Westminstenders: Political vacuums are very bad things

[RedToothBrush]

Johnson has been notible (once again) but his absence.

Whilst we appreciate he has been ill and has a new baby, we are in the midst of a national crisis and a sense of leadership and guidance from our prime minister has been lacking.

And its not gone unnoticed.

Not just by the press. And not just by opposition. Nor NHS and care managers. But on the ground where it matters.

The lack of the sense of seriousness has dissipated. The sense of duty to country to behave. The idea that it will some how be all over this week when it doesn't appear to be the government strategy. The total lack of policy for a week whilst it's become clear bit by bit that these things have been under discussion and decided upon prior to the supposed key meeting on Thursday from the announcements from the regional assemblies. All in favour of a TV stunt tomorrow night.

Let's see how that goes.

The grandstanding isn't a substitute for detail and substance in a crisis. And we still have the looming show down at the end of June over extension of transition. More optics. More lack of practicality at a time when things will really be on the brink.

The next month will be telling and we hit the wall of economic reality which will bring the whole world crashing in on the lives of so many people.

This is the calm before the storm. Enough the sunshine. Enjoy the time with families. Before this is over everything will have changed for so many.

This is just the start of things unravelling and it needs someone to take control and draw up solid blueprints for all our futures. Is a man who is so frequently awol from where he is supposed to be and doesn't take commitments and responsibilities seriously, really the man for that?

Churchill had a vision for the country that cited housing as our second social service, the NHS being our first.

Will Johnson manage to some how forge out so grand new venture which gives the resource and rewards it deserves to the NHS (beyond lipservice and empty platitudes and clapping, that recognises the importance of social care and can stop the almost inevitable coming wave of homelessness and unemployment

And can he do it without selling us off as a basement bargain to the us?

There's like 6 kids there when they go.

squid 💐
I suggest sending them in ft, to give both of you - and the kids - a break from each other

He's not a key worker so I always felt it was sorta taking the piss.

Not saying this describes your DP squid but I wonder in how many households across the land there are men finding out that looking after young children turns out not to be a doddle after all. Or maybe that's just my circle of friends, but going by some of the MN threads it seems other share this issue. Years ago, when my friend was trying to complete her PhD whilst looking full time after 2 young DCs, her husband would come from work to criticise why wasn't more done in the house and implied she was dossing it

My DP is much better than most men I think, and then gets praised extravagantly for doing what pretty much every woman does as standard

On a related topic:
www.theguardian.com/education/2020/may/12/womens-research-plummets-during-lockdown-but-articles-from-men-increase

My sister does academic proofreading and translation (mainly articles produced in a country that went into swift, hard lockdown) and confirms she is mostly getting articles from men just now. The female academics who usually send her stuff are doing so less.

I've been talking to female colleagues with kids, as we've had a message from the head our research group (single, childless woman who works 364 days a year) saying we must keep up research in the next few weeks.
We've also noticed that in the vague messages from our university about how we'll most likely have to carry on with at least some online teaching as of Sept, no one has mentioned that if we cycle in and out of lockdown, those of us who have kids will really struggle to do that while juggling childcare and homes schooling.

Fwiw squid I'd also say send your dc's into school for a bit. It's probably not easy for your DP to wfh with them and it would cut a bit of slack for you both. It's been a long hard slog for you

I'd send them in too, Squid. Give you both a bit of a break.

DrB We don't have kids, but DH has been furloughed whilst I'm still at work so has been playing at being a 'house husband'.

Just today he said 'wow, I never appreciated the mental load the meal planning and shopping actually is.'

(Well, what he actually said was 'fuck me, this meal planning malarkey is such a ballache. And Tescos is a fucking nightmare! I don't know how you do it on top of work and stuff.' But the thought was there.)

squid
I live near Southampton General.
I have friends who are teachers at many of the local schools.
The kids want their own routine and their own time.
The fact that the parents benefit is a bonus.

Technically 30% of kids have always been eligible for school
only 2% have been going.
If a load of your medic mates sent their kids in then the school would come back to life
you would all get a break
and more marriages will survive

Clash to your DH's more accurate description. Here is an old but good New York times' article on decision fatigue. When I read it I suddenly realise why I just go so sick of making parent and household decisions all day on top of working full time.

www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/magazine/do-you-suffer-from-decision-fatigue.html

Clash 😂
Well at least he hopefully appreciates it is hard work and will share more equally after this crisis is over

Auld Depressing in 2020
Men - as a sex - have to become less selfish, for women to even approach equality

John Crace on the grilling:

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/may/13/boris-johnson-resorts-to-bluster-under-keir-starmer-cross-examination?CMP=sharebtnn_tw

As Boris has no clue what advice his government has and hasn’t given, he can’t knowingly be untruthful. 😂
Nor, given his career track record, show any signs of being able to differentiate between truth and lies.

