Westministenders: Can you tell your Rs from Elbows?

[RedToothBrush]

This week Mark Sedwill has resigned (or was he pushed?) and David Frost (chief brexit lead) was appointed National Security Adviser in a move that enraged Theresa May. The former prime minister felt that his appointment was unprofessional and that was a political appointment not an independent one and that he lacked experience. Of course in terms of national security we still haven't had that report on Russia and I don't believe The Intelligence and Security Committee has yet been named (not sat since Johnson was appointed as PM).

We have passed the deadline for extending transition and we have now apparently said that negotiations on the end of transition will finish at the end of September.

The bill ending Free movement of people has been signed, amongst much fanfare by the Conservatives saying they have delivered on the Referendum promise. However we might have up to 3million Hong Kongers who we are willing to allow into the country which might not go down too well with those who were unhappy with 'unrestricted EU immigration'.

We also have the demonstration of utter incompetence, outsourcing and lack of coordination and communication from central government and local government in the covid-19 crisis. A national scandal that isn't being properly reported by the press and leave you with the very large question of who is this government serving? If its contract with Deloittes over testing didn't require them to report positive tests to Public Health England, what was the point in the testing? How can this be consistent with 'The Government’s new approach to biosecurity will bring together the UK’s world-leading epidemiological expertise and fuse it with the best analytical capability from across Government in an integrated approach.' and will provide real time analysis and assessment of infection outbreaks at a community level, to enable rapid intervention before outbreaks grow.?

The growing feeling that Brexit is being exploited by this government for personal interests and those of big business at the expense of the general public is one which was feared and grows harder to argue against by the day.

Thanks red
Pmk in weary disbelief

Thanks red

Pmk

PMK thanks Red

PMK

A real squirrel.

Dead cat bouncing

Pmk thanks

Hmm I wondered with Hong Kong if the Chinese could actually throw those with British passports out, in the style of Amin and Uganda? The Chinese Govt reason being that those citizens preferred to have British passports instead of Chinese and there is no barrier to them coming to the UK now.

I don't know how many Ugandan Asians Amin kicked out - I don't suppose it was three million. (No, it didn't include Priti Patel's family, they had already gone.)

PMKing cat enjoying the sun

Love the way that BJ was apoplectic at the possibility that Sturgeon wouldn't rule out placing restrictions on English hot spots coming into Scotland (when a hot spot has already been identified in Gretna/Annan), yet can't see that that is exactly what is being done with Leicester

He also can't bring himself to call the Scottish Government "the Scottish Government" and crassly not not unexpectedly calls it "the Scottish Administration"

Early PMK. Thanks Red and everyone for these lively, wide-ranging and sanity-saving threads.

Thanks Red. This is a smack in the face.

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Thanks, red 💐

@HesterThrale

Thanks Red. This is a smack in the face.

Depressing. I'm finding myself checking the stats for my sister's country of residence elsewhere in Europe... Except they've had less deaths there than we've had in my region so I don't know why I'm worried.

PMK - ta Red & everyone.

Last week’s summary:

twitter.com/RussInCheshire/status/1276512600398925824

#TheWeekInTory

1. Let’s start with the milder corruption: it was revealed Matt Hancock tried to block 400 homes and a primary school near Newmarket racecourse, after receiving at least £65,000 in donations from horseracing bigwigs who opposed the scheme

2. And then Robert Jenrick, the Housing Minister, overruled his dept and planning officers to rush through planning permission that saved Richard Desmond a £45m fee. Desmond is a billionaire pornographer, former-Express owner, and (subsequent to this) a Tory donor

3. The Tory Manifesto says: “we will offer more homes to local families, enabling councils to use developers’ contributions via the planning process”

4. The lost £45m was the “developers’ contribution”. One of Britain’s most deprived areas lost it. A billionaire kept it.

5. And then, I'm sure coincidentally, Desmond donated £12,000 to the Tory Party the next week. A bargain – only 0.02% of the £45m he saved

6. So this week Jenrick denied he had done anything wrong

7. Unfortunately, he had already admitted his actions were “unlawful” on 29 May

8. And then the business minister said voters could “raise their concerns at Tory fundraisers”

9. So now have to donate to the Tory Party before we can complain about the Tory Party doing illegal things for their donors

10. In Coronavirus news: Boris Johnson announced more relaxations of the lockdown, saying he would “trust the British public to use their common sense”

11. 48 hours later a major incident was declared on the South Coast, as 500,000 people common-sensibly crowded the beaches

