Boris stands down as MP with immediate effect part 3

[DuncinToffee]

Tomorrow is the Commons vote on the Privileges Committee's findings that Boris Johnson deliberately misled Parliament over Downing Street parties during lockdown

The vote is a free vote rather than being whipped either way. Tories have been told that the vote will be a one-line whip, meaning they will not be obliged to participate.

Boris Johnson is believed to have advised his backers to not vote against it.

Michael Gove confirmed on live tv that he will abstain

Tobias Elwood has u-turned on abstaining after hearing stories from voters

Rishi Sunak, who knows

I cannot believe you are comparing Shipman to Johnson.

The pandemic sadly killed people, as it did in many countries.

My point has always been they are 2 separate things. The restrictions were there to stop community spread. Workplaces, like Downing Street and tiktok dancing weredifferent as these people were with each other every day. The risk was already there and mitigations like testing were in place

NO THEY WEREN'T

I can't see how you don't get that.

What did you do during the pandemic?

Did you go into an office?

Have you read the Government advice on keeping offices safe - people took steps to reduce contact and only have ESSENTIAL contact - even if offices.

You don't understand what the office guidance was. Or you can't be bothered to read it.

Just like Johnson.

Maybe you need a 1 page summary.

Read this -and you see that you are wrong @Janiie

Working safely during COVID-19 in offices and contact centres

PowerPoint Presentation (publishing.service.gov.uk)

Quite.

I went into work. I was classed as a keyworker.

My role was to attend work daily despite the risk. And follow extremely right RA (sent to us by government) to limit those risks once inside the workplace.

We held staff meetings on teams with each room of staff together - but not mixing.

We are in our classrooms - as we couldn't gather across "bubbles" in the staff room.

It wasn't just a case of "turn up to work and nothing inside needs to be safe because you're all there anyway". Nowhere had that RA.

That went directly against the rules sent to us by government.

I don't believe they didn't understand rules. How can you address a nation and tell them the rules and yet - somehow - not know what they are?

I kept an open mind as I believe in democracy and due process.

There is now NO doubt. Rules were broken and Johnson deliberately misled parliament and the electorate.

What aboutery has finished.

Even 2/3 or the Tory party didn't see the point in voting because the outcome was so clear cut.

2/3 didn't disagree with the report.

They knew it couldn't be disputed as it was basically factual.

It's even worse more is still coming out

I totally share Janiies outrage at the comparison of Harold Shipman and Boris Johnson.

Harold Shipman never once said "let the bodies pile up".

Cake, show me all the PowerPoints you like, anecdotally though I can tell you I know keyworkers and it was not all 'one in the staffroom only at a time'. I don't doubt some places stuck to the rules to the letter, but many workplaces were more flexible.

I'll say it again, if Johnson was knowingly breaking rules they wouldn't have had the professional photographer taking pics, they wouldn't have had notebooks and emails full of arrangements. They'd have been secretive.

At worst he was very naive and should've had someone keeping an eye on unelected civil servants.

Oh dear. Joking about Harold Shipman, a mass murderer. How very hilarious.

You are missing the point.

No matter what some people did - this was the official guidance as well as the law about essential workplaces.

You do accept that the guidance is official?
If you read it, then you will see what was expected.

That's all you need to know.

I cut my teeth on Monty Python chopping body bits off and blood spurting everywhere. I guess it's the sense of humour you inherit from people who were dug out of the Blitz.

Workplaces, like Downing Street and tiktok dancing weredifferent as these people were with each other every day

Distancing wasn’t the issue with nurses TikTok dancing btw. It was deemed by some as inappropriate/bad taste given what was going on around them at the time.

Personally I didn’t mind them and am aware that staff of these services can’t spend their existence in a permanent state of somber seriousness, especially given the pressure they were all under.

Monty python was fiction. Harold Shipman was real, real victims and real relatives. There's a difference, obviously.

For the hard of reading @Janiie

Objective: To reduce risk to the lowest reasonably practicable level by taking preventative measures, in order of priority.

Employers have a duty to reduce workplace risk to the lowest reasonably practicable level by taking preventative measures. Employers must work with any other employers or contractors sharing the workplace so that everybody's health and safety is protected.

In the context of COVID-19 this means protecting the health and safety of your workers and visitors by working through these steps in order: • Ensuring both workers and visitors who feel unwell stay at home and do not attend the premise.

Businesses and workplaces should make every reasonable effort to ensure their employees can work safely. When in the workplace, everyone should make every reasonable effort to comply with the social distancing guidelines set out by the government (2m, or 1m with risk mitigation where 2m is not viable is acceptable).

