Matt Hancock on Andrew Marr

[BlackSwan]

He sounds completely sensible and on the ball. Relieved we have a competent character at the helm.

He sounds committed to the job and totally without artifice

So would my neighbours 7 year old. But I wouldn't necessarily use that as the criteria to make him health secretary anymore than the lottery of being a Boris mate and bagging a cabinet job makes sense.

If he came with a distinguished career in medicine - academic or practical - then he'd certainly have earned my time and consideration. But he hasn't. Although if I came across a knotty PPE problem, he'd be on speed dial.

It’s possible to simultaneously be committed to your job, without artifice and pretty clueless. I’ve worked with people like that. And it’s not a binary situation, isolate over 70s vs isolate everyone.
FWIW I don’t have sufficient knowledge to decide whether the Govt’s strategy, such as it is, will be successful in managing the outbreak while preventing avoidable deaths. It does seem to rest on a lot of assumptions, and plenty of very well qualified people dispute it (I’ll try to find a link).

Gosh blackswan it’s interesting how he attracts wildly different views. Have never seen anyone so admiring of him. Interesting.

I’d give anything for a ‘gray unremarkable safe pair of hands man/woman’ at the moment.

maths.qmul.ac.uk/~vnicosia/UK_scientists_statement_on_coronavirus_measures.pdf

I think he looked utterly terrified - he knows what's coming

I thought he did well. Answered every question he was asked. It’s not good news certainly but I think he was good.

Clearly his private office have sorted out an excellent media pack and briefing, which actually does reassure me. The ministers are figureheads of varying abilities, but they will be reliant upon the people around them who do know what they are talking about. COBRA isn't just a vanity project, it's whole purpose is disaster recovery, so it's very unlikely that the government is taking action on a whim. I'm no Boris or Conservative fan (there are very few of the current ministers I find palatable) but these are cross party decisions and whatever action is taken is unprecedented - things like this take a lot of working through in our parliament.

I also felt he looked deeply uncomfortable and talked as if he was making things up as he was going along.

I didn't see the interview but the comments on here stand out to me that the same people will never be happy with what is said because no one can say everything is fine. It isn't.

People are screaming to close schools so we can social distance ourselves. Then they scream when over 70s are told to social distance as if it's an outrageous suggestion.

It’s good when politicians actually answer questions. It’s better if their answers are coherent, detailed and convincing. Which his weren’t.
Do I think any other member of the Government or Opposition would have done better? Probably not. But that’s not the point.

"people will never be happy with what is said because no one can say everything is fine. It isn't. "

^So true.

Obviously isolating people over 70 wont work in practice, as surely large swathes of them do childcare /voluntary work and so on.

My parents do this. We've just planned out today how they are going to self isolate- dropping volunteer work, ordering shopping online and not looking after the grandkids. It may mean DW stops work for 3 months because we have no childcare, but it's the safest plan.

It's down to everyone to read the advice and figure out how to cut risk as much as possible.