Government not following their own restrictions

[babymama471]

With the constant drip feeds of parties taking place at number 10 during the lockdown it is making me question of the tories were not as concerned by covid as they have led us to believe

I'm not trying to spread conspiracy theories but I can't quite get my head around it. They made the rules to lock us down, to stop our children from going to school, supposedly to save lives. So why did they all not give a second thought about mixing and partying? Were they not concerned about themselves/ their families?? Did they know something we don't??

They seem to have had a sense of security about the whole situation, partying without a seconds thought! Whereas we were crossing the road from our loved ones on our daily walk incase we were to infect them/ become infected.

It just doesn't make sense.

I

It just doesn't make any sense.

@truthfullylying I'd like to think Tory voters will finally wake up but I'm not holding my breath...

And we did follow the rules to the letter, NHS workers/nurse in this household so it's not like we had much choice, plus we made our decisions based on what we could find in the science journals. It still mystifies me that some health workers - below the level of consultant - think the Tories are a jolly good idea.

As lots of other people have said, with the Ukraine and climate change waiting in the wings, just to name a couple of major issues on the road ahead, it would be great if there were a few grown ups in charge.

And for those wondering what the government did get out of this, well, until partygate, this has also been an exercise in social control and obedience on at least one level. The virus is real, and I'm very grateful to the scientists who came up with the vaccines. But the response to it from our bunch of uncaring psychopathic "govern"ment (or at least the cabinet) has been off the scale in terms of numptiness and empty speeches.

@Waxonwaxoff0

Well the PM ended up in hospital with Covid so it didn't work out well.

He had covid End of March and into April, he was fine by May and partying after that. Take note all his parties were after he had covid so you are wrong about that and that’s a big if he had covid! Looked theatrical with a. Few actors thrown in and the lack of respect and care after he has had doesn’t ring true. They are laughing at the masses. It isn’t just U.K. all the big shots give the orders and have their own rules. In other words wake up 🥱

@WrigglyDonCat

It's really simple to understand, and some pp's have gone some way to explaining it, i.e. because those breaking the rules knew that there was very little risk to themselves, either because they had already had covid and/or were some combination of young/fit/healthy.

But then many would say (and have here) that they should have been worried about more vulnerable people and would have known it. That would suggest that either every single person involved was either utterly self-centred or a psychopath, and frankly that explanation doesn't wash.

So why would a bunch of highly educated, more or less intelligent people with access to the best and most up to date information ignore the rules they were putting in place? Simple - they knew the rules were about as effective in stopping Covid as a string vest is at containing a fart. So the combination of not feeling at risk themselves, and knowing that the rules didn't actually do anything meant they felt free to do what they liked. Politically stupid, but entirely sensible risk management.

The rules (certainly after the first couple of months) were nothing about stopping covid, and everything about psychology in various ways. Initially needing to persuade the people the government had terrified (somewhat understandably in the early stages) to get back out to work and to spend. It was also to give the impression that they were in control and were doing something (even though there really wasn't much that could be done). And thirdly, to deal with the normal defence of well what about all the other countries doing the same thing, it was arse-covering. It would be a ballsy Government that said we won't do what others are doing, because if that call is wrong, the brown stuff is really hitting the whirling air distribution device.

Completely agree. I remember thinking that none of it made sense, and then we saw the deliberate obfuscation of law and guidance. There were loopholes included in every new set of guidelines, and that ridiculous discussion about the difference between spirit of the law and the actual law.

The only logic I can see was the ‘save the NHS’ as decades of mismanagement by government of all colours, have left it in a position where it would be unable to cope with any increase in numbers of admissions.

And still no one willing to talk about the poverty and associated ill health that increase risk of serious Covid. We still need an holistic genuine response, not the safety theatre and posturing we are currently being subjected to.

