You can’t have your pint here – this is not an ‘outdoor space’!
Until Saturday, the day of Prince Philip’s funeral, our politicians are ‘in purdah’. This means they are not permitted to litter the MSM with their ponderous pronunciations. No interviews on telly. No photos of the PM doing this, that and the other – and thank God for that: those photos put a person right off their breakfast! However, a tiny little ‘announcement’ had to be made. As we all know, pubs are permitted to serve pints and other things from today – but only outdoors. So there was the inevitable nanny state warning and there were the inevitable local tinpot dictators. There are also two rather intriguing covid ‘news’ – and there is one more item proving that wokeism is alive and kicking in our universities.
First – the ‘covid’ news. Of course, “we” needed to be admonished that “we” must behave responsibly now that pubs can serve us in their outdoor areas, provided they have them. It seems that what is ‘outdoors’ depends however on where you live, or rather on how your local authority defines it:
“Scores of pubs and restaurants face confusion as Covid rules ease on Monday after being told their outdoor seating spaces primed for reopening do not count as outdoors. Government guidance says that shelters, marquees, and other temporary structures with roofs must have half their walls open at all times to be classed as outdoor areas. Local authorities are interpreting the rules differently, leading to outcry from some landlords and restaurant owners who have only just been told they supposedly fall foul.” (paywalled link)
One such ‘interpretation’ means that a landlord in Lancashire was told by his local authority that his walled outdoor seating area wasn’t ‘compliant’. Yes, that’s correct: there are four walls around this area so it ain’t properly ‘outdoors’. Applied strictly, does this mean the tiny back gardens of terraced houses up and down the country aren’t ‘outdoors’ either?
These government ‘guidelines’ have provided field days for local authorities. Referring to some ‘interpretations’ which deem using greenhouse-like structures to keep punters sheltered also are ‘indoors’, the chief executive of the British Beer & Pub Association, Ms McClarkin, told The Telegraph:
“We have overzealous local authorities that rather than approaching our publicans in the spirit of assisting us in reopening safe trading spaces are coming in specifically to look for things to perhaps pull us up on. It is a bit frustrating.” (paywalled link)
Indeed – and as the next week will apparently be rather arctic, this means that sitting outdoors unsheltered will be rather uncomfortable. And here’s good old Labour, saying that what’s needed is – more guidance:
“Toby Perkins, the Labour MP and deputy chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Beer, called for more clarity from the Government about how to interpret its guidance. “Neither local authorities nor publicans are epidemiology experts. It really is for the Government to make clear what the rules are,” he told The Telegraph.” (paywalled link)
Yes – everybody not only needs ‘government guidance’, they also need ‘government interpretation’ of that guidance. “We” cannot possibly be allowed to use our common sense because we plebs aren’t ‘epidemiology experts’! Instead, “we” must be made to follow ‘expert advice’, regulating our lives to the last letter. Perhaps “we” need to be told how to breathe properly … and yes, Labour is happy to keep going down this route because it doesn’t matter to them if a dictatorship is based on socialist ideology or ‘health fascism’, as long as they have the means to control and coerce us.
How much value we can accord to these ‘expert opinions’ is inadvertently demonstrated in the news that:
“More than 50 per cent of England’s population are in areas where virtually no new Covid cases at all. Some 4,307 areas – with a total population of 34.5 million – have had so few Covid cases that Public Health England has not published their data for a month to protect the identities of the few people with positive tests. Meanwhile, 1,091 places – with a population of 8.2 million people – have had no data published since the end of February.” (link)
Oh dear – and still, to ‘stop covid’, pubs are told that their outdoor areas aren’t really outdoor areas so people can’t visit. Also – isn’t it interesting that data covering a population of over 8 million people haven’t been published since the end of February? What are the covid emperors trying to hide? Perhaps they’re preparing the ground for a ‘great denial’ – namely that “we” won’t get a 3rd wave in summer?
‘Government scientists’ – are these all experts in epidemiology, as Labour demands? – have now cautiously accepted the verdict of proper medics about how respiratory viruses behave. We wrote about that last week, quoting Prof Carl Henegan. The DT had another report yesterday on this ‘war between modellers’, with some more material being produced by more scientists.
