Westministenders: Reployed back to No Deal Planning

[RedToothBrush]

Now Covid-19 is over (yeah I know right) lots of civil servants who were switched from brexit no deal planning to covid-19 planning have been switched back to their original remit.

For some reason this doesn't exactly fill me with confidence.

We've also seen yet another doubling down on the EU not being flexible and how they need to make a deal. And lots of rhetoric about being serious about no transiton planning.

Remember we have something of a deadline looming at the end of next month.

So before we are even out of this crisis, the government have lost interest. Today's press conference was an eye opener - Van Tam openly said that the time taken to get test results was too long and wasn't good enough yet and meant track and trace wasnt still operational despite it being such a crucial factor in being able to go into the next phase as planned on 1st June.

Another deadline we won't make - the Manchester Nightgale still has patients and the local authorities in the NW are going mental. So the government is playing more silly buggers over blame and villianising the evil workshy teachers. Noting the government guidance for teachers on how to teacher children at home says fuck all and the guidance on reopening schools makes a Theresa May dog ate my homework style document look positively well thought out, in terms of practicality. (Not even going to touch on the question of whether its safe - the whether its workable one is more important).

I guess that means things are getting back to normal at least.

A recession looms, but workers rights are now fair game and fully in the government cross hairs - as we see from a lack of PPE for the 'heroes' and the attacks on the teachers. As well as the carers who were sold down river. That'll be the ununionised carers...

Taking back control.

Pippa Crear @pippacrear
UPDATE: Durham Police contradicts Downing Street’s claim on Dominic Cummings that “at no stage was he or his family spoken to by the police about this matter”.

Beth Rigby @bethrigby
Police tonight say on record they did speak to Dom Cummings dad. Directly contradicts statement put out by No 10 today

Rob Powell @robpowellnews
NEW - Tory MP Steve Baker says if Dominic Cummings doesn't resign the PM will "keep burning through political capital". Adds it's "very clear" he travelled when others were being told they couldn't #ridge

MORE - Steve Baker: "nobody is indispensable, Dominic should go and we should have a Chief of Staff to the PM who doesn't end up in the newspapers" #ridge

MORE - Steve Baker says that ministers were pushing "quite thin lines" yesterday to try and change the story and it "hasn't worked" #ridge

MORE - Steve Baker admits that he has never thought Dominic Cummings should have been in No10 because he creates "too much collateral damage". Says he shouldn't have doubled down on the Vote Leave bus in 2016 or the Brexit campaign Turkey leaflet #ridge

MORE - Steve Baker says Dominic Cummings' actions have turned lockdown rules into a "nonsense position, a pantomime position" which are "completely unenforceable" by policy as there is now "extreme latitude in interpretation of rules" #ridge

Simon Hoare Mp@simon4ndorset
With the damage Mr Cummings is doing to the Government’s reputation he must consider his position. Lockdown has had its challenges for everyone. It’s his cavalier “I don’t care; I’m cleverer than you” tone that infuriates people. He is now wounding the PM/Govt & I don’t like that

Damian Collins @damiancollins
Dominic Cummings has a track record of believing that the rules don’t apply to him and treating the scrutiny that should come to anyone in a position of authority with contempt. The government would be better without him.

3 Tory MPs.

All unhappy. From a range of camps within the Tory Party.

So the race is on to develop vacinne before virus disappears because they won't be able to prove it works. Apparently Astro Zeneca has order for 100,000,000 vaccines for GB but when asked if we get it first answer was ' we have supply outlets in UK USA India so all should be able to get'. Ours will be produced here. What's to betting USA gets theirs first as we are always behind in producing anything!

Beth Rigby @bethrigby
Shapps says it untrue Cummings went back to Durham after Apr 14

Police DID speak to family. But it was DC’s father who made the contact & it was on security issues

Doesn’t know abt Barnard Castle on Apr 12. But says DC out of 14-day isolation (this was height of lockdown)

Peak was 10th remember. Day Johnson went to hospital if memory serves. Which begs a few questions to me.

Adam Bienkov @adambienkov
Downing Street yesterday: "At no stage was he or his family spoken to by the police".

Ahh, re No10 on police speaking to DC, was a "I never had sex with that woman" defence.

Def popcorn time. Who will survive? Will it be Dom going? Or will it be that Collins, Hoare and Baker better watch out??

Re article bcf linked to about late lockdown

Simon Nixon @simon_nixon
Johnson should be grateful to Cummings for deflecting attention from this deeply reported and utterly devastating account of his dithering and incompetence in the weeks before lockdown.
www.thetimes.co.uk/article/three-weeks-of-dither-and-delay-on-coronavirus-that-cost-thousands-of-british-lives-05sjvwv7g

Extraordinary nugget here: the Johnson government has been editing its old videos to remove embarrassing evidence of his early misjudgements.

Nice to see this reference to our @thetimes March 13 leader. I remember very well the criticism we received at the time on here from client journalists and outraged Johnson fans for daring to question his strategy and judgment

4 tory MPs... And

Gaby Hinsliffe @gabyhinsliffe
Worth noting that @Simon4NDorset (called for Cummings to consider position) & @William_Wragg (RT'd Steve Baker saying he shd resign) are both on the liason committee, which questions the PM on Weds.

Shapps on Andrew Marr right now - I don't envy him!

Rafael Behr @rafaelbehr
So Shapps is saying, in essence, that self-isolation should begin not immediately but only once you are satisfied with your childcare arrangements, that cross-country travel is permitted to fulfil that condition, and that the rules said as much all along.

