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Original poster

To not understand the outrage at Dominic Cummings?

999 replies

Wow123 · 25/05/2020 08:08

Please don’t flame me for this. I’m not posting this to be controversial. I am someone who always tries to see the good in people which has been to my detriment at time’s in the past so I’m very well aware that maybe I’m missing something here and being too kind when he possibly doesn’t deserve it.

My understanding is that Dominic Cummings is saying that he only returned to Durham on one occasion which was because he had fears about potentially being unable to look after his child if him and his wife both ended up too unwell with Covid. I can understand the logic in that.

I appreciate the government advice at that stage was to stay home but if he genuinely didn’t have anyone to help with his son, then I can understand his fears and that he was trying to put his child first as any parent would.

My understanding is that a matter of days after, the government did clarify that travelling in the event of needing support with children if you had caught covid was an exceptional circumstance and that travel in that instance was acceptable.

I personally live hundreds of miles from family and don’t have anyone I could ask for help in the local area was I to become unwell with Covid so this does resonate with me.

I understand that there were sightings of Dominic Cummings on other dates in Durham which indicate that he travelled back up there. If this is true, I definitely agree that he needs to be sacked, but at this stage, there is no proof of this.

Am I missing something here?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
6
StealthPolarBear · 25/05/2020 10:23

Did you see my response to you about "highly likely"? Or had you moved on to the next thing?

tawnygrisettes · 25/05/2020 10:23

I get it, OP. I can't get worked up about it either. What saddens me is the nasty, spiteful witch hunt and horrified, pearl clutching finger pointing that we are seeing now. Give him a break, it's over and done and in the past, he's just a person who might have made a mistake or a show of poor judgement but nobody is hurt and I can't bring myself to wish any ill on him. These are difficult times for everyone.

Disclaimer: I hate Tory policy and never have/never will vote for them.

HeatherIV · 25/05/2020 10:24

if you truly don't know anyone that stuck to lockdown then you must know only idiotic selfish morons.

That's a matter of opinion. Most people are able to think for themselves rather than follow blanket rules imposed by a nanny state for the stupid.

LagunaBubbles · 25/05/2020 10:24

I don't know if he or his wife have relatives in London - that would make a difference

Yes they do. Clearly this "childcare" issue is just a story he's concocted.

Daffodil101 · 25/05/2020 10:24

(And I apologise for my tedious picking over the semantics....however, spinning the facts in either direction does justify clarifying meaning).

NiknicK · 25/05/2020 10:25

Why is everyone surprised by this. Hasn’t it always been one rule for them and one rule for us? Whether it’s fair or not you’re outrage will not change this going forward. The government are always going to protect their own. Me personally I’m past caring and will focus my energy elsewhere, you know on things I can actually change, as opposed to something like this.

altmum · 25/05/2020 10:25

Tawny - you are missing the point, he hasn't said sorry or admitted he made a mistake.

Hadenoughfornow · 25/05/2020 10:26

Daffodil and other families need to be grateful for that.

Many accidents have happened, people killed due to people falling asleep at the wheel.

I have regularly driven the same distance as you. Sometimes on my own and other times with DH. We always stop. And if its the 2 of us we take turns.

We have done it with kids asleep in the car. (never on my own granted) and we still have to stop for toilet breaks. 1 of us stayed with the sleeping kids whilst the other went into service station.

LondonJax · 25/05/2020 10:26

Mary Wakefield wrote her Spectator piece as if they were living in London - where there townhouse is. There was no mention of his parents helping him, his sister doing their shopping. All she mentions is that she was vomiting and, within 24 hours, he was in bed with fever and aches/pains/shivering.

So they either drove up when she was vomiting. What did she do about that? Vomit in a bush? Vomit in a service station? Keep it in the car? Because if it were either of the first she potentially infected others.

If they travelled when he became ill you had two adults driving up the motorway for 260 miles when they were incapacitated. With a child in the back.

He is a senior aide in government. He makes one phone call and Downing Street would pull out the stops to get him/her to hospital and their son to safety until his sister could drive 260 down to London.

