Westministenders: Brevid

[RedToothBrush]

The government have FINALLY started to treat no deal brexit and covid as one entity in terms of fucking the economy.

On the one hand you have one camp who think they can sneak No Deal through as a consequence of Covid. On the other you have people who realise that it might be quite a good idea not to doubly screw your entire economy and to continue to be able to import medical supplies freely.

We now no that No Deal Brexit will involve passports to get into Kent and 7 mile queues of trucks because this has passed the lips of Gove. Y'know one of those who has been denying this for the past 4 years and presenting it as 'scaremongering'.

We are now firmly into the end game where businesses have to make plans based on the government plans and technology. Y'know the ones that aren't complete yet despite it only being 2 months to go.

Johnson has today done an interview about covid restrictions in the NE in which he got all the detail wrong. Its almost as if he forgot the lines he was instructed to recite and have no fundamental understanding of what rules he's putting into place to control the lives of the population.

As we lurch into October, there is speculation of full local lockdowns being brought in to try and deal with the spiralling number of cases which have to be the result, in no small part, of a dire lack of local testing facilities in the North of England. Meanwhile we've got The App finally. The one that doesn't work and the police and many health care staff are being advised not to use cos its so bobbins and will lead to them constantly isolating needlessly. Thats just something the rest of us have to contend with.

The feeling is that Cummings is up for No Deal. Johnson has been brainwashed into it, which lets face it, isn't too hard given how hard of thinking he is. However there is a growing sense that Johnson may now bottle it and declare victory in the jaws of defeat. That might be a premature hope.

We await the answer and the all important question of whether Christmas is indeed cancelled - that is for everyone who hasn't already cancelled it due to financial hardship...

Refusing to collaborate in fantasy or lies - to pretend that systems are in operation, when they are NOT -
counts as being "not the most constructive partner"

Constructing fantasy ?

Well of course we know what Gove thinks of “experts”.

He really can’t bear the idea that others might be more knowledgeable than him.
Just like Cummings. They’re peas in a pod in this.

Sliders = what we used to call flip flops (but without the divider for the big toe)

Oh, I haven't noticed those, pretty
Every day on Westministenders a learning experience

I've got shower shoes like that for the gym, when I think on it, though
and they sound of a similar construction to open-toed slippers, but presumably not so old & naff

uk.reuters.com/article/us-britain-eu-chemicals/red-tape-for-firms-is-price-of-leaving-anti-science-eu-gove-says-idUKKBN26M5TB

Gove:
Britain should celebrate its looming break from the “anti-science and anti-innovation” approach of the European Union even if it costs its industry more in red tape
🤦🏻‍♀️

mrslaughan
I think immigration can build a vibrant thriving society, but when you do it at the expense of the indigenous population- it's going to cause problems.....

EU migrants contributed £4.7 billion a year to U.K. finances but many of those who voted Leave were not benefiting from this. In this article from August 2019, a ‘migration dividend fund’ was proposed, with funding going direct to underprivileged communities. Seems as good an idea as any. But of course all too late now.

The problem again is the distribution of wealth within the UK

Since about 1980, a disproportionately large share has gone to the wealthy
That is a choice, endorsed by voters at most GEs - whether or not they realised this

That problem remains, regardless of whether it is wealth from immigrants, oil, the City of London, whatever

LQ an oncologist radiologist friend in British Columbia (BC) says that the centralised nature of health care in BC had been a bone of contention among doctors in that it has hindered health care innovation. However, she now says that it has helped immensely in developing a coherent response to Covid. Also, let's not forget that England can pretty much fit into Vancouver Island. That space must to help.

If EU immigrants had not come, would the (slightly lower) wealth in the country really have been shared more fairly with the less well off ?

DrB In contrast, devolution of public health services, health services, as well as education etc to
Germany's 16 states, containing 401 administrative districts,
has worked very well

Each district has authority, resources and local knowledge to manage its own "patch",
interpreting the regulations set out by their state,
all fitting in to the few basic rules agreed nationally by Merkel, the coalition government and the leaders of the 16 states.

@BigChocFrenzy

If EU immigrants had not come, would the (slightly lower) wealth in the country really have been shared more fairly with the less well off ?

