Ukraine invasion discussion thread - part 9

[cakeorwine]

Because MN only allows 1000 posts and this is fast moving

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/4496974-The-Invasion-is-ongoing-Part-8

How different is the money spaffed on Test and Trace from the way Oligarchs get so rich?

It isn't. The amount of money which went of that was obscene and I simply do not believe it was genuine. For comparison, the entire Hinkley Point development will cost less than test and trace. The cost of hosting the olympics (including all of the stadia) was about one third of the cost of test and trace.

Group message from our execrable Cabinet is just to cast doubt on the numbers of visas offered.

Just watching BJ saying, "I'm not sure those are the right numbers" and going on to claim that they are "processing" thousands of visas and that the UK "will" be taking in hundreds of thousands of refugees aye right

He also continues to claim that "the UK is leading the process of accepting refugees from around the world"

He again talks about the scheme that the UK "will" be introducing ie they still haven't sorted out the details for individuals and organisation to sponsor ie pay in advance to allow refugees people to come into the UK.

But proclaims proudly that there is no way that the UK could or should let people come in without checks.

He's now going in again about how the UK is "leading the world" in its actions

Plus all those shops now closed down due to Amazon. They can be adapted at short notice for temporary use.

A number of those conversions are a nightmare and they've been in the papers.

Shield House is just one example of “permitted development”. It is an outcome of a government experiment in deregulation, which allows homes to be made out of old offices and shops without planning permission, that has been going on for some years. An estimated 65,000 flats have been made in this way. The experiment has been catastrophic in several significant respects, but the government has recently decided to double down on it, expanding their policy such that office blocks may now be replaced with entirely new buildings without permission. This means that undersized and badly planned and located flats can now be realised at a larger scale. This is the famous definition of insanity – doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results – applied, with devastating effects, to the places where people live.

Other such conversions have had other problems. At one, Templefields House, also in Harlow, trucks thunder past all day long, which can make trips out a miserable and potentially dangerous experience. “It was just a horrible environment,” says a former member of staff there. If people didn’t have drug problems when they arrived, he says, the amount of dealing inside the densely populated block meant that many of them soon did. “There were two instances where babies were taken off their mothers because they had overdoses.…

In Terminus House, a 14-storey concrete former office slab in the centre of Harlow that has achieved national notoriety, a BBC Panorama programme reported on mothers and children living in tiny studio flats, on gang fights in the narrow corridors and lift lobbies that left blood on the walls.

www.theguardian.com/society/2020/sep/27/housing-crisis-planning-converting-office-blocks-homes-catastrophe-jenrick

The price of oil reduced significantly during lockdowns due to reduced demand for it. Could the Government recommend people work from home again where possible to reduce the demand again ?

They don't need to be permanent conversions. We are talking about temporary use.

In terms of polling, I also STRONGLY suspect there is a significant majority who think the oligarchs should be deal with more strongly.

Part of Brexit's support was driven by a dislike of 'the elite' and this idea of corrupt politics. It was part of Vote Leave's campaign strategy to feed off this sentiment.

That also causes Johnson something of a polling problem right now.

I think that people will mistakenly think that money will go to government rather than being merely frozen, but the dislike of these super rich will certainly be there.

There's a real irony here. You can't escape reality. You can push it down the road and pretend its not an issue and you can lie about its roots and causes. But ultimately it catches up with you. Particularly in democracies. But its also a feature of dictatorships and part of the process of when they ultimately collapse. The Chinese are particularly aware that even they have to keep a certain % of their population at least satified on key issues, otherwise the risk of unrest grows.

@dreamingbohemian

They don't need to be permanent conversions. We are talking about temporary use.

Temporary use for how long? Until more housing is built or people are settled in places with available housing?

Permitted development has been horrendous in some areas. It's hard to discern the difference between that and B&B temporary housing which is miserable.

The present conditions for asylum seekers and refugees are ghastly (disused army camps) and they're no place for families.

I would like to see strong govt. policy for adequate housing (as I've written to remind my local MP and councillors yet again).

Dominik Stillhart, director of operations for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), has been speaking with BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

Asked what's gone wrong with so-called humanitarian corridors, he said they had been talking to both sides "for days", but problems remained confirming the detail of any ceasefire agreement - to allow civilians out of bombarded cities.