Where the social distancing guidelines cannot be followed in full, in relation to a particular activity, businesses should consider whether that activity can be redesigned to maintain a 2m distance or 1m with risk mitigations where 2m is not viable. ▪

Further mitigating actions include:
▪ Further increasing the frequency of hand washing and surface cleaning. ▪ Keeping the activity time involved as short as possible.
▪ Using screens or barriers to separate people from each other.
▪ Using back-to-back or side-to-side working (rather than face-to-face) whenever possible.
▪ Reducing the number of people each person has contact with by using ‘fixed teams or partnering’ (so each person works with only a few others).
▪ Where the social distancing guidelines cannot be followed in full, even through redesigning a particular activity, businesses should consider whether that activity needs to continue for the business to operate, and if so, take all the mitigating actions possible to reduce the risk of transmission between their staff.

You should ensure that steps are taken to avoid people needing to unduly raise their voices to each other. This includes, but is not limited to, refraining from playing music or broadcasts that may encourage shouting, including if played at a volume that makes normal conversation difficult. This is because of the potential for increased risk of transmission, particularly from aerosol transmission.

We will develop further guidance, based on scientific evidence, to enable these activities as soon as possible. ▪ Finally, if people must work face-to-face for a sustained period with more than a small group of fixed partners, then you will need to assess whether the activity can safely go ahead. No one is obliged to work in an unsafe work environment.

Where the social distancing guidelines cannot be followed in full, even through redesigning a particular activity, businesses should consider whether that activity needs to continue for the business to operate, and if so, take all the mitigating actions possible to reduce the risk of transmission between staff.

Social distancing applies to all parts of a business, not just the place where people spend most of their time, but also entrances and exits, break rooms, canteens and similar settings. These are often the most challenging areas to maintain social distancing and workers should be specifically reminded.

You are making yourself look stupid.

Or maybe you just don't understand

At worst he was very naive and should've had someone keeping an eye on unelected civil servants.

Bless, we are back at tending the pot plants

'Bless, we are back at tending the pot plants'

Starmer?

Boris Johnson is real too, with real victims who have real relatives some of whom are posting on this thread, but don't let that moderate your posting.

Starmer doesn't need a minder, he also knew the rules and adhered to them and wait for it, he didn't lie to Parliament

No dear, the subject is Boris. Do keep up, the subject matter hasn’t changed,

Cake, show me all the PowerPoints you like, anecdotally though I can tell you I know keyworkers and it was not all 'one in the staffroom only at a time'. I don't doubt some places stuck to the rules to the letter, but many workplaces were more flexible

Did they stand up in Parliament and lie about it?

I don't doubt some places stuck to the rules to the letter, but many workplaces were more flexible

Stuck to the rules.

And that's it. The point.
You have admitted there were rules.
They didn't stick to them.

And we know what was said in Parliament.

The Prime Minister
What I can tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman is that all guidance was followed completely in No. 10. May I recommend that he does the same with his own Christmas party, which is advertised for 15 December and to which, unaccountably, he has failed to invite the deputy Leader of the Opposition?

Hallelujah. Enlightenment has arrived.

anecdotally though I can tell you I know keyworkers

well I can tell you that I was a key worker (NHS, not frontline) and you know absolutely nothing.

He told another lie a few minutes later:

We are helping to build another 40 new hospitals with an injection of £36 billion of investment

Boris Johnson is a habitual liar.

It seems another Minister is lying at the moment apparently about asylum statistics and has been asked several times to correct the record.

I like Dawn Butler's contribution

We are honourable Members of Parliament. It is not just a title, but something we should hold dear. We should be honourable in what we do in this place. We should be honourable to the people we serve, because they have elected us. Democracy demands honourable conduct, and we have not seen much of that over the past few years. If we allow lies to go unchecked and deceit to become the norm, our democracy begins to crumble, and that is what has been happening.

We sit here time and time again and see Ministers coming to the Dispatch Box. We all stand up and say, “That is not true, that is not true”, and we are told that we are not allowed to say that. We have to say, “They have inadvertently misled the House and they will have to come back to the House to correct the record”, but they never come back. T
They tell a lie, they sit down with a goofy grin on their face, they walk out and they never come back to correct the record, and that is a problem for our democracy.This House must be able to speak truth to power. Honourable Members of this House must be able to stand up and say, “That is incorrect”, otherwise what is the point or the purpose?

We must also not be so obsessed with the archaic rules of this House. We must be honest with ourselves and say, “We have got to challenge the rules of this House if they are not working.” We have to challenge the system of this House if it is not working. It is a nonsense that in this House we cannot call somebody a liar if they are lying. People say, “It will degrade the House and everyone will be calling each other a liar.”

If people do not want to be called a liar, do not lie—tell the truth. That is the solution to the problem. The truth must prevail and integrity must be restored. All Members of this House are guardians of our democracy, and I am sorry, but we are not doing a good job; we must do much better, and this report does bring some of that back to us.

It was a good speech.