do you work in a meat processing plant at the weekends too?

This is how public opinion drifts bit by bit to the right - when people don't hear a counter perspective to anything
 
Do you work in a meat processing plant at the weekends too?

This is how public opinion drifts bit by bit to the right - when people don't hear a counter perspective to anything

A counter perspective is fine, as long as it contains an effective mechanism to have some influence on what happens. Without that it's just hot air. Starmer has made it clear that he will oppose in line with evidence and subject to some conditions. That puts at least some pressure on Johnson to follow evidence. Just blow up in front of him in indignation and you give him the perfect excuse to ignore it all by saying "well these guys are not serious about supporting anything, so why bother?"

When you sit on the arse end of a thumping majority, you can either oppose everything and sit there like a protest group for four years, or attempt to actually influence and exert some control over what happens.
 
Just blow up in front of him in indignation and you give him the perfect excuse to ignore it all by saying "well these guys are not serious about supporting anything, so why bother?"

He wouldn't be so sophisticated, it'd be more like "typical shouty lefty. Bah!"
 
. Basically the government has been arguing for weeks that with adequate track and trace technology the lockdown can be gradually reduced. They have entirely failed to deliver such functionality.


How would Starmer argue for that? The app? He’d be a laughing stock, they’d say “cherry on the cake.” They’d point to all the local flair ups that they’re already tackling. They’d explain that they have a huge team poised ready to trace contacts, that everyone should call them as soon as they have symptoms. They’d insist that they’re working right now with ONS to put in place reporting which is statistically irreproachable. Working too with Apple and Google to create world beating software.

And, of course, they’d say that he doesn’t have working class interests at heart, that he doesn’t want people to go back to work even though it’s perfectly safe for them to do so, he’d rather see their wealth decline, he wants them to remain poor and needy. They’d say that he doesn’t care about our darling schoolchildren, England’s hope, Albion’s flower. Sweet angels who are already suffering physically, mentally, spiritually, from not going to school. They’d say they he even begrudges the Great British Public getting their hair cut and he even wants to stop them having their pints of ale in The Rovers. What a scoundrel!

And BJ would thud the table, proclaiming the tories to be the party which represents workers’ interests, the Labour Party a bunch of intellectual bankrupts, worthless troublemakers in a crisis of a magnitude unheard of since the invasion of William the Conquerer, unfit for power and unfit for opposition.

I could write the speech!
 
He really is useless isn't he? Fancy saying he was broadly in favour of the intentions but subject to:

- confirmation of scientific basis.
- adequate funding and resources for local authorities and health services to deal adequately with spikes or increases in infections rates.
- properly functioning track and trace.

None of which I'd bank on Johnson actually being able to deliver.

But heck, he could have said "We don't support the intentions you unspeakable lunatic, you're going to kill us all. There is no evidence that it's any safer than day one and if the PM thinks we're going to go along with any of it, he can swivel on this!"

I'm sure that would have done a lot of good - for Johnson. Not sure it would have helped anyone else.
4D chess?
 
4D chess?

Simply leaving that argument until there is something tangible to go on. You never know Johnson may have met all three of those conditions - or perhaps he hasn't. In which case no doubt he will have a satisfactory explanation should it all go wrong. But one thing he won't be able to do is claim he was thwarted by anyone else.
 
He could have started with David King on 2m - he could have taken the Blackford approach and asked for full publication of the scientific advice - he chose to go belly up I'm afraid.

He chose a wise strategy. Even if you think it's wrong to do what the PM is proposing, how do you think it would go down with the voting public that the Labour Leader was opposed to something they really want after three months in isolation? How do you think the Tory Press would spin it if he opposed it? I'm sure that he would like to skewer Johnson but with a basket case of an economy, the catastrophe that is Brexit on the horizon and the inevitable dashing of expectations of vast investment in Red Wall seats, this was not the hill to die on. We are stuck with this Government for 4.5 more years; There will be plenty of opportunities for them the fail.
 
Tens of thousands of people will need further hospital checkups for pulmonary fibrosis

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-53065340
Someone I know who had covid 19 early on and was hospitalised but not ventilated was rushed to hospital on Saturday when they could not breathe. They were kept in overnight and put on oxygen and sent home on Sunday with strict instructions to not wait as long next time. All down to lung damage caused by the immune reaction to the virus.
 
He chose a wise strategy. Even if you think it's wrong to do what the PM is proposing, how do you think it would go down with the voting public that the Labour Leader was opposed to something they really want after three months in isolation? How do you think the Tory Press would spin it if he opposed it? I'm sure that he would like to skewer Johnson but with a basket case of an economy, the catastrophe that is Brexit on the horizon and the inevitable dashing of expectations of vast investment in Red Wall seats, this was not the hill to die on. We are stuck with this Government for 4.5 more years; There will be plenty of opportunities for them the fail.

I've already explained that failing to put up any opposition makes it more difficult to do so in future, because peoples' ideas aren't static. Nobody will say 'ah yes that Starmer man was right not to say anything in Parliament when the Government relaxed the 2m rule against the leading scientific advice of the day', but many will sure have reason to lament his failure to provide any leadership at a critical juncture - maybe even you....
 
Though if they nod along as the country descends into a catastrophic second spike with tens of thousands of unnecessary deaths they’ll co-own that too. A more logical approach would be to simply follow the science and look for cracks between SAGE and other advice and government action. Also apply constant pressure for freedom of information and the one constant in all this is this shower twists and conceals everything it can get away with.

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