To ask if we’re heading for another lockdown?

[TreeLine6]

So covid cases are rising and like clockwork, the likes of independent sage are back in the media calling for ‘protections’ like masks, isolation and social distancing to “avoid full lockdown”.

Is it time to reintroduce some measures like the rule of 6, a cap on large events numbers and maybe distancing and early closure for hospitality as independent sage are calling for?

Personally I feel that with vaccines and treatments, we are now in the best position we’re going to get with covid and would be very reluctant to comply with further measures, that themselves cause enormous harm.

Sorry!

Vaccines (and antivirals) are now doing the job of preventing serious illness and death in the vast majority of people who are infected.

I had a flu thing 2 weeks ago that I still feel
like utter shit from, that someone passed to me but I’ve not been ranting and calling them selfish.

No one gives a toss unless it’s Covid these days, even though for me it was much more mild and short lived

@VampiresWife and did they not claim furlough? Most hospitality issues are related to staffing challenges ie Brexit.

China's inital lockdown, though extreme, did prevent spread across the country.

The risk for China is supply chain difficulties not Coronavirus lockdowns.

Why would a local family run coffee shop/pub be experiencing staffing issues due to Brexit? I mean, Brexit has a lot to answer for, but when businesses expressly say that being closed for months on end has made carrying on impossible due to lost revenue and bills piling up, that isn't about Brexit.

Of course their staff claimed furlough. What difference does that make?

Speaking as a fervent and crowing Remainer, it's true that there are problems stemming from restrictions rather than Brexit.

The limitation with furlough was that it wasn't available during all the periods when there were restrictions. If a venue was open but having to fund reduced numbers due to rule of six, tiers, or any of the various halfway measures, that could have a massive impact on profitability without the corresponding ability to furlough staff.

Its generally accepted Brexit caused a lot of so called low skilled Labour to leave the UK, made worse by CV, not just in hospitality, travel, drivers, butchery, social care, nhs, food processing, warehousing & hospitality.

No hospitality business was closed for months on end, 2 at most, many did takeaways/ home deliveries.

Staff never claimed Furlough, the employer did but tht wasn't cost free, so staff were let go.

But no there wont be another LD unless we have a variant that kills and escapes vaccines.

I don’t think people are reading your comments in the spirit intended, @Jourdain11 .😂

Ha, all you're being asked to do is stay at home and watch Netflix, if you can't wear a mask you need to stay fuck at home, it's all the fault of these SELFISH people flocking to the pub.....

I'm one of those selfish people flocking to the pub. I'm pretty sure the pubs are grateful that people are engaging in such selfish behaviour as it supports them and their livelihood.

I don't want to watch Netflix. I want to socialise with my friends, in person and preferably in a pub!

But is that the spirit of lockdown?

Whenever I read that phrase on here back in the grim old days I was put in mind of a ghost of the type that visited Ebeneezer Scrooge. Perhaps to show him all the people he murdered by buying an Easter egg, or sitting on a park bench?

No hospitality business was closed for months on end, 2 at most, many did takeaways/ home deliveries

This is wrong.

Pubs were closed for over 3 months in England in both the 2020 and 2021 lockdowns, as were many restaurants. This was in addition to the month long November 2020 lockdown lite and then there were also closures in Tier 4 areas. There were some hospitality businesses able to offer takeaway during some of the multiple closure periods but it was indisputably true that some businesses were closed for months at a time.

Selfish, maskless Covidiots flocking to the pubs! Don't they understand exponential growth? The virus is ever-changing and determined. Fighting it is like fighting a many-headed monster, which, each time a neck is severed, sprouts a head even fiercer and cleverer than before. We are fighting that which is unfixed, mutating, indestructible.

The businesses I'm referring to were local, mainly family run ones which employed either family members, local sixth formers, and people from the local community. Perhaps in big city centres and chain pubs, Brexit had an impact on staffing. But not here.

How on earth to come to the conclusion that businesses weren't closed for months on end? Pubs, for example, closed in March 2020 and didn't reopen until July during LD1. Many couldn't reopen due to restrictions still in place (rule of six, outdoor service only, etc). Then there were closures in the November 2020 lockdown which segued into the tiers, then LD3 in January 2021, after which pubs remained closed until March 2021. So in all, the pubs on my high street were closed from November 2020 until March 2021 at least. And no, they didn't deliver.

I think what we need are genuinely effective masks for the vulnerable and in particular for those who cannot have vaccines, or for whom they don't work. We also need research to find which masks are most effective. Not just for those still heavily affected by covid, but because this won't be the last pandemic to hit the world, and because those with compromised immune systems could be better protected from a whole range of infectious diseases.

