Westministenders: The Virus

[RedToothBrush]

Its like living in a Bad Disaster B Movie.

If you thought Brexit on your TV every day was Bad, The Virus is a whole new level.

The 5pm broadcast with Johnson and friends, and the public infomation video with the unblicking Chris Witty (who has such unfortunate mannerism he makes me think he's me a Dr Who alien akin to the Slitheen).

Who knows what will happen. Just that everything has changed and our entire economy is now on life support whilst we figure out how to deal with the crisis and what on earth our exit strategy is.

Johnson has however refused to join a joint EU purchase scheme designed to assist countries through the crisis.

Meanwhile the US is about to go nuts... so what does that do to a trade deal?

More money for the NHS? More hospitals?

Well its possible that might just happen...

[AuldAlliance]

I'll let you know when my letter arrives, LQ. Although postal deliveries are very few and far between just now...

[notimagain]

I thought you had to pay cash for your fine?

Nooo...don't do that..

As Auld says there were a few cases in France of people wearing armbands waving people down and issuing on the spot cash fines..

As a result there's been a few reminders on the TV that the Gendarmes/ Police Municipal never ever collect cash on the spot.

[ListeningQuietly]

It will be interesting to see how many of the French fines are fully carried through though
as 'policing by consent' is an important principle

The back story of this UK is probably interesting .....
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-52148020

[AuldAlliance]

And the one thing the DC were really waiting for was fresh milk, as they hate UHT. There was none...

[AuldAlliance]

It's v annoying. Better be extra careful, as it's 400e second time round.
There are lots of police checks here: gendarmerie is 200m from my house and I live on a sort of avenue with a big central space where people take their walks. Lots of checking on sunny days, by heavily armed police in uniforms I've never seen before. They screeched to halt and hauled someone in the other day...

[Mistigri]

Ah Auld, what a pain.

I haven't seen a single police check, and I go out for walk around the big local square every day.

Mind you it's hardly worth them checking here because there is never anyone around.

There is a bit more road traffic than there was, but it's still incredibly quiet. And it's really easy to get click and collect slots at the supermarket now. The only shortages seem to be sliced bread and six-packs of UHT milk (you can get individual bottles though).

My small community contribution has been helping a woman who usually runs a market stall and who is now doing fruit and veg deliveries. The demand for delivery is absolutely massive, so I've been sorting out her orders and putting them into google sheets.

[BurneyFanny]

Thanks listening. Sadly not surprising.

[ListeningQuietly]

Burney
it says 1208 currently in hospital in the 93
742 men

[BurneyFanny]

That Géodes site isn’t working for me, too many people on it. But our hospitals are all completely full in the 93.

[Peregrina]

Oh speeding fines - got one and assumed it was for DS/DiL because they live there. Looked at the date, and no, it was mine! Annoyingly, I wasn't aware of speeding.

[AuldAlliance]

No, no cash.
I presume I'll get a letter, like other people get for speeding fines.
People were passing themselves off as police and demanding people pay on the spot fines in cash, apparently...

[Peregrina]

I thought you had to pay cash for your fine? You might be lucky.

[ListeningQuietly]

From next week I'll be out and about every day and even though its not required here, I'm planning a papers bundle so I can explain why I am wherever I need to be.
P P P P P P

[AuldAlliance]

I've been really careful about it, and nagged DS1 when I boot him out for a 10-min walk.
But I had a slot to collect groceries set up and they rang to say they wouldn't be open at that time and to go and get it straight away, so I was a bit flustered. DS1 was doing homework and asked me sth when I was heading out to the car. I got distracted and picked up the wrong paper, so it had yesterday's date and said I was off for my daily exercise.
Clearly inaccurate...

The gendarme scanned my driving licence and muttered sth about "first fine", then started going on about how lovely Scotland is, having seen where I was born. I didn't like to say, "Yes, it is, but have you just fined me 135e or not?" I presume he had.

[ListeningQuietly]

Police out and about here in the UK today, but I think that was good old fashioned crime ...

[Peregrina]

Thanks for the link because DS is in France, so it's good to know how many cases they have. He's been religiously printing off his form when he goes out, although its unlikely that the gendarmes will venture up his road, but the time he forgets will be the time they do.

[AuldAlliance]

Oh, everyone is over on the new thread...

[AuldAlliance]

Oh, thanks Mistigri
I think I got fined today by the gendarmes...

[Mistigri]

Compare and contrast the coronavirus briefings in France.

The FR govt makes some errors early in the crisis (allowing local elections and football matches to go ahead) but their handling of the epidemic has been admirably transparent.

In addition to new (confirmed) cases and hospital deaths, they are now publishing not only deaths in other settings but also an estimate of excess mortality, and an estimate of milder cases that resulted in a medical consultation but no hospital admission.

There's also a government website where you can use a map to get local data (so I now know that 17 people are hospitalised in my département, 6 in intensive care, no deaths).

(Link here for Auld: geodes.santepubliquefrance.fr/#c=home)

Good news is that new cases are down sharply in France - which applied a range of measures all at once about 18 days ago (rather than the more gradual approach seen elsewhere). Too soon to call a trend though.

[DGRossetti]

"Daily coronavirus briefing: £13.4bn of NHS debt to be written off to aid coronavirus fight

That's not even a year of £350 million a week.

[HateIsNotGood]

I'm just viewing Brexit as it being 'furloughed' whilst CV19 is of paramount importance to most governments - especially right now in Europe (inc UK, etc).

Very probably there are 'skeleton staff'' in the backrooms contemplating/working on Brexit - but no one, anywhere can do more than speculate on anything right now.

[Horehound]

Thanks @BigChocFrenzy

[BigChocFrenzy]

Do you mean:

"Daily coronavirus briefing: £13.4bn of NHS debt to be written off to aid coronavirus fight"

That just means the NHS doesn't have to pay it back out of their budget
i.e. they have effectively received £13.4 bn more money from the Exchequer

[Horehound]

How can they write off debt?!

[RedToothBrush]

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eu_referendum_2016_/3869149-Westminstenders-A-test-of-logistic-planning?watched=1