Westminstenders: Events...

[RedToothBrush]

Events have taken over. EU / UK negotiation have been put on ice due to covid-19.

The US has banned all travel from Europe - apart from to the uk and Ireland - in a manner which is highly political to drive wedges.

The effects of leaving the European Medicines Agency may be much more serious than anyone could have anticipated.

There's a oil price war going on between Saudi Arabia and Russia which has further driven market fears led by covid-19.

There the crisis in Turkey with Syrian refugees which is also distracting the EU.

We are facing lockdown and economic turmoil over the next weeks and months.

Johnson is having his leadership moment with deaths projected to possibly exceed UK WW2 deaths.

We are desperately trying to recruit negotiators as it's suddenly become apparent we don't have enough to carry out all the trade deals we want.

The civil service will be stretched to its limited by covid-19. Yet we also have Brexit to consider.

Where next? How bad are things going to get?

Over half a million have signed this now - surely it’s only a matter of time before schools close? Public pressure will be hard to ignore.

You do realise you wrote that on a Brexit forum. Which knows a petition of 5 million was happily ignored, as were massed demonstrations - the biggest of the decade ?

I think Brexit has shown how easy it is to ignore public pressure. Especially when you've just been elected with a majority of 80 ... although that said, a few less MPs might spice things up. Be interesting to see how the quotient of 650/65,000,000 plays out in the next few months.

So if half a million or thirty million were calling for the dention of all Chinese people in the UK, that would be a good thing?

Well that's interesting DGR. Since you've been so vocal in criticising what our government is doing.

You are far from alone in doing that, of course, notably, the first reaction from Labour Leadership contender Nandy was to to call for Brexit transition to be extended, that says it all to me about what her priorities are.

Bad time to have left the worlds largest and most powerful trading bloc? yoikes

Yes I feel we're quite alone, unsupported and weak.

Re closing schools... One of the effects of this would be to reduce the availability of NHS workers and other key workers Louise
Yes but some countries - I think Germany's one - have asked schools to remain open to key workers' children. There are ways...

We must think of staff safety too.There are many teachers and other school staff over 60. And they are at higher risk of contracting the disease, along with other customer-facing professions like dentists.

The NYT has this on it, but personally I can't open it on my laptop.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/03/15/business/economy/coronavirus-worker-risk.html

DGR You do realise you wrote that on a Brexit forum. Which knows a petition of 5 million was happily ignored, as were massed demonstrations - the biggest of the decade ?

Well yes indeed. But when it involves actual deaths of constituents...

Didn't they bow to pressure this weekend to start having daily press conferences, like other countries?

Well that's interesting DGR. Since you've been so vocal in criticising what our government is doing.

I think you need to look up sometimes and see the things flying over your head ....

Didn't they bow to pressure this weekend to start having daily press conferences, like other countries?

Not really, it was the usual Tory flim-flam. It sounded like it, until you actually read the detail. It sounded like Boris would be giving us a daily update, as it seems all the grown-up world leaders are. Then it descends into "or a senior minister", and by the end of the announcement it finished:

although Downing Street said it would be a priority for a member of the cabinet - including the Prime Minister - to give a daily address, there might be times when it is impractical or inadvisable. In such instances, Larry, the Downing Street cat will be available for photographs

What's been flying over my head then?

What's been flying over my head then?

Nothing destroys humor more than explanation. Except bad spelling .

Seems bookmakers now need a bailout

www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/business-51904417

Fair enough then, I didn't get the joke....moving on!
Just a quick thought, that Health Secretary everyone on here hated, Hunt I think was his name....?

"the first reaction from Labour Leadership contender Nandy was to to call for Brexit transition to be extended, that says it all to me about what her priorities are."

The welfare of the whole country, rather than keeping one particular Tory policy on schedule ?

Brexit has happened; what are you so worried about ?
The COVID crisis means very limited time, resources, attention for any future deal

It was one thing to go for a hard Brexit and WTO terms before this
Now, it could be the final stray in killing off a lot of companies that will be struggling badly by EOY

Schools are closed in France but remain open so key workers (doctors, nurses, healthcare, etc.) can carry on.
I know it's hard to grasp from where you are just now, but there are excellent and terrifying reasons for doing this.
France's political class are not perfect but it's a pretty damning indictment of UK citizens' trust in theirs that they can't see that no one does anything like this lightly or without thinking it through carefully.
And a Brexit extension is inevitable now. Maintaining otherwise is only possible if you are not watching carefully enough what is currently about to happen.

Fair enough then, I didn't get the joke....moving on!

No harm done. There will be another along shortly

And a Brexit extension is inevitable now.

Only if the UK wants it ...

Hunt was despised by many, especially in the NHS;
but even he is balking at the UK going its own way - against nearly all the experts around the world -
during a pandemic that may kill 100s of thousands in the UK

Hunt's mistakes are orders of magnitude worse than what could happen here

If BJ wanted to gamble for high stakes, he should have done that at Cheltenham instaed

oops

Hunt's mistakes are orders of magnitude LOWER than what could happen here

tbh, even if he had built up the NHS, no health service could cope with the kind of peak we may see in the UK with this govt strategy

Hell of a gamble and baffling why anyone would take the political risk of things going so wrong, with the added blame of doing it differently to everyone else

No BCF, sadly, she wasn't. Jaw droppingly, she made not one mention of our country or the welfare of our citizens before launching into "point scoring". Here's her original article indicating what the government "Must" do. See start of para 2, and note there's no mention of Britain earlier in her piece.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/09/coronavirus-government-extend-brexit-transition-period

btw, what Churchill said about Labour leaders is as bad as what any Tory has said about Corbyn

• but when the country was in desperate peril they all put that to one side, until the crisi was over

If Starmer becomes Labour leader, he'd add much needed talent to a unity govt
And he'd presumably appoint some cleverer MPs than Corbyn did, having a much larger pool to choose from than the hard left

Louise I read it - must be a different article to what you read

She was talking about the problems we face, the hardships
SHe had suggestions on how to financially support workers who must self-isolate etc

BCF maybe you have to read the article with special "Leavers and Tories are the most oppressed victims of the universe" goggles?

BCF maybe you have to read the article with special "Leavers and Tories are the most oppressed victims of the universe" goggles?

You joke, but modern tech makes it trivial to serve up two different versions of an article based on the viewers browsing history (which will reveal their political leanings).

Just feed the "facts" into an AI engine (remember how hard Google are plugging AI ?) and get a Tory version, and a Labour version.

After all, we all know to clear our cookies before booking flights, don't we ?

There's a mention of this in a piece I did for my degree over 30 years ago "Social implications of networked technology". If I had a 5 1/4 inch floppy drive, I could probably resurrect it.

Maybe I have, or perhaps you are missing my point. Nandy (who to be fair to her is usually far more in touch with the "local" than many other MPs) chose to talk only "globally" in her piece before getting into what the government "Must" do. "Must" articles are an absolute pet hate of mine I readily admit.

What she wrote later in the same article is not relevant to my point, it's what she wrote first that was clearly her key priority.

As it happens, now this is becoming more and more serious, I think she may have a point, but if you want to convince people of that, this is absolutely the wrong way to pitch it to me.

There is no reason whatever to presume that what comes first in an article of any kind is the priority.
Most people, myself included, who write articles of any kind do not structure them like that.

There is no reason whatever to presume that what comes first in an article of any kind is the priority. Most people, myself included, who write articles of any kind do not structure them like that.

Not quite sure of the point you are making, but it wouldn't necessarily apply to AI-generated articles.