Here’s one titbit I found especially intriguing since it shamelessly states the blimmin’ obvious. Of course, what is and has been obvious to us peasants can only be accepted if some scientists – ‘experts’, you understand! – have published something about it:
“Scientists from Public Health England (PHE) also discovered recently that Britain gets enough sunlight between April and September to inactivate the virus outdoors. However they found that between October and March there was not enough ultraviolet light for that to happen, suggesting another reason why the virus may return in the Autumn.” (paywalled link)
Who knew! And who’da thunk that this covid virus has been behaving just like other cold viruses in the past, that our ever so beloved ‘Sacred Cow’ should actually have known about it:
“In Britain, NHS data shows that December tends to be the worst month for respiratory admissions to hospital, when approximately 1,000 occur each day. The rise tends to start in September and peaks in December-January before tailing off in the Spring, and reaching the bottom in Summer.” (paywalled link)
Well I nevah! But label it the “we’re all gonna die” virus and everybody will do exactly as ‘government’ tells them to, having switched off their normal brain activities. It’s no surprise then that more and more scared people are happy to go along with a ‘covid passport’. Keep this statement from Lord Blunkett on file, it’s the prototype for what all those passport fanatics say. He told The Times:
“I can’t see how [a certification scheme] infringes on civil liberties. We already in certain circumstances require proof of age, and proof of vaccine or proof of test seem to me to be perfectly in line with that. It doesn’t seem to be a great civil liberties issue to say if you’re not prepared to have the vaccine or a test, then you’ve decided that for yourself — that’s a conscious effort to exclude yourself from events which would require it.” (link, paywalled)
Yes, it’ll be our own fault when we’ll be ‘excluded’! Should’ve got that jab, or at least pay for incessant tests to show one’s ‘innocent of covid’. In any case, so many other countries are already doing it – “we” don’t’ want to be left out, do we! See this report in LockdownSceptics on what’s happening.
And then there’s this latest twist in the vaccine saga. This is astonishing:
“China has admitted its Covid vaccines do not work well – which could slow the world’s battle against the virus.In an extremely rare confession, the director of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, Gao Fu, said the vaccines ‘don’t have very high protection rates’ against coronavirus symptoms. They are being used in at least 45 countries. He gave no specific details, but a University of Chile study found that China’s CoronaVac jab was only 3 per cent effective in the 28 days between the first and second doses, rising to 56.5 per cent two weeks after the second dose. This may explain why Chile is suffering a severe Covid surge despite having one of the highest global vaccination rates.” (link)
Ah – but perhaps this covid surge in Chile is because it’s now autumn there, and as we saw above, respiratory viruses start surging in autumn? Perhaps this surge isn’t just ‘covid’, given the way the PCR tests have been set up, to produce ‘covid’ no matter what? I do hope this Chinese official won’t be punished for his ‘gaffe’! Far more important is the question which nobody seems to ask: if the Chinese jab ‘doesn’t work’, how come the Chinese aren’t keeling over with covid in their millions?
I leave you with news that, according to the latest ‘guidance’ to university tutors, marking students’ works down for spelling mistakes is a huge no-no:
“[…] because requiring good English could be seen as “homogenous north European, white, male, elite”. Several universities are adopting “inclusive assessments” as part of an effort to narrow the attainment gap between white and black, Asian and minority ethnic students and to reduce higher dropout rates among those from poorer backgrounds.” (link, paywalled)
Let’s forget educating our children and students to be proficient in written English! This is racist, and since ‘all must have prizes’, why should university degrees be exempt when insisting on grammar and punctuation is clearly depriving some of their prize? I wonder when, not if, we’ll see guidelines demanding to be lenient with students who can’t calculate properly. After all, some ‘experts’ have already said that maths is racist … and it surely is anti-feminist!
I believe this leniency in regard to the “Three R’s” has already infiltrated the MSM’s newsrooms, else why are we seeing so many reports and articles where the authors are never questioning the SAGEs data and pronouncements, displaying their own lack of understanding for all to see.
It seems only the local covid ‘police’ is still capable of using English when interpreting the covid rules. Perhaps the pub landlords ought to tell them that their ‘precision guidance’, interpreting what is and isn’t an ‘outdoor space’, is … racist?
KBO!
Photo by Jim Davies 
There was another bit in lockdown sceptics that got me mad today. Some ‘experts’ have discovered that a ‘preventer’ steroid inhaler used by asthma and C.O.P.D. sufferers can be beneficial in treating Covid19. Or so they say.
They also say it suppresses the immune system. What? But vaccines encourage an immune response don’t they? Something wrong there. Well I seem to remember that congestion is the first response of the immune system to covid type viruses.
