Westministenders: Lockdown continues

[BigChocFrenzy]

The UK has been on lockdown since 23 March,
with no end in sight.

The deaths peak is predicted to be around 17 April,
with the controversial IHME prediction that the UK will have considerably more total deaths - 66,000 - by summer than other European countries.

Supermarkets are struggling to satisfy demand for online slots for the vulnerable
and to keep shelves supplied for other customers

Like all countries, the UK economy is being hammered and heading for a deep recession.
Estimates are for UK GDP to fall 15% this year.

A million people have applied for Universal Credit
The self-employed and small - and some large - businesses are struggling to stay solvent.

They don't know how long to plan for.

The PM is in ICU and Raab has taken over as stand-in, but needs Cabinet approval for decisions.
Probably BJ will be unfit to resume his duties as PM for several weeks, if ever.

WIll he stand down soon and let the Cabinet choose a new PM,
or will the UK continue for weeks with a stand-in leader during the worst crisis since WW2

What's the plan, anybody?

Thank you BCF

I'm glad to see the local council has decided to pay attention to the travelling community - considering they are usually ignored in regards to their health :

Coronavirus and unauthorised encampments

We are well known among the traveller community for taking a robust approach to unauthorised encampments throughout the district.

Indeed, we are one of the few councils in the country to have been granted an injunction by the courts that enables us to quickly move traveller families off of council land.

But the arrival of the coronavirus, or COVID-19, has forced both the police and us to temporarily change our approach in order to follow national guidelines.

The police will no longer evict travelling families from unauthorised encampments and have asked councils to allow those families to stay on suitable sites all the while the crisis continues.

With some vulnerable people among their number, this will allow them to access healthcare and reduce the potential spread of the virus. There is no evidence to suggest travelling families are directly responsible for the spread of coronavirus and are just as likely to catch it as the rest of us.

We will provide facilities like water, toilets and waste removal.

In return, the families are asked to agree to a strict set of rules governing their behaviour that apply to anyone using council land. If they do not, they will be evicted.

They are:

• Not to cause any damage to the site
• Not to drive vehicles along any footpath
• Not to burn, dump or tip rubbish or trade waste on any part of the site
• Not to go to the toilet in the open
• Not to abuse, intimidate or harass anyone near the site
• Not to carry out or permit any form of anti-social behaviour
• Government rules on the coronavirus must be followed at all times

We will be using the motorhome area of the New Dover Road park and ride site. It already has standpipes and the facility to empty chemical toilets. We will also provide portaloos and take waste away on a regular basis.

Our enforcement team will visit the site regularly to carry out welfare, behaviour and safety checks. It will also be monitored by CCTV.

Chief Executive Colin Carmichael said: “This temporary change to our approach has been sparked by a change to the national guidelines of dealing with traveller encampments.

“If this crisis has taught us anything, it is that those who are not normally vulnerable and in need of help quickly become so because of the disruptive power of the virus. We need to put the normal rules of engagement to one side in order to ensure everyone gets the help they deserve.

“Coronavirus has shown us time and again it does not discriminate and to beat it nor should we.”

Travellers arriving on our land in the district will be directed to this site if their presence is causing a problem and we will use our normal processes to evict them if they refuse to head to New Dover Road.

If they are not causing any problems, we will keep in touch with them but not move families on.

Seems no one wants tests anymore.

www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/matt-hancock-says-lack-of-testing-is-down-to-not-enough-demand/15/04/

Matt Hancock claimed there has been a lack of testing over the last couple of days because there hasn’t been “enough demand” in today’s press briefing.

The health secretary, who has come under fire for not providing frontline workers with enough protection, appeared to suggest coronavirus tests are going unused in the UK every day because there aren’t enough people to test.

Bollocks to Hancock. You just wonder how many more excuses they will come up with for falling down on the job.

When they have tested everyone in every care home, every hospital worker, every fire brigade person, all workers in shops, then they can start on the rest of us.

I have had a runny nose for the past few days, I suspect it's hay fever, but it would be good to have a test for corona virus to rule that out.

If they wanted to test us, there would be a 3 word slogan everywhere : Get Yourself Tested! With a phone number, a website, a letter to everyone.

Or they could visit care homes, hospitals, supermarkets and so on.

As I said, IF.

I heard a whisper that there was a contractual issue with the distribution of test kits and they started moving again last night.

Well, I've been begging for a test for weeks. GP wants me to get tested. Did. not. get. one. And that was with bloody pneumonia visible on x rays. Very angry.

That is what really worries me, Songs. I get that most of us are likely to have a brush with COVID-19 before this is over, and we don't know who will be severely affected and who won't - but we NEED to know what we're dealing with, starting with testing so the appropriate treatment path can be selected.