Unfortunately what many people fail to grasp is that one of the biggest reasons we can't have sick pay that allows people to pay their bills, adequate funding for the NHS, air filters that some people want installed is 18 months of furlough, grants, loans and trying to keep businesses afloat! If ( and I don't believe we will) go down that path again that will be the end of not just hospitality but the NHS! Even so called "soft measures" have a devastating effect! Social distancing in any area means less people either spending money or being treated, masks have a similar effect , those that believe they work are worried to go places in case others aren't and those who don't believe they work ( or are exempt) avoid places due to harassment and judgement. I'm personally speaking from a position of what I believe an easy time during lockdowns! My income was next to nothing, my kids lost their income and training, 2 of them and me had our mh destroyed, 1 had a new baby and was desolate with zero postnatal support whilst her DH was working full time! My DH worked all the way through in full filtered masks (only one of us to get it!!) But I had a big house, large garden and consider myself lucky! Living with a scientist who specialises in data analysis helped I think! I had to avoid everywhere masks were needed due to my own issues and I still do! But I as what I think is a privileged position do not support any further measures at all and seeing how small businesses got around them last time and didn't have to pay the tax man therefore not providing any income to the country, I wouldn't be following them!

No they weren't... all our local pubs & social club did take a ways and even 3 months doesn't come under "months on end" which i think most people would think meant 5 or 6 at the very least.

I was working for a company that had IT with Greene King and we were sending technicians to their pubs by the end of May (LD was announced late MArch)

Not belittling LD's (awful blunt instrument) but by June 2020 things were all opening up, yes with the rule of 6 etc but even international travel in July was happening.

The later 2020 LD's were pretty short lived (and ignored) and then we had vaccines.

Yes, the attempts to deflect the damage done by lockdown onto Brexit is bizarre. Brexit and lockdown have both caused significant problems for the hospitality industry. The one doesn't cancel out the other.

Well there's always the upside for hospitality if we had another lockdown, it'll be a swifter death for making businesses than the slow decline by the lack of staff, price rises, supplier issues and hangovers from the last few times they were closed combined with the moon on a stick expectations so many have with the inevitable trashing online about how a leisure experience (or lack thereof) had ruined their life or some such over dramatic bollocks in reaction to not being pandered to like a child because you're spending a bit of money.

We'll not have any hospitality left as we know it at this rate.

Pubs reopened in July

They absolutely were not 'opening up from June'. And as you say, there were still restrictions in place, meaning many venues (music venues, theatres, etc) couldn't open at all.

Your local pubs may have offered delivery. Doesn't mean they all did.

And there was only one later LD in 2020. We had tiers instead; tiers 3 and 4 were very restrictive. The LD that began in January 2021 lasted three months.

Many pubs, restaurants etc did not open between November 2020 and March 2021, or later. How is over four months not months on end?

You said no hospitality business was closed for more than 2 months, which is wrong even assuming you meant consecutively not in total. The fact that the venues near you were in a position to offer takeaways throughout (which means they must do food because in the early 2020 lockdown alcohol only takeaways hadn't yet been permitted) certainly doesn't disprove that. Many venues doing takeaways isn't the same as them all doing.

There are also pubs that didn't have an outside area so couldn't open in April 2021 either. These things are facts, unlike semantic, opinion based argument about what constitutes months on end.

There’s not going to be another lockdown. Anyone who thinks that is even a remote possibility for another wave or similar variant needs to seriously up their reading on current state of the economy and impact/effectiveness/cost of prior lockdowns.

Not happening.

Furlough was available until Sept 2021, rule of 6 and table service only had gone before then

Some parts of the country were comprehensively fucked over for months on end. Leicester and Bolton in particular, all of Greater Manchester at a later and earlier time. Some of those places were locked down and forgotten about while the rest carried on oblivious.

You had to be eligible though. It wasn't the case that anyone who worked for a business that was struggling could be added at any time. The scheme existed but that didn't mean it was available to any pub as a response to eg tier changes, impact of mask reintroduction etc. Not least because in some of these cases the legislation actually meant higher staff ratios being needed, like table service in local restriction areas. Just without any funding for that.

Some people seem to really relish the idea of another lockdown, forgetting that it caused so much damage to peoples mental health, physical health due to cancelled operations and appointments, older people in care homes without visits from family, missed education which teachers are still trying to catch up on, businesses already hanging by a thread. Why would anyone want to go there again?

Some parts of the country were comprehensively fucked over for months on end. Leicester and Bolton in particular, all of Greater Manchester at a later and earlier time. Some of those places were locked down and forgotten about while the rest carried on oblivious.

People forget about this. In fact, many people didn't acknowledge it at the time. I remember being told I was lying when I explained that my part of greater Manchester had additional restrictions.