O/T. The Government's handling of Covid

[Andy_Faber]

Sounds very ill thought through and contradictory to me, but then so did the whole ‘eat out, help out’ initiative. Thoughts?

The problem is that so many aspects are Unknown’s and so little true concensus even within the scientific and health communities exists. EVERYONE has an angle, most of which contradict, and this whole thing has shown what a delicate machine the world as we had made it really was - globalisation has a lot to answer for. I think HMG got off to a bad start but have done an ok job (with a few high profile ****ups) of keeping a million plates spinning at the same time. Personally I couldn’t give a **** if Boris goes grouse shooting so long as he keeps me and mine, and by extension my countrymen a) alive and b) in employment or other means of at least buying the essentials and I’ll comply to help that rather than moaning

[ramAnag]

The problem is that so many aspects are Unknown’s and so little true concensus even within the scientific and health communities exists. EVERYONE has an angle, most of which contradict, and this whole thing has shown what a delicate machine the world as we had made it really was - globalisation has a lot to answer for. I think HMG got off to a bad start but have done an ok job (with a few high profile ****ups) of keeping a million plates spinning at the same time. Personally I couldn’t give a **** if Boris goes grouse shooting so long as he keeps me and mine, and by extension my countrymen a) alive and b) in employment or other means of at least buying the essentials and I’ll comply to help that rather than moaning

Sorry Andy but that just totally avoids the question.
Critical questions and ‘moaning’ are quite different too, imo.
I appreciate you’re half a dozen years or so younger and not a grandparent, although that’s scarcely relevant.

The worst I’ve said in this particular exchange is that it’s ‘confusing’. You think HMG have done an ‘ok job’...I disagree...but that’s not the point so I’ll phrase my questions differently.

As a grandparent who has complied totally - and never moaned - with all the ‘advice’ about family get togethers throughout the pandemic how am I meant to feel when suddenly told that’s grandparents are now exempt from the rules if child care responsibility is involved? What has changed...have the over sixties suddenly ceased to be the most vulnerable...was that never actually the case...or is this simply all now about convenience in terms of parents being able to go back to work?

I also genuinely don’t understand the point of the 22.00 hrs pub curfew. What difference does it make when people stop drinking and leave the pub? Surely all that matters is whether people abide by the social distancing rules while they’re in there. Speaking anecdotally I’ve been in five pubs since they reopened and their ‘management’ - as far as Covid is concerned - has varied massively...from brilliant to poorly observed ‘lip service’.

P.S. Sorry, overlapped with Ram...who goes some way to explaining it.

[Geoff Parkstone]

Doesnt everything sound very ill thought through and contradictory to you.

I look forward to the day when any government policy doesnt sound so, but I expect to be dead before that happens - or at very earliest a libdem government! Sorry, I will be dead before that

[swaledale]

Doesnt everything sound very ill thought through and contradictory to you.

I look forward to the day when any government policy doesnt sound so, but I expect to be dead before that happens - or at very earliest a libdem government! Sorry, I will be dead before that

Here we go again those dipsticks otherwise known as Government scientific advisors now scaring the **** out of people, I can see another **** up on the way and the Country going down the tubes completely!

Read a report by another set of equally experienced, knowledgeable scientists who were of the opinion that we just ahve to learn to live with the virus, that IF the government had planned over the summer how to do this we would now be in a position to do this.


However, it seems BJ and his government of no talent merely wished that the virus would go away, obvious that wasn't going to happen so now what will the ****wits do?

[Andy_Faber]

Here we go again those dipsticks otherwise known as Government scientific advisors now scaring the **** out of people

So you’re a Covid denier too!

[ramAnag]

Doesnt everything sound very ill thought through and contradictory to you.

I look forward to the day when any government policy doesnt sound so, but I expect to be dead before that happens - or at very earliest a libdem government! Sorry, I will be dead before that

Harsh...actually no...although most things this government suggest do.

Does it not sound ‘ill thought through and contradictory’ then...in the light of what we’ve been told for the last six months?

Doesn’t it all seem a case of ‘these are the rules...this is what you’ve all got to do...except when it suits us to tell you something that completely contradicts those rules’?

P.S. Could you also explain how the 10.00 pm pub curfew is going to help overcome Covid?

[Ram59]

P.S. Could you also explain how the 10.00 pm pub curfew is going to help overcome Covid?[/QUOTE]

I think it widely known that by the end of the night, after people have had a few drinks, that common sense and social distancing, go out of the window. Rather than close these places, causing more economic problems, have a 10pm closing time to cut down on drunken behaviour.

To be honest, I think that it's one of the more sensible measures that's been brought in.

[Geoff Parkstone]

Couldn't have put it better myself Andy

[Geoff Parkstone]

Harsh...actually no...although most things this government suggest do.

Does it not sound ‘ill thought through and contradictory’ then...in the light of what we’ve been told for the last six months?

Doesn’t it all seem a case of ‘these are the rules...this is what you’ve all got to do...except when it suits us to tell you something that completely contradicts those rules’?

P.S. Could you also explain how the 10.00 pm pub curfew is going to help overcome Covid?

I'm in no position to understand the logic behind the way restrictions are imposed, but, unlike you I assume that there is a basis.

As a guess, I'd assume that people get more pissed and more likely to ignore social distancing rules the longer the pub is open. They can't stagger opening hours as that would just result in pub crawls to find the late opener.

Socialising is plainly the way the virus spreads as seen by reduction in cases in full lockdown and rising numbers as its been eased. Its about finding a balance to stem the rising tide. I don't have the knowledge to understand if this will help (nor, I'm sure, do you) but you have to assume the underlying experts behind government policy may have, no matter how much you despise the face of government.

Just because we don't understand it doesn't make it wrong......

[ramAnag]

I'm in no position to understand the logic behind the way restrictions are imposed, but, unlike you I assume that there is a basis.

As a guess, I'd assume that people get more pissed and more likely to ignore social distancing rules the longer the pub is open. They can't stagger opening hours as that would just result in pub crawls to find the late opener.

Socialising is plainly the way the virus spreads as seen by reduction in cases in full lockdown and rising numbers as its been eased. Its about finding a balance to stem the rising tide. I don't have the knowledge to understand if this will help (nor, I'm sure, do you) but you have to assume the underlying experts behind government policy may have, no matter how much you despise the face of government.

Just because we don't understand it doesn't make it wrong......

Which...again...doesn’t begin to address the grandparent/over 60’s question.

It’s true...I do ‘despise’ this government. Not because they are a Tory government...I don’t ‘despise’ Tories...but because they are a right wing government who represent nothing other than the blinkered politics of selfishness...imo.

Now, put the boot on the other foot and imagine Labour had won the last election...can you honestly say you’d still have the ‘just because we don’t understand it doesn’t make it wrong’ philosophy’? I suspect not.

You say ‘socialising is plainly the way the virus spreads’ and I agree...but how do you square that with an allegedly vulnerable age group now being given special dispensation to mix with children who have spent the day mixing with other children from a variety of backgrounds and other - allegedly vulnerable - adults at the school gate? It’s a completely apolitical question...just tell me how it makes sense and what has changed.

P.S. I’d say you and I and many of the regular contributors on here have just as much ability as most politicians to understand the need for and logic behind restrictions.