How anyone thinks we can be talking about opening schools while not reassuring parents that, say, the not inconsiderable numbers of asthmatic British children will be especially quickly seen and appropriately treated if they pick up COVID, I don't know.

Possibly schools will be opened again only for those who are low risk to themselves and to staff,

i.e. only NT kids without disabilities, SEN, ECP,
amd only those who can manage toilet and clothes independently, without help

A lot of what was previously unthinkable is becoming the new normal

It may well be that attending school becomes optional for all kids until at least the vaccine is available,
so parents state at the beginning of the next term whether their child will be attending
if so, they must abide my current attendance rules, or face suspension for absences;
otherwise, parents educate / childcare at home

Or it may be that parents can choose to defer school until the term of the child's 7th birthday, which works well for some other education systems

• yes, some of disadvantaged would slip much further back, but in this emergency that may no longer be an important consideration

But waiting till everybody is vaccinated is utterly untenable ....
something has to give.

yes, some of disadvantaged would slip much further back, but in this emergency that may no longer be an important consideration

It fucking well should be.

Agreed, LQ.

Prof Neil Fergus noted there is no dedicated department for CV, unlike the dept set up for Brexit. Hancockup slapped him down.

Starmer agrees with extending, but wants details of how and when lockdown can end. Me too! Other countries can do if (notably Germany), so should the UK.

Ferguson

PM's spokesman says CV shows UK needs to leave EU:

"We will not ask to extend the transition. And, if the EU asks, we will say no. Extending the transition would simply prolong the negotiations, prolong business uncertainty, and delay the moment of control of our borders. It would also keep us bound by EU legislation at a point when we need legislative and economic flexibility to manage the UK response to the coronavirus pandemic."

www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/apr/16/coronavirus-uk-live-news-covid-19-lockdown-extension#block-5e984d7d8f08ea7431f43f44

So they really will crash the economy dressed up as all the fault of the corona virus.

To add to my post above - I think that they will be playing a dangerous game with is. People are more or less obeying the lockdown, eating up store cupboard and freezer food, which is no bad thing, but will they want to continue with this once the danger is passed? I think that's highly debatable.

The Tories now, with their majority will find it very difficult to blame other parties. Starmer too, although I suspect he will disappoint, is not the bogeyman that Corbyn was.

Matt Hancock claimed there has been a lack of testing over the last couple of days because there hasn’t been “enough demand” in today’s press briefing.

There was a carer on yesterday's news saying that 3 of her staff were out sick because they had symptoms but couldn't get tested because they couldn't get to the testing sites because they don't drive...

Great, now we are going to have 2 shitshows for the price of one - no deal Brexit and added Covid 19 without any testing, no PPE where needed. So it’s more firms going bust, recession/ depression, domestic violence, kids going hungry etc. What will it take for people to see through them and the media to hold them to account?

What about those kids who have a parent with cancer who need to be protected from covid-19 infection, or teachers with family members who have cancer, should they not be an important consideration ? As a Labour supporter I don't get Keir Starmer's focus on calling for an exit plan at this point at all, think he should focus on the lack of testing, he needs to starts coming up with solutions (which would include more testing) otherwise it just looks like sniping.

But waiting till everybody is vaccinated is utterly untenable ....
something has to give.

How the hell is this going to work? Unless they keep chucking money at people, more and more will lose everything. There wont be an economy left in a few months never mind by the time some possible vaccine hoves into view.

Violet
Lockdown has to end within the next six weeks or there will be no economy left to return to.
Starmer is absolutely right to be asking what the Government's plan it.
That is his job as the leader of the opposition

I am shocked by the level of drawbridge pulling by those with secure incomes (particularly pensioners)
do they not realise that the shops really WILL empty soon if the crops are not picked
and that furlough payments will not stop business going bust and putting millions out of work before the middle of June

We have to find a way to live with Covid.
Protect the vulnerable
get the rest out working and learning

Parents whose children can't attend school might wonder WTF their taxes are going.

Or will they get a rebate for private home schooling ?

Private school parents do not get a rebate
nor do current home schoolers
and those who do not pay income tax (47% of the adult population) are still allowed to send their kids to school

splendid looking straw man though

ListeningQuietly I completely agree with you. It's also really worrying me that the government still appears hell bent in a year end crash out. Their handling of corona has given me zero confidence that it wont be yet another disaster. Its fucking criminal, people and businesses have had enough shocks as it is.

Private school parents do not get a rebate nor do current home schoolers

That's because they choose that path.

I am referring to parents who are paying their taxes, but being denied the benefit thereof because of a ruling of the state. Which is not a strawman, but a perfectly valid point to raise.

It also bleeds into the situation of people forced to pay tax, but unable to vote.