12. Boris Johnson said he “would not hesitate” to bring back lockdown if the rules on social distancing weren’t observed

13. 48 hours later, he hasn’t brought back lockdown

14. Then the govt announced councils would have the “power and resources” to enforce local lockdowns

15. But council leaders wrote to the govt to explain that they don’t actually have the legal powers to do this

16. And then 8 out of 10 councils in England have declared they are at risk of bankruptcy, having absorbed cuts of between 26% and 50%

17. Health leaders, including the presidents of Royal Colleges of Physicians, Nurses, GPs and Surgeons wrote to the govt asking for an urgent review of preparations for a second wave

18. The govt declined to do a review

19. And then the WHO warned of global shortage of oxygen and breathing equipment

20. So naturally, the govt opened pubs and cinemas

21. Then, after a month of not telling us the daily test numbers, the govt went a step further and cancelled the daily briefings altogether

22. UK Statistics Authority issued a 2nd official warning about the “trustworthiness” of the govt’s figures

23. Association of Medical Research said 74% of clinical trials had been put on hold in 2020 due to cuts

24. So we spent £900k painting a flag on Boris Johnson’s plane

25. And then it was revealed the govt spent £12m on the “world beating” contact app that didn’t work

26. If you paid the average £50,000 programmer salary, £12m buys 320 programmers

27. The German app code is open-source, and the free repository for it lists 34 programmers

28. The UK has repeatedly declined to use the free German App

^29. Boris Johnson claimed in Parliament that "no country in the world has a working contact tracing app”

30. There are working contact tracing apps in: Angola, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bangladesh…^

… Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, Czech Rep, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Latvia, Malaysia, Morocco, N Macedonia, Netherlands, Norway, NZ, Poland …

… Qatar, Russia, S Africa, S Korea, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland and Vietnam. That's 42 countries.

31. The gov declined to publish its report on food and medicine shortage risks from no-deal Brexit, which surely bodes well.

32. Boris Johnson said Brexit must be delivered, as we have a “democratic duty” to listen to the people

33. A report this week found 9m voters – most thought likely to oppose the Conservatives – will vanish from the electoral roll when new Westminster seats are drawn up

34. When the govt (breaking pre-election promises) merged the Dept for International Development into Foreign Office 2 weeks ago, they said there would be no cuts to overseas aid

35. This week the Treasury asked govt depts to find "a minimum of 30%" cuts, including overseas aid

36. The govt continued to decry the removal of statues connected with slavery, as this might “diminish public knowledge of British history”

37. Govt cuts led to the closure of 773 public libraries, and I suspect many of them contained books about British History

38. The Minister for Arts said the govt was “committed to supporting the Arts Sector in through crisis”

39. Emergency funding for the arts (converted into £)
- France £6.3bn
- Germany £900m
- Canada £295m
- Italy £221m
- NZ £90m
- Spain £68m
- Ireland £18m
- UK £0

40. In 2019 the govt committed to net zero carbon emissions by 2050

41. A year on a report found at the current rate, the govt would hit its target by the year 3650, which is 1500 years from now, a mere 1470 years too late

42. This week it reached 38°C in the Arctic

43. The govt said it would “fairly and courageously to maintain law and order” in the light of the #BlackLivesMatter movement

44. And then the govt announced it wants to abolish trial by jury in order to address a 41,000-case backlog caused by its own cuts

45. It's Friday. Not even very late Friday. There are 2 more days of this week to go.

This week so far.

twitter.com/RussInCheshire/status/1277992483255775233

This episode of #TheWeekInTory is just stuff since Friday

1. Ineptitude alert: due to Brexit the UK is leaving the EU’s Galileo satellite scheme, which is vital for satnav

2. Independent experts said developing our own satellite system would cost around £4bn

3. So instead, the govt announced £500m investment to make existing satellites to do the job

4. But they are too close to earth to be used for GPS positioning, so cannot work

5. A space policy expert said “The fundamental starting point is, we’ve bought the wrong satellites”

6. Democracy news: it was reported “PM wants Brexiteer to head Civil Service”

7. But the Code of Conduct says Civil Servants “must not act in a way that is determined by party political considerations”

8. Then Michael Gove gave a major speech about the need to decentralise govt

9. And the next day the Cabinet Secretary was sacked, so that Dominic Cummings could centralise more power

10. A replacement – David Frost, a Brexiteer - was appointed, and will now be Cabinet Secretary, National Security Advisor and simultaneously lead Brexit negotiations

11. The former Cabinet Secretary Lord O’Donnell said “I’m worried about the appointment” as it was “made without any due process”, and Frost “doesn't have much background in security”. He said “it shows an erosion of civil service impartiality”

12. Public safety news: 3 years from Grenfell, the National Audit Office found only 14% of dangerous buildings have had their cladding removed

13. The UN warned the UK may breach international law over its failure to remove combustible cladding from high-rise buildings