Stillhart said the challenge was to get the two parties to an agreement that is "concrete, actionable and precise".

He added that so far there had only been agrements "in principle", which had immediately broken down because they lacked precision, regarding routes and who can use them.

Illustrating his point, he said some ICRC staff had tried to get out of Mariupol along an agreed route on Sunday, but soon realised "the road indicated to them was actually mined".

@Roussette

Permitted Ukrainian 🇺🇦 refugee arrivals so-far: 🇵🇱 Poland: 885,303 🇭🇺 Hungary: 169,053 🇸🇰 Slovakia: 113,967 🇲🇩 Moldova: 84,067 🇷🇴 Romania: 71,640 🇪🇺 Other EU: 157,000 🇬🇧 UK: 50

It is shameful.

But temporary for how long? Temporary before they can go back to Ukraine is a long time. Temporary before we find houses here would be quite a while - we know there are too many people currently in unsuitable housing. Temporary before they are put up in spare rooms would be truly temporary, but then you shift from one temporary solution to another. I really think we should do it - I would let them in now and work it out later - but is is not a simple problem.

In China Xi has done a massive shakedown of the oligarchs where they find 'corruption'. Some were killed, some were imprisoned and all got the message. Some figures are up to 90% of their wealth has been sequestrated to pay government bills. It's like Bezos has $170 billion and the government says you only need $17 billion and while you're at it stop playing around with rocket rides. and we will use this money to repair our infrastructure, pay our pensions and invest in the future. Not that I would ever want to live in China but it would be good if our global masters got the democratic message and we could build affordable housing for all and welcome refugees to help build our country and return to their when safe to do.

Cue Clav saying but Corbyn ....

No surprise

Russia is a no-show at international court hearing

Anna Holligan
BBC News Hague correspondent
Russia has refused to attend an International Court of Justice (ICJ) hearing where Ukraine is calling for a halt to the invasion.

The Russian ambassador in The Hague, Alexander Shulgin, indicated his government did not intend to participate in the proceedings.

The head judge at the UN's highest court said she regretted the non-appearance of the Russian Federation.

Ukraine's representative Anton Korynevych told the court: "The fact Russian seats are empty speaks volumes, they are not here, they are on the battlefield."

He accused Moscow of defiling the Genocide Convention by using claims of a non-existent genocide as a false pretext to try to justify the invasion.

"Putin lies, Ukrainian citizens die," he said.

Ukraine has asked the ICJ to urgently intervene to ask Russia to immediately suspend its military operation, prevent further civilian casualties and any acts of genocide or rhetoric expressing genocidal intent.

Both Russia and Ukraine are members of the court, and both have signed up to the Genocide Convention.

Temporary housing doesn't have to be miserable. It often is in the UK because government doesn't care and doesn't allocate enough money.

I went in some of the temporary housing in Berlin and while very basic it was not squalid or miserable.

@Roussette

Permitted Ukrainian 🇺🇦 refugee arrivals so-far: 🇵🇱 Poland: 885,303 🇭🇺 Hungary: 169,053 🇸🇰 Slovakia: 113,967 🇲🇩 Moldova: 84,067 🇷🇴 Romania: 71,640 🇪🇺 Other EU: 157,000 🇬🇧 UK: 50

But look at how many more refugees the UK has taken than say South Sudan, Eritrea and Tuvalu.

Just had to remove myself from the living room, my mother is having a telephone conversation with my sister- who supports Putin, and believes we are being fed misinformation about Ukraine's situation.
My bathroom has never had such a severe srubbing!

@Justanotherlurker

Probably been posted, but Russia is looking to cut itself off from the wider internet, it's been muted for years and there has been obvious signs they have been prepping for it as well, (involved in global cyber sec) they could move over to the Chinese red firewall or just cut itself off completely.

It is a rumour and not verified but the chatter has been ramping up in circles I am involved with, here is a public tweet

twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1500553480548892679

It isn't verfied of course, because simply, it won't until/if it happens.

I think this has been misinterpreted.

It reads that they are trying to ensure control of all domains and websites related to official Russian resources.

They are trying to reduce their vulnerability by getting websites off AWS (Amazon cloud hosting) and onto russian hosting services and remove all Javascript that is again from non-russian sources.