And finally if we say that the government didn’t follow the rules because they knew those rules to be unnecessary, that leads to the question of why no one else, including the media, was paying enough attention to notice this, and those that followed the rules to their own detriment must face up to their own culpability in that behaviour. I suspect that bit at the end should be said quietly though.

and those that followed the rules to their own detriment must face up to their own culpability in that behaviour

I knew to a fair extent why the media used the methods it did and that it was effective for compliance, especially since enforcement was low, but I still think that this is a bit unfair and incorrect

Firstly some of it I had no choice, eg school closure and secondly it wasn’t really me that would be impacted as much as someone else at higher risk

We have a real issue with our government. From where I stand we have leaders who honestly do not care one jot about society or the outcomes for people who have not achieved financial greatness.

It is not just their response to Covid/lockdown but a whole host of issues that are getting steadily worse. I am not just talking about the Conservatives. This has being going on for a while. I honestly have never thought that I have no one I want to vote for as I feel none of them advocate for me.

My local council has gone bankrupt. Good luck to even getting basic services such as libraries or bins collected but they collected the council tax every month and were hellbent on sending people straight to court following one missed payment.
Liberal Democrats were elected as they were going to protect student loans, got into government and promptly tripled them within 24 hours.
Labour ignored calls not to go to war and had no plan for the aftermath. They also allowed adults to abdicate their responsibilities and the welfare state is out of control. So people who really need support are missing out.
Conservatives are in it for themselves and hand over generous contracts to their buddies.
Greens can not seem to work out what a woman is and other parties are too extreme.
None of them are controlling the media, who are pushing their own agenda e.g causing panic food & petrol buying.

There are so many issues and none of them are being addressed e.g. Zero hour contracts, full time workers having to claim benefits, low level anti social behaviours not being tackled. To name a few.

@babymama471

So why have the government had such disregard for their own rules? I am really struggling to understand.

Do they really just not care? Do they have no thought for their own family/children? And these are the type of people that are running the country.

Absolute disgrace.

I think it's a mixture of two things.

One, some of the people involved had already had it recently and could reasonably believe they had antibodies. FWIW I do think this includes Boris, purely because he looked so dog rough when he had it. Some of them also won't have had a particularly bad time with it and therefore wouldn't see any reason to do much to avoid reinfection.

Two, some of them genuinely were pretty low risk. Young, no underlying conditions etc. We did know by May 2020 that individuals had very different levels of risk. For various reasons this was not as clearly communicated as it might've been.

@babymama471

But how do we know that he actually was in hospital with covid?

Can we trust anything he says? I'm not convinced we can.

I’m sure he was in hospital with covid. I’m sure he was on oxygen.

I somehow doubt he was ever anywhere near death, given his incredibly speedy recovery. I suspect they moved him to ICU to keep an eye on him because having the PM arrest on your ward would be highly embarrassing.

This is what I don't get, for most of the last two years I've followed the rules largely out of fear of what catching or transmitting covid would do especially in spring 2020- all that diving into hedges as someone approached on the same path etc
Since the vaccine I've relaxed somewhat and definitely last six months it's more the worry of having to isolate etc
BUT in spring 2020 pre vaccines when icus were rammed and healthy young people were dying it was so worrying but clearly those in the know weren't worried at all just ruling by fear
Nhs we couldn't have any face to face team meetings or get together even outside which makes a mockery of all this 'work event nor a party' nonsense
Only thing I can think is so many of the cabinet had it early on thag maybe they assumed they were immune?
So infuriating and can't believe he has not gone

@babymama471

With the constant drip feeds of parties taking place at number 10 during the lockdown it is making me question of the tories were not as concerned by covid as they have led us to believe

I'm not trying to spread conspiracy theories but I can't quite get my head around it. They made the rules to lock us down, to stop our children from going to school, supposedly to save lives. So why did they all not give a second thought about mixing and partying? Were they not concerned about themselves/ their families?? Did they know something we don't??

They seem to have had a sense of security about the whole situation, partying without a seconds thought! Whereas we were crossing the road from our loved ones on our daily walk incase we were to infect them/ become infected.

It just doesn't make sense.

I

It just doesn't make any sense.