Rather he just recites the answer that he wants to be true and hopes to make it so by willpower alone.
And to be fair, it’s a tactic that’s worked often enough in the past.
....
In other times it might have been uplifting for the opposition benches to see the prime minister so comprehensively dismantled.

But there was little cheering or a sense of satisfaction,
because in a time of crisis you rather hope the country would have a leader in whom you could believe.

Someone you could trust to make at least some of the right decisions.
But we have Boris.
Incompetent, unprepared, selfish, lazy, amoral, and just not that bright.

And no matter how many times Starmer batters him with an indefensible charge sheet at PMQs, Boris will remain prime minister for the duration.

Northern Ireland-born British and Irish win EU citizenship rights

(English, Scottish & Welsh ... suck it up)

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/may/14/northern-ireland-born-british-and-irish-win-eu-citizenship-rights

All British and Irish citizens born in Northern Irelandd* will be be treated as EU citizens for immigration purposes,
the government has announced after a landmark court case involving a Derry woman over the residency rights of her US-born husband.

The move is a major victory for Emma de Souza ending a three-year battle to be recognised by the Home Office as Irish, a right enshrined in the Good Friday Agreement (GFA).
....
Her husband, Jake, will now be allowed to remain in the UK indefinitely if he applies for the EU settlement scheme,
an immigration status for all EU citizens wanting to remain in the UK post-Brexit.
....
The Home Office made its rule change in parliament on Thursday,,^ finally bringing immigration law into line with the 1998 peace deal, which allows anyone born in Northern Ireland to be British, Irish or both.

.....and then gets praised extravagantly for doing what pretty much every woman does as standard

Oh indeed. My children are grown up now, but I have never forgotten the time when DH came back from taking DD out and said "You've no idea how difficult it is shopping with a pushchair." Cue an explosion from me "What do you think I have been doing for the past couple of years?"

BigChoc
ooh that deSouza ruling is interesting
it overturns a plank of Theresa May's anti EU hostile environment
snigger

Northern Ireland-born British and Irish win EU citizenship rights

This sounds like another nail in the coffin of the United Kingdom. Customs border in the Irish Sea. N Irish citizens are EU citizens. What is to stop them saying "Let's reunite and get on with it. Westminster is only interested in us when they need votes."

Hahaha
Oh, yes!
Dh came home from work when ds1 was a (very poorly, sickly, never sleeping) baby and said "this carpet needs hoovering"...
Hahaha
He never said it again, the fucker
I swear, only dogs could hear the pitch my voice got to

Thought I’d share a nugget from the Italian press about a Sanofi Covid vaccine going to the US first as the Americans apparently spent more.

www.repubblica.it/salute/2020/05/14/news/coronavirus_la_sanofi_promette_che_dara_il_vaccino_prima_agli_usa-256598146/?refresh_ce

I found the same article in French but didn’t spot it in the U.K. press? I might well have missed it though, there are some newspapers I can’t bring myself to click on.

www.lefigaro.fr/societes/vaccin-le-president-de-sanofi-repond-aux-attaques-contre-le-laboratoire-20200514

BJ apparently decided that being fat landed him in hospital, so plans to make the nation thinner too

• I thought seeing him in that broadcast that he was thinner and might be on a diet

Hello sugar tax again ?

He’s not that overweight, I think being stupid is far more the problem in his case.

Ce sera le cas parce qu’ils ont investi pour essayer de protéger leur population, pour redémarrer leur économie» et parce que le gouvernement américain «partage le risque avec Sanofi»

Shared the risk = paid through the nose.

More on the vaccine furore that melassa posted:

or .... How a firm can become an international pariah by taking Trump's dollar

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/14/global-report-leaders-urge-free-vaccines-as-france-allows-staycations

Paul Hudson, the British chief executive officer of Sanofi, said any vaccine would go to the US first since it had done the most to fund the company’s research.

“The US government has the right to the largest pre-order because it’s invested in taking the risk,”
Hudson told Bloomberg.

The European commission and health experts responded furiously, pointing out that Paris-based Sanofi has received tens of millions of euros in the form of research credits from the French state in recent years.

The French government described Hudson’s remarks as unacceptable,
while the German press pasted the firm as a soulless and disloyal multinational willing to blackmail governments to extract lucrative subsidies.

< yep, they are getting slated here, rare to see such a pile-on >

The US refused to join international efforts to find a vaccine - because Trump wants 1st rights to any vaccine

Does anyone know how the efficacy of the vaccine is being tested in the human trials?

Are they being exposed to the virus with all the ethical implications?

The French are probably particularly furious about this, because the millions that Sanofi gets are part of a research credit system that many academics have been contesting for years.
On the radio this morning (France Info, maybe?), they were reporting that the French spokesperson for Sanofi has now denied the vaccine would go to the US first.