Westminstenders: The Tunnel or Bridge

[RedToothBrush]

Apparently negotiations are in the black hole of the EU tunnel or should that be on the back of the fantasy of the Boris Bridge?

Another week closer to complete meltdown.

I'm guessing that our world beating customs solution will be based on blackboard and chalk.

I’m not sure that the new restrictions are going to achieve much really. After all, it’s staying exactly the same in Greater Manchester and rates here have been rising steadily for weeks despite the restrictions

I stumbled across this editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine earlier: www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2029812?query=featured_home

It’s utterly damning of the US response to Covid and surprisingly political: Anyone else who recklessly squandered lives and money in this way would be suffering legal consequences. Our leaders have largely claimed immunity for their actions. But this election gives us the power to render judgment. Reasonable people will certainly disagree about the many political positions taken by candidates. But truth is neither liberal nor conservative. When it comes to the response to the largest public health crisis of our time, our current political leaders have demonstrated that they are dangerously incompetent. We should not abet them and enable the deaths of thousands more Americans by allowing them to keep their jobs.

I agree with you @QueenOfThorns - I can't see how this is going to change much interns of the pandemic. It will certianly create more divisions.....

What they need to do is sort out track and trace - however that would require removing a cash cow

twitter.com/globalhlthtwit/status/1315685205240315904?s=12

No one asked local people for permission, and even in this Brexit-backing area, the disruption is straining support for Britain’s divorce from the EU.

On the contrary, they were asked in December 2019, and the county returned all bar one of the Tory candidates up for election. Boris's ticket was 'Get Brexit Done' and they responded - OK, whatever. I don't recall anyone in Kent asking questions as to how it would be done.So yes Caveat Emptor applies.

@QueenOfThorns, I suspect the new restrictions will piss off a lot more people.

[quote TheABC]@QueenOfThorns, I suspect the new restrictions will piss off a lot more people.[/quote]
Oh yes, there is that. This bunch are so incompetent that it can’t be deliberate, though!

Its time for Tiers Before Bedtime then...Social distancing rules have been in place throughout Red, I'll just leave this here...

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8827355/Revellers-play-cricket-street-Piccadilly-Circus-turns-rave-drinkers-kicked-out.html

I get the "cookie jar" analogy. Now here come the Tiers Before Bedtime

London, Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle and Manchester.
Liverpool - T3; Manchester, Leeds and Newcastle (among others) - T2; London and whole of the rest of England T1.

@LouiseCollins28
Shame your PM didn’t consult you, Louise, he was trying to simplify and introduce consistency but somehow he’s made it worse. Oh dear.

An explanation

.

Not sure they shoot many grouse in Liverpool DGR?! Plenty of shooting I believe, but no grouse.

I'm not a Scouser but that seems in poor taste. Care to put your home town up for some cheap ridicule LouiseCollins28?

DGRossetti
SEVINGTON, England—Four years after Britain voted to leave the European Union, Brexit can still seem abstract. But in the county known as the Garden of England, it is literally taking concrete form.

At least the customs depot should be temporary - the area was already earmarked for development;

"Ashford borough council’s deputy leader, Paul Bartlett, welcomed the plans, saying on Facebook: “A HMRC clearance depot is vastly preferable to the warehouses proposed by [owners] AXA/Friends Life and granted planning consent by ABC {Ashford Borough Council] in 2015.”

Feb 2016;
"Locals fear 'Amazon' project could bring a giant warehouse to Kent village."

"The proposed development would be built on boggy greenfields located next to the picturesque villages of Sevington and Mersham in Kent"...

www.theguardian.com/business/2016/feb/19/locals-fear-amazon-project-could-bring-a-giant-warehouse-to-kent-village

Same here LQ

MIL who i nearly fell out with due to brexit, is now saying they are all incompetent. I’m wondering what she expected to happen

Temporary... is that for 6 months or 6 years?

I very much doubt that those fields will ever be fields again. If they are not used for customs, they will be used for something else now.

Is anyone else watching Dispatches on C4? It’s all about American food standards. DH insisted on putting it on while we were eating, and I couldn’t really argue because it’s his birthday. Scary stuff

I very much doubt that those fields will ever be fields again. If they are not used for customs, they will be used for something else now.

Indeed - planning consent for 'something else' was granted in 2015.

QueenOfThorns

Keir Starmer said he thought chlorinated chicken was perfectly safe to eat on LBC this morning - or at least he said he wasn't worried about its safety.

@Clavinova

QueenOfThorns

Keir Starmer said he thought chlorinated chicken was perfectly safe to eat on LBC this morning - or at least he said he wasn't worried about its safety.

He may change his mind when he finds out how much faecal contamination there is in it 🤢

What do you think, Clav? Are you watching the programme? Are you happy to eat animal faeces, pus and carcinogens?

FWIW chlorinated chicken is safe to eat
because its been sterilised
the problem with it is WHY the animals are in such poor shape that they flesh needs to be chlorinated

How about chlorinated 🐿?

Clav I didn’t hear the LBC Starmer interview but this article gives a rather different slant on it than you do.

He said [farmers] were worried that, as the UK starts to make trade deals with other countries, there was the potential for "our high standards for food will slip."
The Labour leader said farmers were "very worried" about that, as they believed it could "drive down their standards, and that is not what they want."
When LBC's Nick Ferrari asked Sir Keir if he was "nervous about chlorinated chicken and food products like that," the reply was that he did not want chlorinated chicken.
"Would you eat it Sir Keir?" Nick asked, which caused the Labour leader to chuckle and reveal he is a vegetarian.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.lbc.co.uk/radio/special-shows/call-keir/sir-keir-starmer-chlorinated-chicken-brexit-trade-deal/

@brianmoore666 posted on Twitter:
Despite widespread press reports and legal action over improperly awarded Govt contracts; the fact that we've wasted billions of pounds on systems that don't work - no criticism from that beacon of parsimony The Tax Payers Alliance.
Wonder why?

@ListeningQuietly

FWIW chlorinated chicken is safe to eat because its been sterilised the problem with it is WHY the animals are in such poor shape that they flesh needs to be chlorinated

That’s the line, yes. But they interviewed a US scientist who’s conducting a study into contamination in shop-bought meat, and he was happy to display his Petri dishes of salmonella, campylobacter etc that he’d cultured from the allegedly sterile meat.

They also had a retired food safety inspector who explained how the washing process cleverly distributes the faeces over the whole carcass.

the problem with it is WHY the animals are in such poor shape that they flesh needs to be chlorinated

They eat chlorinated chicken in New Zealand of course. Keir Starmer only mentioned supporting British farmers - he said he is a vegetarian
himself.

More on Sevington here;

"Friends Life Ltd first submitted the plans for the structures [warehouses] at Sevington near junction 10 of the M20 in 2014 on land earmarked by Ashford Borough Council for business use."

Axa Real Estate took over the land in 2007;

www.kentonline.co.uk/kent-business/county-news/business-park-applications-submitted-22990/
www.kentonline.co.uk/ashford/news/giant-warehouses-plan-approved-96116/

I don't know why everybody worries about Chlorinated Chicken.

The UK is going to have world beating agricultural standards

and NO WAY would nice reelected Donald want to crush British farmers

@ListeningQuietly

FWIW chlorinated chicken is safe to eat because its been sterilised the problem with it is WHY the animals are in such poor shape that they flesh needs to be chlorinated

... imo, if animals are in poor shape, then their meat will have fewer nutrients and higher levels of toxins

So my concerns about animal welfare and eating meat produced to a high standard are driven by self-interest
(of course I support decent animal welfare standards for their own sake too)