The thing is, individual risk from COVID is statistically very very low, unless you are CEV or elderly. It's the population-wide consequences of coronavirus that will harm you. The government are very aware of this and it means that as long as most people are following guidlines, the minority flouting them are also protected.

And of course if someone high up in government needed a hospital bed, they'd get one. They aren't going to put at risk of overwhemled healthcare the same way you or I would.

It really does make you wonder, OP.

My memory keeps taking me back to the beginning. You know, when we were led to believe it was so bad that people were dropping dead in the streets. So bad that people were being locked in their homes.

I’ve been saying the same thing OP. Terrifying the public into complying but they weren’t scared themselves, were they? It’s classic psychopathy. Imagine the laughs they had at their boozy parties, imagining the proles banging saucepans for the NHS, and going for a walk but not being able to sit on a bench.

It’s unfortunately a sense of entitlement which CAN come with being born into money. I live in a town where there’s a very expensive public school, and a road separates two parts of the campus. There is no crossing there. Every day when I drive past you get young men (it’s never the girls) from this school just strolling out in front of the traffic with a superior air, as if they are so jolly important that the traffic naturally will stop for them. I feel like they are the Tory MPs of the future. I’m not saying everyone in private education acts like that, before anyone starts.

They clearly weren't that worried about it but have done a marvellous job of fulfilling the agenda to create fear in the general public. I agree with you OP.

It just shows the restrictions went too far. They were cruel and unreasonable and in many cases illogical.

@Buzzinwithbez

It just shows the restrictions went too far. They were cruel and unreasonable and in many cases illogical.

Ha - tell it to the judge! This is such a lame excuse for Johnson who made the fucking laws.

A few fixed penalty fines and it will all be sorted.

@Buzzinwithbez

A few fixed penalty fines and it will all be sorted.

Not in the opinion polling. 62% think Johnson should resign. He is now openly mocked in focus groups. Do you think that 62% will just change their mind?

I can't comprehend it either

I think a big part of it is that people's attitudes tend to change after they've had covid themselves - "I've had it now, so now I'm ok, I don't have to be so cautious". Which was mostly true until Omicron appeared. And until we the next successful mutation comes about, anyone who's had Omicron is probably pretty safe from reinfection for 3+ months at least.

I saw the same at my kid's primary school - they were being very, very cautious (rightly so), until the head caught covid (and gave it half the rest of the staff). Then she came back after recovering, and there was a visibly changed approach - things like whole school assemblies back on last autumn, despite rising cases all around. Even first week back after the Christmas break (and soaring Omicron cases) they continued to be fairly complacent.

Then one of the teachers who'd only recently recovered from delta came down with omicron. Suddenly the penny dropped that they weren't all safe from catching it again, and they tightened right back up on their prevention measures.

I'm not excusing the government's behaviour at all - I think it's an absolute disgrace the way they've carried on. But I can understand the mentality behind it - I'm just getting over omicron and looking forward to getting a bit of normality back after hiding away for the last two years.

And until we the next successful mutation comes about, anyone who's had Omicron is probably pretty safe from reinfection for 3+ months at least Booster immunity will have waned - this will be a big problem potentially. 3 months is a very short gap for something as nasty as covid.

I think the comments about Boris not having to struggle for care or a bed stand true. He wouldn't have been told to call back when his lips were blue etc. He's a selfish man anyway and has got away with a lot (non covid), which he should have been held to account for. As for risk to self - he had already had covid. He never really took it seriously until he had to (or at least be seen to - I genuinely don't think he is at all bothered about the death toll or long term health impacts) - he still downplays covid. Even things like not wearing a mask in hospital, sitting unmasked next to David Attenborough, not wearing a mask in the commons during outbreaks etc. I use my phone so apologies for no paragraphs.

So why did they all not give a second thought about mixing and partying?

Because they think they are more important than you, and that rules shouldn't exist for them.

@Curiousmouse

So why did they all not give a second thought about mixing and partying?

Because they think they are more important than you, and that rules shouldn't exist for them.

But wouldn't you think, since in their eyes they are more important than the rest of us, that they would be completely protected at all times from covid?