The steroid relaxes the muscles in the bronchial tubes thus suppressing the cough reflex. Now that, to me, is the last thing I’d want to do. Covid19 causes CONGESTION in the lungs. Just like the bronchitis I suffer from, causes congestion. It is one of the problems lumped under the C.O.P.D. umbrella. To get rid of that congestion I cough it up and spit out the excess phlegm.
As usual, these so called experts are simply suppressing symptoms by throwing treatment at them. Some of the time, at least it does no harm. But in this case I’m afraid, for some patients it will do harm.
The irony is that the most beneficial treatment of all is the common cold because it boots Covid out.
Yes Ralph and it was you that first said on here about congestion being an early symptom of the virus. That got me digging deeper into the subject.
C.O.P.D. is an umbrella term, like I say. At one time it included asthma, then the asthma ‘experts’ got it ‘out’.
I almost certainly do have emphysema as well as bronchitis but since we begin adult life with far more lung capacity than we need that is not what is troubling me.
One good G.P. said it was bronchitis. A good old fashioned word! More searching. Realised that none of the treatments I’d been prescribed were useful for bronchitis.
Throughout my childhood my father was smoking, coughing and spitting. It was a longish time before he died. Presumably he had early antibiotics when a bacterial infection set in but none of these modern treatments.
I don’t pretend to know how others should deal with their breathing problems but it does worry me when I come across something like this, that may do harm.
Bear in mind that there is money being made, all along the line, by throwing more drugs at patients.
I’m no medic Pauline, but I thought that lung congestion was the late final symptom of the Covid-19 virus, the way it kills through lung failure.
I found out about the common cold cure for Covid-19 by searching for “Rhinovirus versus Coronavirus” online. Lo & behold there was a BBC News item about university researchers discovering that the common cold will evict Covid from human body cells if it moves in after Covid. The Rhinovirus family is one tough virus family, that’s why the common cold has been around for so long.
There was a time when education for the poorer/working classes was deemed to be unnecessary because all the while they were kept ignorant they would not get ideas about improving their lot and would endure their servitude for slave wages. It seems that we are heading back to that era all over again!
University education is now not worth the paper its printed on! It most certainly is not worth the money it costs to attend one!
It is becoming a predictable course of action for those who would oppress others to accuse them of being racist at every opportunity! Soon we will need permits to be able to continue breathing as oxygen will be ‘rationed’ to those who fall in line with all the latest diktats!
Frederica. CO2 is causing Global Warming!! they say. Well those that say it better stop breathing out then!
So with the end of Covid policing can we expect a cut in bloated cops budgets ?
euge. Only the graduate entry cops.
A few weeks back the bbc put up a caption to a report, with the word sulphur in it – spelt sulfur. This is what our national broadcaster has been rejuiced to.
When evaluating tenders I have a small allocation for English and Presentation. It was accepted by the Board on the grounds that ‘if a company cannot make an effort bidding for a project, how far will they slip when they have secured the project (incumbents for maybe two or three years)’.
“…Let’s forget educating our children and students to be proficient in written English…”
We have a wonderul language. Spelling is IMPORTANT because there are words that SOUND the same, but with different spellings have totally diferent meanings. I read a fine example the other day…
“,,, you may not agree with what I am going to say, but BARE with me…”
What! Does that mean we all have to strip off in unison?
… Start the music …
If you go down to the woods today . . . . .. the teddy BEAR’S picnic.
Ahh but . . . . The TORIES have wrecked our universities.
I was told so, by a GREEN when she canvassing to vote No to Brexit.
She said so, so it MUST be true.
Blunkett has previous. He tried pushing ID cards when he was a minister and it subsequently emerged he had shares in a company developing biometric cards. Amazing how personal profit and public benefit so often mean the same thing to the political class.
Strange isn’t it Matt. Surely that can’t be true. I mean he is Labour. They ‘don’t do’ investing in shares do they. They fight for the working man, not the bosses.
Ah but Pauline…..If you remember it was Peter Mandelson who is on record as saying that Labour was very ‘relaxed’ about people becoming ’filthy rich’!!!! But only if you’re part of the ‘great club’ it seems. All politicians seems to be fixated on becoming rich at public expense now. Either directly through their own efforts at expense fiddling or through under-the-counter means by allowing their business mates to bid for and get rich with public contracts so that ultimately, when ‘they’ are finally out-of-public-office they can be sure of a very well paid sinecure back out in the private sector! All the rest of the plebs must be poorly educated and kept ignorant because that way we won’t realise that we are being slowly but surely returned to absolute serfdom!
Yes I was joking Frederica.
So was I Pauline. I’ll remember to put lol after my comment next time!!!