And by implication, anyone who would have done what Cummings did but chose not to because they thought it wasn't allowed is a mug.

Rich Lancaster @rich_lancaster
The guidelines literally state you should self isolate in your primary home and not travel to a second home.

I wonder if Cummings' child is going to school on 1 June?

Come on press why did Dom travel to second home (against guidelines) and sister not come an pick up child if this is a childcare issue?

I mean there hundreds of thousands of people juggling childcare right now...

I wonder if Cummings' child is going to school on 1 June?

Kid isn't 4 yet.

Born 2016. So not yet at school (reception is 1st Sept 2014 to 31st Aug 2015).

Nick Eardley @nickeardleybbc
The key point is that people remained locked down says Shapps on #Marr.

But remember No 10 account admits Dominic Cummings’ had already been showing symptoms when they moved from London to Durham.

Jane Merrick @janemerrick23
Shapps round 2 on #Marr: asked about Harries saying exemption for children if “extreme risk to life”, Shapps says “a four year old can’t feed themselves”. Also reveals he hasn’t spoken to Cummings directly. Doesn’t know whether they stopped en route.

Shapps says of the possibility of a petrol stop, Cummings is very keen on SD rules and “I don’t think he had the virus at the time”. WHAT? The inconsistencies in Cummings’ account are extraordinary. #Marr

Instead of sending a Secretary of State out on live TV, whom he hasn’t actually spoken to, to defend the murky inconsistencies in his story, perhaps Dominic Cummings could have the courage to set out in detail what actually happened? Would certainly clear things up. #Marr

Incidentally the following story has also just popped up on my timeline

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/couple-charged-stealing-out-of-date-tesco-5687720.amp?__twitter_impression=true
Couple in court for stealing food from Tesco bins had just £8 a week to live on
Benefit sanctions left Paul and Kerry Barker with £8 a week after rent, bills and repayments to a loan shark they had turned to - so they resorted to raiding a locked Tesco compound for out-of-date food destined for the rubbish

They got a compassionate discharge but had to go to court.

It sums up the difference in 'extreme threat to life' when you are rich and poor - which is what the public are seeing. And it still doesn't explain why the Cummings who were showing symptoms and apparently very ill, risks such a long drive when the sister could have driven to London.

Our ds is still up in Aberdeen, in his own. He's 19, so can cope and likes the independence

But - because he has no support up there (he's a student, so his friends have gone to their parental homes) - Dh and I did have a contingency plan that if he fell ill badly with Covid, then one of us would drive up (2.5 hour drive) and bring him home and both would then self isolate for the required length of time while the other looked after them at the appropriate distance (we would've been able to "lock" off the attic floor which has ds' bedroom and a spare bedroom currently the junk room and a bathroom). Wouldn't have been fun for either of them, but them's the rules for the plebs

Jennifer Rankin @jennifermerode
Incredible admission by leadingTory Brexiteer Steve Baker. They were told to vote for WA without reading it “on the basis Michael Gove articulated: we could change it later”.
So they voted for it. And now discover there will be an border in the Irish Sea.

And Michael Gove is the man Boris Johnson appointed to be the UK representative on the Joint Committee — to implement the Irish sea border. This week the gov finally admitted that there will be checks at the border.

It goes without saying such reports from a senior well-connected Brexiteer will fuel EU fears that the UK government can’t be trusted. And as the EU always has, they will press for strong legal guarantees/safeguards in the future relationship.

Hahahaha! Steve Baker you say?

Churchill received hundreds of proposals to bump off Adolf and turned them all down because he was the Allies' greatest asset.

Operation Foxley was very well planned.

Also, is someone being ever-so-clever-here ?

On whether Dominic Cummings should or should not resign from his job as advisor to the Prime Minister: Should resign: 52%

52% - really ?! Well that's sorted then. If we get Brexit with "52%" then we should lose Dom with "52%"

Pleased to see some papers picked up my suggestions for headlines yesterday. I'm here all week ...

This is going down like a bucket of cold sick. Nice to see the Times pursuing Johnson on his fitness to lead.

Neither story is going away.

Lbc @lbc
Peter Bone, Conservative MP for Wellingborough, said when an advisor becomes the story, the advisor has to go.

He said Boris Johnson can carry on without Dominic Cummings if he goes but it will be hard if he stays.

Thats Peter Bone of the (apparently very pissed off) ERG.

pretty, same sort of thinking about our DS, especially as DH is vulnerable. We went to different route of ordering him home before lockdown, and thought it was a bit naughty to go and fetch him from the station!

Simon Nixon @simon_nixon
The giant hole in Cummings’s story is that by his own account he wasn’t ill when he got in the car for six hours to drive to second home. Pity Marr didn’t push harder on this, rather than accept Shapps’ preposterous claim not to have spoken to DC before going out to defend him.

If he (or his wife) were ill, he should have been self isolating. If they weren't, then he can't use the extreme threat to life excuse.

So two ERG big guns telling it like it is.

Boris wouldn't be where he is without the ERG.

Pity Marr didn’t push harder on this, rather than accept Shapps’ preposterous claim not to have spoken to DC before going out to defend him.

(Checks who Marr works for ... oh, BBC).

And there's an extra day for the story to carry on fermenting - if these people knew anything about baking stories, it's that they can develop a much deeper flavour if you let them rise in the fridge ...

Eh? We are repeatedly told Caddy is 4?

Plus EYFS are returning.