Especially the Queen. I was shocked myself when I watched them mask up for photoshoots at that g7 summit thing, and then removed them and walked beside each other. Why were they all willingly unmasked around her, and she was herself too. Not to mention the fact this was groups of people from different countries.

@BlueLines81

I’ve been saying the same thing OP. Terrifying the public into complying but they weren’t scared themselves, were they? It’s classic psychopathy. Imagine the laughs they had at their boozy parties, imagining the proles banging saucepans for the NHS, and going for a walk but not being able to sit on a bench.

It’s unfortunately a sense of entitlement which CAN come with being born into money. I live in a town where there’s a very expensive public school, and a road separates two parts of the campus. There is no crossing there. Every day when I drive past you get young men (it’s never the girls) from this school just strolling out in front of the traffic with a superior air, as if they are so jolly important that the traffic naturally will stop for them. I feel like they are the Tory MPs of the future. I’m not saying everyone in private education acts like that, before anyone starts.

This is my experience of very very rich public school types I have spent time with. They genuinely have a deeply held belief that they are worth more than everyone else, that only they really matter. They genuinely believe they can pretty much do as they want and the rules don't apply to them, and it's not even that they don't care who suffers but that they don't really see anyone not in their 'set' as human.

One of the reasons they were so willing to break the rules is because a lot of them will have private healthcare, their kids aren't in state schools with large class sizes and windows that don't open. They have money that insulates them from their bad decisions. They're never going to suddenly find themselves homeless or without food.

They have absolutely no experience of normal people and normal life in this country, and they don't care. And it's not just the Tories who have politicians who are like this (though they are the worst by far). Just think of the expenses scandal.

The parties show the reality of who they are. Nothing will improve in this country while people like this are in charge. They've almost entirely got rid of or sidelined all the MPs with a conscience or any vestige of basic human decency.

It just shows the restrictions went too far. They were cruel and unreasonable and in many cases illogical.

Ha - tell it to the judge! This is such a lame excuse for Johnson who made the fucking laws.

That really is it. The government zealously encouraged compliance, and the law was absolute. It's fair comment that enforcement was low, but the threat and punishment were high in both material and social senses. (Remember Priti Patel saying she ‘would call police’ on neighbours breaking coronavirus restrictions?)

It is true that a few drinks and a birthday party should be a fuss about nothing. But it against the law. Quite unbelievable, even now. But it was.

I do not see a good way out of this for Borris.

A few things I think about this are:

1. While a lot of scare tactics were used they never lied about the actual personal risk to individuals. It was always clear from quite early on that most people would come through covid just fine, even if they were sick for a few weeks. That includes CEV people, to be clear. So any notion people had that they were at massively high risk was not based on any fact.

2. The government constantly makes rules that they would never follow/tolerate for themselves, but these are mostly targeted at poor people, people with disabilities, marginalised people and immigrants. It's interesting that the middle classes who are normally pandered to are now up in arms about something that happens to people with less power every day. Constant indignities and hypocrisies are heaped upon them and no one gives a shit.

3. When the government tried to ease restrictions or actually did ease restrictions there was a backlash. They were in a position of knowing a lot of the restrictions were pointless or damaging - that was why, for example, they tried to open schools in Jan 2021 - but there was a huge uproar and so they backed down. It was cowardly of them to do that but the impetus came from the same public who are now whinging.

Boris is a lying weasel, no doubt about it. But it was the WHO, the medical community, PHE, Van Tam and Whitty who drove the restrictions that people now realise were unnecessarily punitive and, in many cases, just ridiculous. The argument seems to be that Boris and his band of idiots should have followed the rules, when in fact what they should have done is said they weren't necessary. They didn't have the courage or integrity to say that, they just let the public police each other and did their own thing.

TBH I don't have much sympathy for people who are now looking back in anger. The time to realise it was all a farce was in May 2020, not now. It's too late. The pointless suffering has happened. Take it out on Boris, by all means, he's a turd, but maybe also take a look at why you didn't realise sooner what a waste of time it all was.