To be really enjoying Boris Johnson's downfall Part 3 Cake ambush

[Notonthestairs]

To be really enjoying Boris Johnson's downfall Part 2 http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/amiibeingunreasonable/4459992-To-be-really-enjoying-Boris-Johnsons-downfall-Part-2

And on it goes.

@the80sweregreat

They just don't like Blackford because he speaks his mind. The report is being looked at by the lawyers now.

I hear Kier Starmer is a shit hot lawyer.

We are all waiting to him to go over it with a fine tooth comb anyway!

Eating and drinking at work was never not allowed

Of course. However, as you keep carefully omitting, @JaniieJones, indoor gatherings that are not reasonably necessary for work were not allowed, and unquestionably the birthday event was not reasonably necessary. Not even No. 10 have claimed that it was.

@the80sweregreat

They just don't like Blackford because he speaks his mind. The report is being looked at by the lawyers now.

I also think they hate that the SNP are so strong, they should stay in their place as a minority party!

They have no clue what to do about Scotland now Scotland has rejected the old parties.

It won't be tomorrow because it's holocaust Memorial Day and they can't have the MPs back in as they will be at this event. Sky news said this earlier this morning.
Friday is normally quiet too apparently, I suppose many go home that day.
I think Monday now

twitter.com/robertshrimsley/status/1486360138197999617?s=21

Really interesting thread about suggested tactics for managing the SG report and the media.

@the80sweregreat

It won't be tomorrow because it's holocaust Memorial Day and they can't have the MPs back in as they will be at this event. Sky news said this earlier this morning. Friday is normally quiet too apparently, I suppose many go home that day. I think Monday now

I’m pretty sure I heard Daniel Finkelstein say that wasn’t a problem.

@JaniieJones

'Why in god's name would Starmer be like a rabbit in the headlights? '

I've no idea! he should have been powerful and damning but he wasn't at all. I understand the speaker tells them to sit and stand but he just dithered a bit too much, he looks weak. I'm not an Angie fan but she'd have really gone to town.

What a bizarre idea. Some sort of pathetic "powerful" act would just have mirrored Johnson's posturing. What he gave us was a calm, forensic insistence on keeping Johnson to the issues, so that it became really quite laughably obvious how, every single time, Johnson was squirming around desperately trying to deflect attention. And yes, I also wondered about a bit of chemical enhancement on Johnson's part to try to shore himself up. At this moment, he's probably sitting in a corner and gibbering.

At this moment, he's probably sitting in a corner and gibbering

As opposed to standing in front of the public and gibbering?

@derxa

Weird bit to get hung up on but the point remains, it doesn’t matter whether you’re there several days a week, you only get a snapshot from the patient pov. You won’t get any meaningful insight in what it means to work there. I used to work in the NHS. Lunch in our group was the highlight of our day. The idea that any of us would sit outside shivering and eating from a plastic tub is just ludicrous. Painting NHS workers as meek shrinking violets is nonsense.

Even in the summer during a pandemic with NHS workers getting seriously ill and dying?

@ClaudineClare

No Gray today, then?

Looks like we may have time for days' more speculation yet.

Oh for goodness sake.

Anecdata about where people in the NHS ate their sandwiches at lunch is completely irrelevant.

None of them were PM.

‘Everyone was doing it’ is such a pathetic defence for the head of state.

The vast majority of people obeyed the rules and for many that came at a tragic cost.

Meanwhile the Johnsons were inviting their interior designer around for birthday tea, presumably without telling her that they couldn’t afford her services.

He just needs to go.

Lived through the whole Thatcher era as an adult. I loathed what she stood for with every fibre of my being and was a very active trade unionist. I however truly believe that she would have had enough savvy, possibly even enough morality, to expect those responsible making the laws and regulations around Covid to follow them and to do so herself.

This is not about cake, or whether or not a party was actually a party. It is purely and simply about expecting the same standards Government applied to us to apply to them, as the (Conservative) Lord Finkelstein has aptly expressed.

I also think those criticising Dominic Cummings part in all this should remember who was actually stupid enough to appoint him in the first place.

@merrymouse

Oh for goodness sake.

Anecdata about where people in the NHS ate their sandwiches at lunch is completely irrelevant.

None of them were PM.

‘Everyone was doing it’ is such a pathetic defence for the head of state.

The vast majority of people obeyed the rules and for many that came at a tragic cost.

Meanwhile the Johnsons were inviting their interior designer around for birthday tea, presumably without telling her that they couldn’t afford her services.

He just needs to go.

absolutley.

Lived through the whole Thatcher era as an adult. I loathed what she stood for with every fibre of my being and was a very active trade unionist. I however truly believe that she would have had enough savvy, possibly even enough morality, to expect those responsible making the laws and regulations around Covid to follow them and to do so herself.

Very true and I hate that woman.

@Roussette

I like that saying derxa, I might borrow that!

Remember to say it in a strong Glaswegian accent

I like to think that any PM would have made everyone stick to the rules as much as humanly possible. Certainly no parties , strict bubbles and strict rules imposed even more so for them. I thought that even Boris Johnson would too considering he had covid himself etc etc. but then I'm naive like that , clearly.
Mrs Thatcher and Mr Brown would have kicked them all out.

Can I please ask a question from you all?

I'm in Ireland, our electoral system is different to yourselves.

How many MPs can an area have? In my area, there are 4 TD's all representing my area currently all different parties so varied voices.

Yes, me too @CPL593H. if anyone had told me 40 years ago that I’d look back on her with nostalgia my reply would have been very rude.

I am waiting to hear the shenanigans of our lot it will come out eventually. The only party to have brought questions is Fine Gael to date, but there is more, there is always more.

It won't come out until Micheal Martin gets to Washington.

'Anecdata about where people in the NHS ate their sandwiches at lunch is completely irrelevant. None of them were PM. ‘Everyone was doing it’ is such a pathetic defence for the head of state.'

It isn't a pathetic defence, it is fact people who were at work gathered and ate and drank together. The NHS particularly had staff rooms full of donated treats where people had breaks, this outside in the rain eating sandwiches sounds like something the media would say.

Obviously there is a line and we will have to see if and how many times it was crossed in the report. But a 3 man zoom quiz and a piece of cake with colleagues for 10mins does not sound like rule breaking imo. The 1am do before PP's funeral sounds like it probably was though.

Anecdata about where people in the NHS ate their sandwiches at lunch is completely irrelevant

True. Although I am left wondering how long @JaniieJones arms are….

I can't say that I would look back with nostalgia on Thatcher but I agree she would have obeyed the rules that her Parliament had passed. She would also have been prepared to work hard, and make a full attempt to understand the science, having had a scientific background herself.

I think any other PM over the last 40 years would have run a tighter ship than Johnson.

I’ve not been a fan of Starmer generally but he was very good today.Johnson as usual all bluster, insults, extravagant and false claims and deflection. I haven’t said downright lies but I’d be surprised if there weren’t any.

Make that 75 years. Even Eden, who was believed to have 'misled the House about Suez, resigned shortly after.