We can’t meet in groups of 7 or more but Doncaster Races welcomes 2,500 race goers today!

[Goldistheanswer]

I just don’t understand this Government. On one hand, they’re telling us that we won’t be able to meet in groups of more than 6 people and yet today thousands of race goers are allowed to meet at Doncaster! It beggars belief.

Not to be cynical but Doncaster makes money for businesses and the family meet ups only benefit us mere mortals.

Doncaster race course has been told in the last half hour that the rest of the weekend has to be behind closed doors

There's so much wrong with your statement it's untrue (and I say that as someone who thinks racing should have been the last sport to return with crowds due to the greater levels of movement between areas typically done at racetracks). The numbers of people being let into Doncaster are a fraction of the typical crowd and easily allow for much more than 2 metres social distancing at all times, whereas people have been proven to consistently fail to social distance when meeting members of their household outside of their family.

I’ve also heard that Doncaster will be behind closed doors from tomorrow but the reporter on Itv news has just said 3,500 spectators are expected there this afternoon. Also.....Why is the 6 people rule only being applied from Monday?

Think it was the right call to cancel the public attendance, it's not ok to say on the one hand we all have to be careful but on the other hand big events can go ahead.

The biggest risk of an event like that falls on the staff - but also they now won't get paid as they'll nearly all be agency

Risk is also cheering..

@ChanceChanceChance
Unless we want the professional sports landscape to consist of solely premier league football and potentially horse racing we need to find a way to get people back into sporting fixtures ASAP and doing so is not possible without pilots. Getting people into sporting venues, especially where it can be done in a socially distanced manner, certainly needs to be a higher priority than meeting others inside your own household or restarting baby groups for example. There is absolutely no evidence that the virus will spread any more in large Covid secure events where people are appropriately distanced and other precautions are in place than in many types of business that are already open (as realistically the number of unique people in close contact with each other is typically small at sporting events even at full capacity as most people go straight to their seat and remain there for the duration) and there is strong reasons to believe such events are considerably safer than much smaller but unregulated gatherings such as garden parties or family gatherings.

@Goldistheanswer

I’ve also heard that Doncaster will be behind closed doors from tomorrow but the reporter on Itv news has just said 3,500 spectators are expected there this afternoon. Also.....Why is the 6 people rule only being applied from Monday?

They were expecting to be allowed spectators all weekend and the decision to insist it was behind closed doors came after the first race today, so today's crowd are already in situ.

It should never have been allowed. Didn't anyone learn anything from the Cheltenham races? But jockey club is a donor to the ... (guess)

@Hereinthesticks

It should never have been allowed. Didn't anyone learn anything from the Cheltenham races? But jockey club is a donor to the ... (guess)
It is a totally different scenario and sweet fuck all to do with donations to anyone. There are much more limited numbers going to Doncaster today because social distancing is in place. At Cheltenham 2020 there were nearly 70,000 in attendance on the 4th day of the festival.

Still shouldn't have been allowed, which is why it is not allowed spectators after today.

@Hereinthesticks
Nonsense. If you don't understand the difference between what was happening at Doncaster and what occurred at Cheltenham you need to some basic research before commenting. Cheltenham went ahead as usual without any attempts at social distancing and at full capacity with no additional access to hand washing facilities or toilets, where as Doncaster have put in place numerous measures to allow for social distancing and were only ever planning on admitted a small fraction of their usual capacity.

@Hereinthesticks
No, the reason why they have stopped it after today (and only did so after the first race today) is entirely political from the Labour run council and was purposely timed to cause the maximum embarrassment for the government. If this was about public safety they would have put a stop to it yesterday when the mayor made her comments but instead they have chosen to wait in order to make more headlines that criticise the government. With the way labour run councils are consistently behaving I suspect it is only a matter of time before local health chiefs (largely employed by the council and who in many cases appear to be political appointments) are removed from the decisions relating to the virus in favour of central government scientists.

Actually there is research showing that being outside for a while with people who are shouting/cheering is quite risky and that risk is not reduced by the 2m rule.
scitechdaily.com/experts-warn-rigid-social-distancing-rules-for-covid-19-based-on-outdated-science/

But no-one wants a local lockdown or national measures to be even more stringent, so these types of unnecessary crowds are just not a good idea and now the government have introduced the new rules there must be science to back up their decision.

@Hereinthesticks
How much cheering do you expect there to have been. You clearly cannot accept that this was a pilot scheme under Covid secure rules and would have been nothing like a pre covid race meeting. Although having seen your posts on other threads it is pretty clear that your inconsistent positions simply equate to you belieiving that everything you enjoy should be allowed to continue without restriction with everything you don't being banned to compensate for it.

Although having seen your posts on other threads it is pretty clear that your inconsistent positions simply equate to you belieiving that everything you enjoy should be allowed to continue without restriction with everything you don't being banned to compensate for it.
That is crazy - I am doing nothing except sending my DC to school. I don't go the shops (not since March), not seen my family since Feb, haven't been away from home or on holiday. I literally don't do anything I enjoy so I don't have anything to continue. Apart from sending DC to school, I am still on lockdown and not contributing to any virus transmission.

@StatisticalSense You have confused me with someone else, see post above.

@Hereinthesticks
I'm guessing you never attended science class if you think there can be science without conducting the experiment. The whole purpose of allowing the crowds in was to get the data needed to work out the science. Nobody knows with certainty what the effects of controlled and socially distanced crowds at sporting events will be but the closest data that is available (such as from larger places of worship) suggests that it is possible for large socially distanced gatherings to occur safely and therefore it makes sense to be conducting experiments to determine the actual effect. On the other hand there is plenty of data that shows households meeting together (including family gatherings) are a major source of spread of the virus and therefore it makes perfect sense to ban such gatherings based on the science.

@StatisticalSense are you avoiding apologising for the horrible lie you directed at me about my activities and double standards

Although having seen your posts on other threads it is pretty clear that your inconsistent positions simply equate to you belieiving that everything you enjoy should be allowed to continue without restriction with everything you don't being banned to compensate for it.
That is crazy - I am doing nothing except sending my DC to school. I don't go the shops (not since March), not seen my family since Feb, haven't been away from home or on holiday. I literally don't do anything I enjoy so I don't have anything to continue. Apart from sending DC to school, I am still on lockdown and not contributing to any virus transmission.

@StatisticalSense
You can't just say you have researched someone and they are going about activities that they want to continue whilst wanting other people's activities to stop if that person is staying in lockdown apart from sending DC to school.
How you justify that lie?

.. if you need to know why this and Cheltenham went ahead - have a look at where Matt Hancock gets a lot of his funding from .

Tattersalls Ltd and other racing connected donors appear frequently.

www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=24773

Good luck @Eve statisticalsense will come along and tell a lie about you...

RE the social distancing at Doncaster.
The rails bookies seem to be clustered quite close together and not as spread out as would be physically possible quite a few empty pitches
You could argue that as long as 3500 people don't all need beer/the loo at the same time, they should be fine - it's a nice day, they're outdoors...and other than the first race, the favourites aren't winning!

Meanwhile the local comp will have 1500 or 2000 sweaty teens cramed into little rooms and squeezing into a bus to get home.