Re-platforming to Russian hosting is one thing (doable but not always easy) but removing OpenSouce code from applications is going be problematic as it's so pervasive and there are not going to be "replacements" for every scenario. Many modern apps won't work without it - at least not without some serious re-coding.

That's not to say Russia hasn't tested a state restricted internet- see link below - but it's not confirmed exactly how successful it was and progress may have been made since this article was published. But that's not what that document was talking about from what I can gather from the translated version.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-50902496

Arj Singh @singharj
NEW Boris Johnson signals UK won't open new entry route for Ukrainian refugees but will be ‘very generous’

Comes after Priti Patel created confusion after saying she was looking at legal options for a 'humanitarian route'

Just get the fuck on with the existing ones you absolute fucking jobsworths!

I do think when we take more people from Ukraine there need to be awareness that they need jobs and places to live, so support in every day people’s lives.

I think we will as generally good people are here too, but for this it is a close solution eg as people have elsewhere - taken people into homes.

Otherwise it can be profiteering etc or worse

I saw on the news today about the 11 year old boy who was sent alone by his mother, who couldn't leave as she was looking after her elderly, sick mother, to Slovakia with a phone number written on his hand and some papers. Thankfully he was helped and managed to get to his relatives living over there. It makes you think what you would do in that situation. I have a 12 year old and I have to say, I'd probably leave my mother and go with my child in case anything happened to them. No judgement on the mother at all by the way, but it made me think about what I'd do as I have a child nearly the same age. What would all of you do? It's a terrible choice to have to make.

I do think when we take more people from Ukraine there need to be awareness that they need jobs and places to live, so support in every day people’s lives.

And schools plus medical facilities that match the needs of young children through to older people. This has to happen quickly.

@dreamingbohemian

Temporary housing doesn't have to be miserable. It often is in the UK because government doesn't care and doesn't allocate enough money.

I went in some of the temporary housing in Berlin and while very basic it was not squalid or miserable.

Theres temporary post war housing that has been listed:

www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/prefabs-birmingham-george-clarke-best-13978164

It was supposed to last for 10 years.

The residents love them.

The main issue really with this type of building is that they aren't covered by normal mortgages, so theres a barrier as to who can buy them / insurance etc.

Can someone explain why something like this isn't a viable option - not necessarily for families but certainly for single people who are least likely to otherwise get social housing?

Are we really going to say that we can't do similar in 2022?

There's been lots of talk about 'module homes' or 'container homes'.

I know they aren't ideal, but they've got to be better than some of the places that people are currently forced to live in.

Again, I stress this isn't about not being able to do something. Its about a lack of political will to do something.

The difference between the two is MASSIVE but much misunderstood.

Ukrainians with family can't get visas. Its not because we haven't the means to get a foreign office team in Calais or at the borders in Poland. Its because the government dont want to.

We need to keep saying this.

The narrative is 'we can't' not 'we don't want to'. The former is false.

@MarshaBradyo

I do think when we take more people from Ukraine there need to be awareness that they need jobs and places to live, so support in every day people’s lives.

I think we will as generally good people are here too, but for this it is a close solution eg as people have elsewhere - taken people into homes.

Otherwise it can be profiteering etc or worse

We have a problem with recruitment in this country atm.

Lots of jobs. No one taking them...

As for schools. Well I KNOW there are numerous places at local schools where I live, so thats not really an issue everywhere...

Again, I stress this isn't about not being able to do something. Its about a lack of political will to do something.

But even when Johnson says that he's had a change of heart, in practice we find that it's all talk and three word slogans.

Has the Tory Party got any decent MPs still who could mount a coup and get rid of Johnson, Truss and Patel, right now?

Johnson wants to ride two seemingly at conflict horses.

1. We've taken back control of our borders and are hard on unfettered immigration.
2. We are world-leading in the Ukrainian fightback and have opened our country and hearts to welcome them in.

So the plan is ;

1. Well practised lying can cover the cracks and chuck in a bit of sentimental piano music on Priti Patel doing compassion.

Don't worry about that Ukrainian zoo - Carrie will be on that for sure.

Ok an interesting update:

The Kremlin has announced its demands for ending the war in Ukraine:
-Ukraine must change its constitution to guarantee it won't join any "blocs", i.e. NATO + EU.
-Must recognise Crimea as part of Russia.
-Must recognise the eastern separatist regions as independent.

twitter.com/Reevellp/status/1500810351192985600