If you were annoyed at Dominic Cummings before

[NoMoreReluctantCustodians]

How has his performance in the rose garden affected your opinion?

YANBU it's made things worse
YABU its cleared things up for me

And as for those who have stuck to the guidelines and that’s what’s making THEM angry, stay away from the negative energy. You’ve done the right thing. Cummings and thousands of others haven’t. That makes you a better person.

One of the reason given for staying home and not going to a second home was not to overwhelm local hospitals, yet his child used up hospital resources 260 miles from home - why did he not address this point? And why did his wife go in the ambulance when still showing symptoms of C-19 and presumably putting the paramedics at risk? Of course you wouldn't want your child to go to hospital alone but other families had to endure this.

^^this. Not only to not overwhelm local hospitals, but to avoid taking it to areas that hadn't been exposed to it.

It is pretty terrifying that this government seems to think they are not accountable to it's people, that they can just mug us off like this. This should have led to automatic firing or resignation as a clear message of not condoning his actions.

I hope this brings this whole shitty government down. With our terrible death rate, they couldn't have done worse.

Why is this functionary addressing the nation?? He should just be sacked and replaced.

One of the main reasons we voted to leave the EU was that we no longer wanted unelected bureaucrats governing over us, yet here we are having our future decided by one!!

Please name me the constituency that returned Dominic Cummings??

It was just a badly judged piece of PR.

Another misjudgement of the British people by Johnson and his group of 'Elites'.

@Thedogscollar

The constituency of Boris Johnson.

Silly? SILLY??? Silly in taking someone they knew would probably have Covid halfway across country to isolate in their second home breaking the first rule in a pandemic set by himself DO NOT LEAVE YOUR RESIDENCE if you have symptoms which they knew were Covid being as they both had contact with PM and others confirmed to have it. SILLY in BELIEVING such a crock!

Apparently he took a 30 mile drive to a beauty spot on his wife’s birthday to “test his eyes”. ROFLMAO.

This government has no authority left to tell anyone else what to do. Johnson risking the integrity of lockdown and public taking government fuels seriously - ie risking the health of millions - just to save Cummings. I can’t think of a fitting word, so I’ll just go with WEIRD. Two weird men totally out of their depth, charged with steering the fate of the country through one unavoidable, albeit terribly handled crisis, and one entirely self made one (the “B” word’)

let’s not pretend that his attitude is unique.
No, but what is unique, or at least quite particular, is that he is in a position of responsibility and needs to be, like Caesar's wife, irreproachable.
And at the minute, we don’t need any more instability than we’re already living with and it’s almost a case of better the devil you know.
It really isn't. The man is just an advisor. There are plenty of them.

Special person being very special, with zero grip on why wittering endlessly on about their very special and interesting circumstances is an absolute offence to the rest of the UK whose circumstances were obviously never that special and just got on with it, while not being irresponsible, selfish twats. The attempts to turn himself into a victim of the press is interesting considering this whole media circus has been engineered and maintained by him and Boris in the first place.

What bothers me is that Johnson has hurled public trust, good will and a grip on the pandemic to the winds to keep Cummings in post, and is letting this hugely damaging circus roll on. And yes to no accountability any more, no honour, no integrity, no morals, no sense of responsibility. Behave appallingly, front it out, wait for everyone to get bored, applaud your clever little self for getting away with it. Government by sociopaths who couldn't run a sweet shop

Cummings is supposed to be so clever and so important and so valuable, and can't with all his wealth and resources and contacts organise bloody childcare, or shopping, or look after his own kid in his own home, or have the basic grip on safe driving that a seventeen year old passing their test would have. Single mums have had Covid and managed because they had to; any one of them would apparently be a complete gift to the government who totally lack such intelligence or organisational skill. We're all in the wrong job.

Boris, most of the country has given up on you and your government because of this. Good luck in moving on with that.

I am furious that this whole charade is taking up so much time. Johnson is proving himself exactly what the bloody Left said he was and making a mockery of ordinary Conservatives.

Travellerist

We have. I’ve been out for a couple of walks since end of March (I previously walked mikes most dats). It started to get too busy and didn't feel very safe so have stuck to the garden since. Did add a quick early morning once round the field behind us when the dog needed a longer leg stretch once or twice a week for a while but that eventually became too busy too. Online deliveries from pharmacy/supermarkets and local hardware store.
Don’t do Facebook and agree with you entirely about the be kind hypocrisy of many.

Dominic Cummings’ behaviour won’t change ours. The restrictions are eminently sensible to us in our personal circumstances. I am concerned though that it will have negatively influenced many others to behave in a way that probably isn’t wise yet.
Mostly though, it’s the sheer, breathtaking arrogance and hypocrisy of the man that has stunned me.

