Did Boris Johnson just call us all bad parents?!

[Hermagsjesty]

Having watched that briefing I am incandescent with rage, less at what Cummings did - I understand people might have needed to make difficult choices and compromises during lockdown - but at the excusing of it. Why not admit it was an error of judgement and apologise?

I have three children. When my husband and I both became ill with what we believed to be Coronavirus in mid-March, we took turns to watch the children whilst the other slept. I lay on the sofa, feeling the illest I have ever felt, while CBeebies played on loop. We relied on neighbours we barely knew to drop off essentials. We would have loved to lean on family but we didn’t because we believed to do so would endanger them and the wider community.

A succession of ministers - and now the Primeminister himself - have suggested that Mr. Cummings behaved as any loving parent would. But many loving parents did not behave as he did. We struggled and made sacrifices in what we believed was the National interest. Are they now suggesting we just don’t love our kids as much as Mr. Cummings loves his?

Of course it's true. My own childminder had to stop work for that very reason.

What your childminder did, @TabbyMumz, is totally irrelevant to the law on employing nannies, carers and nurses.

That's why thousands of people have been working from home and looking after their kids, because noone else could.

Most people are working from home because their employers require them to do so. The point is, of course, that they are not travelling 270 miles when infected so that their elderly parents or sister can look after their child.

The OP is NBU to suggest that DC broke the rules and should probably resign

She is totally BU to think this is a personal attack on her parenting.

But they arent the facts are they? It's what the press has whipped up.

It is a fact, not something whipped up by the Press, that Cummings drove hundreds of miles potentially putting other people at risk when he has been heavily involved in drawing up and promoting the guidance that tells us not to do that.

It's a fact that Cummings' wife chose to write about emerging from isolation in the London lockdown.

The Press didn't whip up the fact that government ministers have been desperately trying to deny what the guidance said.

Nor did the Press whip up Cummings' and Johnson's evasion of important questions. We have been able to see that for ourselves.

Like some man who supposedly wrote down the number plate of his land rover, because it was unusual? How ridiculous is that? What is he, a land rover spotter!?

No, he's someone who saw a person looking like Cummings in a town 30 miles away from the place that Cummings was supposed to be self-isolating at the time. And the number plate, according to Sky, turns out to be attached to a vehicle that Cummings or his family owns. You can't suggest that the man in question has made this up after the event or that the Press caused him to do that, because he can demonstrate that he checked the number at the time.

Witch hunt or not.

If he'd followed the rules he set then there would be no hunt to be had.

There was a thread on here once about someone who had second homers coming to her village every weekend (i had similar) and she got absolutely slated for daring to moan about it.

Mumsnet is very hypocritical!

Mumsnet is very hypocritical!

and very left wing!

Yes and usually out of step with the public mood.

The OP is NBU to suggest that DC broke the rules and should probably resign She is totally BU to think this is a personal attack on her parenting.

Ok, not a personal attack on her, an insult to ALL parents, ALL fathers in this country who did as they were instructed when coming into contact with CV - isolated at home with their family.

There's no probably about it anymore - Cummings must resign, he is distracting away from key issues, undermining CV strategy, dragging the Gov down with him at a time when we crucially need stability and focus.

I don't think Mn is out of step with the public mood.

16 members of the Tory party have come out against the decision.

If that doesn't tell us something about the public mode then o don't know what does?

TabbyMumz

Here are some facts for you.

The PM's favourite advisor knowingl
y broke lockdown while his family were infectious. Instead of saying, 'er, yeah, shouldn't have done that', the elected politicians, including the prime minister and the chancellor of the exchequer, defended his actions.

It is no longer about one man breaking lockdown. It was inevitable that a small minority of people in the UK would choose to travel while knowingly infectious if we weren't all welded in. That's not a surprise. It is a surprise that it's a man who helped design the UK policies and it is shocking that he should have been lauded for his parental instincts in doing so by the prime minister at the press briefing this weekend.

I think its the Cabinet members who hate him, and the media, who are diluting the focus, to be fair. Not all of us give a shit and would much rather move on and get on with more important things.

MM, Twitter and the Daily Mail all seem to be in agreement this morning. How else would you measure the public mood?

MN!

"And the number plate, according to Sky, turns out to be attached to a vehicle that Cummings or his family owns. You can't suggest that the man in question has made this up after the event or that the Press caused him to do that, because he can demonstrate that he checked the number at the time."
It's more than likely a made up story and the press will have paid someone to make that up. That's how the press works. Whk on earth writes down the number plate of a vehicle? For no good reason?

That's how the press works. Whk on earth writes down the number plate of a vehicle? For no good reason

If I had seen a prominent person like DC breaking the lockdown rules, especially someone who was supposed to be self isolating 250 miles away, I would definitely see a potential story there and collect evidence.

But I would probably be dismissed as a Labour activist.

Still waiting for those facts, thanks.

What would BJ know about being a good parent?

@JudyCoolibar

You're being disingenuous,@Lynda07. By saying that Cummings did what every good parent would have done, he is clearly implying that those of who didn't act in this way in similar circumstances are bad parents

No he wasn't. That's just your interpretation of it. He can't be held responsible for that. Offence can be taken, but not given.

Nine times out of ten, when people complain about MN being hypocritical they mean because some posters say one thing and some another. Like they think that everyone posting on a website has to have the same opinion. It's bemusing. Examples of individual posters applying double standards are much thinner on the ground.

If I saw someone breaking the rules last thing I'd do is collect details households on the side of my house been breaking them all the way throughout but I really dont care enough to grass them up.

I stayed safe so I wouldnt get it and that's all that matters, what I am doing to make sure I dont fall ill. If others want to take bigger risks then go for it.

the press will have paid someone to make that up. That's how the press works.
Perhaps the gutter press you read, but that's not actually how most stories work. This was sensationally good journalism (but not sensational).

If the press have 'made it all up' why have there been no threats of legal action? If it was proven as false wouldn't it be libel?

It can't be hard for a man in his position to prove where he was on certain dates, surely, thereby showing the press to be lying....if they are?

So ok, he was in bluebell wood, on the beach, and in a castle....oh and dancing in a garden. All in a few days, whilst his wife is ill. Yeah, right.

@ITonyah obviously, I don’t think the Primeminister has a personal opinion on my specific parenting choices.

I do, however, feel that in choosing to use very emotive language like “a father’s instinct”, “protecting his family”, “any good parent” etc etc the government have been disrespectful & patronising & shown a complete lack of empathy to the parents across the country who made different choices, often at great personal cost, for what they believed was the good of the community. The govt have chosen to make this about parenting and moral choices. I don’t think that would have happened if he’d have just apologised.