Does a bear drive a Lamborghini? [or insert ridiculous analogy of choice here]

Some interesting data from Oxford Migration Observatory...

migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/primers/social-care-for-older-people-and-demand-for-migrant-workers/

migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/primers/responding-to-employers-labour-shortages-and-immigration-policy/

In addition to the taxes they pay, migrants contribute to the provision of public services in at least two specific ways that have not yet been analysed adequately. First, they can provide skills that are currently not available or in short supply in the UK. Second, the employment of migrants facilitates the provision of public services at a cost that is lower than would be the case if those services were dependent solely on the supply of British workers. Immigration is thus a form of “subsidy” to public services that benefits service providers, consumers and the taxpayer. Potential adverse impacts of this subsidy include downward pressures on wages (or at least wage growth) of British workers employed in public services. They also include, in some low-waged sectors such as social care, an increasing reliance on and entrenchment of low-cost service provision.

Support for what others are saying...

I've just been talking with my parents who live in my home province of BC, and they're really happy with the way things are being managed there. R number decreasing slowly, total number of active cases of covid also decreasing again, and on Vancouver Island only 3 active right now. They've been a model for how to manage a densely populated area (yes the province is huge but Greater Vancouver is extremely dense and about half the population lives there). They also are doing some of the same things as in the UK: closing clubs, no alcohol served after 10pm (and you can't buy it at the supermarket period), events limited in numbers, etc. The real strength though has been leadership. The Premier has stepped back and let the CMO Bonnie Henry, a true expert in public health, take the lead both with public communication and with recommendations for measures to take.

PS Vancouver Island isn't actually that big. It's 24% the size of England and mostly uninhabitable mountains. Pretty though!

"If EU immigrants had not come, would the (slightly lower) wealth in the country really have been shared more fairly with the less well off ?"

Now they're leaving, will the wealth left in the country be shared any more fairly? Or is the Porcine Aviation Team out demonstrating their routine?

Does anyone know why there seems to be more talk of petrol shortages this time round?

Mship I'm talking about England's length (admittedly not going from tip of Cornwall but about Portsmouth to Carlisle), which I thought was about 300'ish miles to Vancouver islands 290 miles. Though it is quite a bit narrower at 62 mi vs 180 miles from Welsh border to Ipswich. Happy to be corrected...

But definitely breathtakingly beautiful!

Petronella Wyatt: BJ

She doesn't think much of BJ - or the rest of us

www.spectator.co.uk/article/petronella-wyatt-my-food-fights-with-boris

Boris now rules by decree, forgetting that it is parliament that is supreme in this country.

Either that, or he has splinters in the windmills of his mind.

A prime minister cannot exist in a permanent state of war with both the legislature and the electorate,
which is given both barrels on an almost daily basis as punishment for the government’s Covid mistakes.

I should like to remind the PM of one of his favourite quotes, attributed to Benjamin Franklin, which he would repeat in happier days:

‘Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Much needed tool from HoC Library staff: 👏🏽

Jennifer Brown @jen_brown93

Me and my @commonslibrary colleagues @carlbaker , @olihawkins and @DanFergusonHoC have made an interactive map of coronavirus restrictions.

Find out what restrictions apply where you are by clicking the link

https://visual.parliament.uk/research/visualisations/coronavirus-restrictions-map/?long=-3.1&lat=54.8&zoom=9&showmore=1

Maybe it will stop MPs breaking them
and stop BJ from being confused again

.... no, I don't think so , either
but a useful tool for the worried public

@DrBlackbird

Mship I'm talking about England's length (admittedly not going from tip of Cornwall but about Portsmouth to Carlisle), which I thought was about 300'ish miles to Vancouver islands 290 miles. Though it is quite a bit narrower at 62 mi vs 180 miles from Welsh border to Ipswich. Happy to be corrected...

Yes by length going south to north they're similar, but it's one of my pet peeves that people don't get that Canada is in fact a heavily urban country with some very densely populated regions. Half of the population lives in just 10 urban areas of half a million or greater (2016 census), and 90% live within 100 miles of the US border (most of the remaining 10% live in the two big cities of Calgary and Edmonton).

There ends today's geography lesson, and therefore Brexit will be fiiiiine. (Apologies to the much more interesting squirrel fact providers!)

The problem is that extremists would have us taking in millions each year, whole populations of failed states, or just anyone who fancies an adventure and that simply cannot be done.

Either someone has been at the Kool-Aid or there is evidence of 'extremists' calling for millions of immigrants to the UK each year.