to think Dominic Cummings should go/thread 3

[SophieB100]

Third thread!

So if he knew the pandemic was coming, as he declared, why didn't he advise the government to be properly prepared? That's rather negligent.

I am once again looking forward to the press briefing tonight,

I wonder if they will take follow ups.

The trick is to ask a simple question. No chance for wriggle room.

Grant Shapps is a chancer who used a false identity to peddle dubious internet schemes and then lied about it.

It's a wonder the ground doesn't open up and swallow Cummings with his obvious lie about testing his fucking eyesight.

It's not so much the lies (although that grates), it's the insult to us that he either thinks we're too thick to see the lies or we don't care.

but we don't know they gave him a test because of what they said or because he was admitted to hospital and that was protocol.

They couldn't exactly conceal suspected coronavirus from ambulance/hospital staff - 2 days before;

www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/mar/30/dominic-cummings-self-isolates-after-experiencing-coronavirus-symptoms

Mary Wakefield has written about her driving exploits in the past, she seems to be quite a capable driver. Of course, that could all be lies, as we can't trust anything she writes.

It's quite clear he edited his blog several times- there's lots of screenshots from the way back machine on twitter. I don't think there's any evidence he wrote about coronaviruses before March of this year.

And anyway, why did he need to bring it up yesterday, knowing that he had edited his blog and it could look shady? Could he just not resist pointing out how clever he is? What was the point? There's no benefit to bringing it up.

If the Alice Cummings isn't related, then I withdraw that point, but it is a huge co-incidence.

Poor old Grant Schapps - he can always tender his resignation.

Well that's interesting Clav that you wouldn't drive from London to Durham - personally I have no problem but for that sort of distance we would usually share the driving. We do like most people do, drive half way ish, have a stop for a loo break and get a drink and maybe a quick bite to eat and then the other one takes over. Things like being not too tired to drive matter to us, nor do we usually have a small child in the back, these days.

@Clavinova

Serious question now- do you really think, at a time of national crisis, it is worth spending this much political capital within the Tory party on one advisor?

I will be clear, I think Dominic Cummings has written some abhorrent things about children and eduction which amount to promoting eugenics, and therefore it's hard for me to see clearly on this issue.

But I just can't imagine watching any political party I supported spend this much capital on one person at a time like this and thinking it was a good idea.

Fair dues to the NHS staff who must have known all about this but maintained confidentiality - as they should do.

The Scottish conservative leader, Jackson Carlaw, has finally called for Dominic Cummings to resign, after coming under intense pressure while a number of his own MSPs expressed their strong support for their colleague

It's quite reassuring that in a current online poll, 62% of Daily Express readers don't think he made a mistake with his lockdown journeys.

I would have thought it would be much higher

Marina Hyde's take on the situation:
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/may/26/dominic-cummings-boris-johnson-terrified-sack-him

Grant Misshaps

Well that's interesting Clav that you wouldn't drive from London to Durham

I would - but under protest.

We do like most people do, drive half way ish, have a stop for a loo break and get a drink and maybe a quick bite to eat and then the other one takes over.

I know that I'm quite a bit younger than you - perhaps I only know men who like driving cars with powerful engines!

We call him Grant Pissflaps. He was nearly losing his pants trying to answer Andrew Mars questions.

If you are unhappy about what Cummings did, please
email your MP
www.parliament.uk/get-involved/contact-your-mp/

Tell them what you think.
THEY WORK FOR YOU

Grant mishaps !
Yes, £ 100,000 a year to advise people , paid by the tax payer.
These spin doctors and advisors have always existed of course , but it does stick in the claw that they appear to be needed in the first place. Why can't governments exist without them ?

Coronavirus: Why did Dominic Cummings say he predicted it?
www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52808059

So for the PM's chief adviser to claim, in the middle of his defence, "only last year I wrote explicitly about the danger of coronaviruses" is worthy of some inspection. Such prescience would indeed have been impressive and helpful, and he does have a long-standing and well-known interest in mathematical modelling and big data.

Looking at his blog, there is one reference to coronavirus, and it was indeed in a blog written in March last year. But it wasn't quite as billed. It is a blog about the risk of a pandemic starting from a leak from a biological lab.

The point of it is that governments should pay money to "Red Teams" to try to break security at such institutions, including £1m to "honey trap" the security bosses.

If this is the writing that "explicitly" warned of the danger of coronaviruses, then it rather suggests that a key No 10 figure believes that biolab security is the relevant issue.
[...]
It is a mystery why he felt the need to burnish his credentials as a coronavirus sage so much that he pointed to having explicitly warned about something that was only added to his blog after the event.

There is no other reference to coronavirus or Sars or Mers on his blog. There is a page on the mathematics of pandemic modelling and "herd immunity" in a long essay written on the education system in 2013, but no references to coronaviruses.

It is difficult to see why editing a year-old personal blog would have been on any list of priorities for any No 10 official on a day like that - in the middle of the period where hospital deaths had peaked the previous week, but care home deaths were still mounting.

I felt a bit sorry for Shapps as it should have been Boris sat there getting the grief!

Beth Rigby put some of the questions on Twitter the night before - and no one had the heart to tell Grant Shapps the answers.

Not even to say that they hadn't stopped on the way up and that he did go to Barnard Castle.

Poor sod

But I just can't imagine watching any political party I supported spend this much capital on one person at a time like this and thinking it was a good idea.

Not great I agree, but it does remind me of when Labour were trying to oust Theresa May just after the 2017 general election - before she had secured the backing of the DUP - similar sort of frenzy although coming from Conservatives this time as well.

Sophie that's a good article. Also a good point that is is actually more on Boris than what Cummings did. He isn't reacting the way he should.

What labour did 3 years ago has no relevance to what Cummings and Boris are doing now. No one was trying to oust either of them.
Well not before this anyway.
It's the British public alongside MPs calling for resignation now. And some of those MPs are Torres! This isn't solely party against party.

This is someone making a massive error of judgement, making a cock up of responding to the press when challenged weeks ago and then getting their spade back out when the story was broken without their cooperation.

Every political party has had scandals. Every political party has had embarrassing moments.

But that doesn't mean they shouldn't face the music when they do.

Clav, they said Theresa May wouldn't last the day back then!
The dirty tricks and spivs have always hang around parliament; it's nothing new but nobody ever tells me why they need them?it really shouldn't be this way for any government. New labour liked having them about too.
It wasn't something I ever really thought about before all this but I agree that if Seamus Milne or Diane Abbott had done what DC did it would be the exact same witch hunt , only a lot worse. Dirty tricks and all sorts.

Not great I agree, but it does remind me of when Labour were trying to oust Theresa May just after the 2017 general election - before she had secured the backing of the DUP - similar sort of frenzy although coming from Conservatives this time as well.

I'm talking specifically about what's happening within the Conservative party though. Ignore what other parties are doing for the moment.

24 MPs have come out publically against Cummings. The leader of Conservatives Scotland has come out against him. Apparently a lot more backbenchers are annoyed in private.

A lot of goodwill is being lost by Boris within his own party. Now, they have a majority of 80, so maybe it doesn't matter. But it's not impossible that later on this year he'll need to push some unpopular legislation through either for public health reasons or Brexit.

At what point do you say- well actually it just isn't worth it?

I know that I'm quite a bit younger than you - perhaps I only know men who like driving cars with powerful engines!

Erm, how do you manage to work out the engine capacity of a car from someone's age? Should I interpret men driving cars with powerful engines as wankers? I believe the Germans call a car like that a penis extender!

But enough of that. Labour trying to oust May - she had been fairly and squarely elected, although chucking away a majority is not good for a PM.