*Why is this functionary addressing the nation?? He should just be sacked and replaced.

One of the main reasons we voted to leave the EU was that we no longer wanted unelected bureaucrats governing over us, yet here we are having our future decided by one!!

Please name me the constituency that returned Dominic Cummings??*

This!

If it had just been the statement and not the follow up questions I think it would have turned my opinion around a bit. But I think the journalists' questions, which weren't even particularly probing, exposed it for the crock of shit it was. Although I can't believe not one single journalist thought to ask him why his wife didn't just drive or why his wife who was showing corona symptoms was permitted in to hospital with their son.

I thought the question about people who had voted cons for the first time was very telling. He was speechless. It felt to me like he just hadn't considered how his actions might appear to other people at all.

I'm no PR expert but I don't know why he didn't try to appeal to the Everyman a bit and just say look I found myself in a position that families up and down the country have been in. I made a judgement call that was driven by worry for my child but I can see in hindsight that it was the wrong decision and I do understand why people are upset - for that I'm sorry.

One of the main reasons we voted to leave the EU was that we no longer wanted unelected bureaucrats governing over us, yet here we are having our future decided by one!!
This ^^

YANBU, I am more angry. Not a word of apology, blatantly a pack of lies, his arrogance and contempt for the public even more on display, and will have seriously damaged the public health effort and efforts to continue to enforce the lockdown measures still in place. So a big 'fuck you' to all the frontline workers putting their lives at risk and dying to care for Covid patients, and all the people who haven't visited loved ones who were dying, haven't been able to have funerals, all the parents who were sick but struggled through looking after their children.

He should be sacked. But he won't be. As others have said, PM too weak, doesn't give a shiny shit anyway, thinks they're all untouchable with their majority. And Cummings knows where all the bodies are buried.

Those people who were at the beaches yesterday supping beer and not managing social distancing have always been doing this.

Did they write the guidelines for us, sunglasses? Are they unelected bureaucrats advising the PM on our (crap) covid response?

Honestly, I can be accused of politicising a child's death but when I think of that poor 13 year old dying alone in hospital and his Mum not being able to stay with him or hold his hand, I feel gutted.

What he's done is legitimise all those horrible what ifs that people have when a loved one dies. Should I have gone to them, should I have spent more time with them. Should I have stayed just a little bit longer. He's made all those people who stayed at home and let their loved ones die alone, feel like the worst human beings in the world.

There were no extenuating circumstances. He was worried about his child, of course. But we have all been, to one extent or another. He's honestly scum.

A significant minority of people in Britain have always stuck their fingers up to lockdown. Some are beyond help, but the government needs to take a chunk of the responsibility for this to. As they have never really given the impression that they are totally behind the lockdown measures 100% themselves. Their heart has not been in it like other countries in Europe. More a case of “apparently this is what needs to be done, sorry folks, you know we’d rather not but try your best” rather than “this is what this country needs to do now for all our benefits and we must all do it”. Hopefully Britain can muddle through it but there is an element of risk reopening everything right now with new cases daily still as high as they are.

Senior adviser at no 10 can’t get :
1- security help at his address
2- online food shopping
3- test for covid

Also couldn't get a teenage niece (or two) to London even though public transport is running and he culd afford to pay for a cab.

He claims to have not stopped on the drive up, does that mean the 4 year old is still in nappies?

His convoluted explanation and self-justification that it was within the rules? I want someone to ask "Do you think the government's communication strategy was sufficiently clear and effective if the vast majority of the public has misunderstood the rules as you see them or been unaware of the "loophole" you exploited?"
Either it was clear and he dodged / broke it, or it wasn't clear and the team he is such a big part of has failed us all? Or would that be too much like accountability? And he's in contempt of parliament .

'have constituents who didn't get to say goodbye to their loved ones; families who could not mourn together; people who did not visit sick relatives because they followed the guidance of the government.'

I don't understand. He also didn't go to his uncles funeral and could not mourn together, he wasn't visiting relatives he was isolating near his family in case he or his wife deteriorated and they needed childcare.

I hope at the press conference they now discuss other issues relating to the crisis. If I had been in 2 minds before then the way the media have hounded and abused him makes me completely understand why he needed to put his family first.

How can anyone be expected to abide by the rules if the people who made them don’t.

Plenty of them have. Politicians are humans too and prone to lapses in judgement. It's disappointing someone at the forefront of the government has made such an error but to go on a witch hunt, and post vitriol, when the majority are just as guilty is a joke.

It's very clear that he and BJ cooked up this bullshit statement between them, and expect everyone to believe it.

Going for a 70 odd mile round trip to test his eyes? Do me a favour.