Wakefield made no mention of Durham because she knew that, if the country found out, there would be uproar. Otherwise why pretend? If you're allowed to travel like this and you see nothing wrong with it, then writing 'thank goodness for our family, who kept us going in Durham' makes sense. She wrote that he rushed home as she was vomiting, 24 hours later he collapsed. Nothing mentioned about not being in their own home when this happened. In fact she said they came out into the London sunshine (and I am paraphrasing).

So the question is, if you know you did nothing wrong (and haven't even thought about the fact that it could be interpreted otherwise) why cover it?

It was not mentioned by her because otherwise, at a time when lockdown had just started, people would have done the same. Which means they were aware that they had stretched the rules until they twanged.

Piggywaspushed · 25/05/2020 10:27

nobody is hurt

We don't actually know that.

Viviennemary · 25/05/2020 10:27

You are missing something. Because he is right in the centre of the you must not brigade. It's an absolute insult to everyone else who followed the rules in spite of what they might have thought was better for their family. It makes a total mockery of the whole campaign.

StealthPolarBear · 25/05/2020 10:27

Everyone is hurt! We've been thanked time and time again for te "sacrifices" we've made, and now we're learning we didn't need to do it after all. We could have followed our instincts.
And that is assuming he and his family didn't directly pass on the virus. No, we have no proof he did, because at this stage there is no tracking and tracing so no way to know how transmission in Durham occurred.

AnneTwacky · 25/05/2020 10:27

Cummings didn't break the lockdown rule, he broke the self isolation rule.

This is more serious because he knowingly brought the virus 260 miles as well as to however many stops they took on the way up.

Daffodil101 · 25/05/2020 10:27

I think you are highly likely to have raised blood pressure if you carry on frothing.

In reality, I can’t tell you how likely. I just prefer to believe it’s ‘highly’ to get my point across.

sleepingpup · 25/05/2020 10:27

(And I apologise for my tedious picking over the semantics....however, spinning the facts in either direction does justify clarifying meaning).

yes it is tedious.

StealthPolarBear · 25/05/2020 10:28

There is no evidence he passed the virus on I'll admit. And at the moment there is no evidence of anyone passing the virus on. Yet clearly it is happenibg.

lilgreen · 25/05/2020 10:29

The teacher that saw Cummings our for a stroll has filed a police report and given details of the car they got into. That was 12/4. So if proved correct by cctv, he will have lied that he only travelled once. Bring it on.

Miljea · 25/05/2020 10:29

OK, Tory press office.

Sensed the mood out here in Plebshire, yet?

What does DC have over BJ that BJ, (and the sycophants singing along in the gallery), is prepared to destroy his credibility over?

Why is Dom so central, so essential to the Tories?

And I wonder if there is a single poster supporting a) what DC did, in blatantly flaunting The Rules he wrote, and b) happily accepting the government's gaslighting of the nation- who didn't vote Leave?

Daffodil101 · 25/05/2020 10:30

(Yes, we shared the driving, of course. And we had a flask of coffee. And for some reason we always made it home without needing the loo.

Strong bladders, maybe!

You’d drive without stopping if you had a toddler like mine, too. She’s wake up if the engine stopped.

Too old to do that now, I’d need a wee).

B1rdbra1n · 25/05/2020 10:30

Nasty spiteful witch-hunt
Wait... what??
Are you trumpty Dumpty over from Twitter🤣

MaeveDidIt · 25/05/2020 10:30

He's a double-standard prick.

JudyCoolibar · 25/05/2020 10:30

No just having a laugh at twitter like I said. The ones who are avoiding the inconvenient truth

What truth would that be, @ooooohbetty? Why so coy about telling us?

Daffodil101 · 25/05/2020 10:30

I think he flouted the rules.

Flaunting them would involve sort of waving them around on a bit of paper.

StealthPolarBear · 25/05/2020 10:31

Daffodil101 ah resorting to patronising replies. Clearly your logic is lacking.