14. Days after corruption allegations against Robert Jenrick & Matt Hancock, it was revealed developers backed by Johnson as London Mayor donated almost £1m to the Tory Party

15. If you take away some of the letters and add different ones, “donation” is an anagram of “bribe”

16. And now, onto Covid. On 1 June the govt said “we will work around the clock to ensure that nobody goes hungry as a result of this crisis [Covid19]”

17. This week govt data revealed 7.7m adults missed meals, and 3.7 used food banks during the crisis

18. Senior police officers warned govt that lifting the lockdown was “total madness”

19. The next day the govt lifted the lockdown

20. The day after that, a major incident was declared as 500,000 people crowded beaches, and illegal street parties broke out across the country

21. Priti Patel said “I want to make sure our police are absolutely resourced”

22. Since 2010, Tories have cut 21,000 police officers, 23,000 police support workers, and shut 600 police stations

23. Trading Standards, which investigates fraud, also had 70% of its budget cut

24. The Home Secretary said the public “shouldn’t take liberties” with the rules and “the full weight of govt powers” could be called upon to ensure guidelines are followed

25. I've looked into this, and Dominic Cummings is still in his job. So, remarkably, is Robert Jenrick

26. Matt Hancock said “a protective ring had been thrown around care homes” by the govt

27. A report this week showed the risk of Covid-related deaths in UK’s care homes is 13-times higher than in German care homes

28. The govt told parliament there are sufficient supplies of PPE

29. The next day govt confirmed that the phrase “200 pieces of PPE equipment” refers to 100 pairs of gloves

30. UK Statistics Authority issued a 2nd official rebuke about the trustworthiness of govt data

31. To address the financial crisis caused by Coronavirus, the PM pledged a £1bn school building programme over 10 years

32. This is 1/7th of the cuts to school budgets since 2010

33. The Blair govt increased school budgets by £12bn in 3 years, which is 40x as much per year

34. A SAGE scientific report said fully reopening schools without substantial improvements in the performance of the test-and-trace system could risk a new surge in cases of Covid-19

35. So the govt announced it would fine parents who didn’t send their children to school

36. Boris Johnson compared himself to Roosevelt and promised a £5bn “New Deal” to boost the economy, and said “this is what the times demand”

37. Roosevelt’s New Deal expenditure was up to 40% of US GDP at the time

38. Johnson’s £5bn is slightly less: about 0.2% of UK GDP

39. PM promised £100m for 29 road projects - around £350k per road

40. The Manchester Airport bypass alone cost £280m

41. And then it was revealed Johnson’s “New Deal” is not new at all, it just brings forward money already promised in previous budgets. So... Old Deal.

42. The govt refused to rule out tax rises to pay for the coming crash

43. Then Boris Johnson explicitly ruled out tax rises for the rich, saying we should “clap for bankers who make the NHS possible”

44. So if the rich aren’t being taxed, that means… oh, it’s you and me again

45. On 24 June, Jeremy Hunt wrote an article in the Telegraph urging the govt to do mass testing of NHS and Care staff to prevent a second wave

46. On 24 June (the same day) Jeremy Hunt (the same Jeremy Hunt) voted in parliament against mass testing of NHS and Care staff

47. The WHO said “a second wave of Covid 19 is a highly likely outcome” and advised all nations to begin preparations for one

48. The govt declined to do a review into preparations for a second wave, even when one was recommended by the Royal Societies of Surgeons, Nurses & GPs

49. BMA reports 1 doctor in 7 is planning to quit after the current crisis subsides

50. Over 22,000 EU-national staff already quit the NHS after the Brexit vote

51. Tories cut £1bn from NHS training budget from 2018 to 2023, so there aren’t enough trainees to replace them

52. And, to end on a cheery note, researchers in China discovered a new type of swine flu capable of triggering a pandemic.

53. So far, there's no confirmation that Chris Grayling is involved in Chinese pig-farming

54. This is just 4 days. My previous #TheWeekInTory was worse

England: Highest areas of infections in Yorkshire, the north & midlands

Wales: 3 meat plant outbreaks

Northern Ireland & Scotland: v low infections

FT: Leicester and Merthyr Tydfil top table for UK-wide Covid infections

Using PHE data release for cases-per-100,000 people during the week ending 21 June

‪https://ft.com/content/4a9fcb75-0abf-43b7-a1b9-09d2c9452204…‬

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In other news, Seumas Milne has left his job at Labour HQ.

Rather worrying stats as I live between 2 of those counties :(

....And all over my FB feed are posts about local pubs and restaurants opening on Saturday.

A&E will be carnage. Thinking of squid and all her colleagues ♥

Ds1 told me that earlier.

This meat packing plant business is enough to make me go veggie. Grim.

miserable pmk