Shopping in our High Streets after Lockdown …
Another Lockdown Day – another day where more and more people are fed up with their house arrest. Another day where experts in anything, from virology to epidemiology to Union bosses, are putting their tuppence-worth into the public domain, via “Our MSM”. Another day with a sly attack on Johnson. Another day where the most beautiful spring weather seems to taunt us all, especially those who’re being chased out of our public parks.
And of course there’s still Brexit. It simply doesn’t matter to Remain that the Law is the Law and that we’re Out on December 31st. One of Ms May’s henchmen, David Lidington (Remain) spoke to a Dutch newspaper, his words eagerly reported in RemainCentral:
“Covid-19 makes extension inevitable,” he told the Dutch NRC Handelsbladnewspaper. “There is not enough bandwidth to pay attention to Brexit in Whitehall or the European Commission and the major capitals.” (link, paywalled)
Oh dear! It seems to have escaped Mr Lidington’s attention that the group under David Frost is working fine. Since there’ve been no unofficial leaks from that group, Remainers are floundering but of course, our Remain Champions in Whitehall give them support, muttering anonymously to RemainCentral:
“Some in Whitehall suspect that if lockdowns are not rapidly lifted it will be in neither side’s interests to cause further economic upheaval if a trade deal cannot be struck this year.” (link, paywalled)
An extension would cost us a huge sum of money, in addition to what we’re still paying, but that’s utterly negligible to Remainers. While M Barnier waffles on with his customary head-teacher phrases on ‘progress must be made’ (link), Remainers hope for succour from Brussels:
“An EU request for an extension might prove to be politically more acceptable to the government although at this stage this is also being ruled out.” (link, paywalled)
It doesn’t matter to Remain that Johnson’s government has repeatedly said there won’t be an extension – they still demand we Remain. Here’s another look at the coming, staggering financial burden for us taxpayers to which Remain is oblivious:
“Taxpayers will pay the wages of a million people at a cost of more than £1 billion after 144,000 companies hit by coronavirus applied for government support in a single day. […] Experts believe the unprecedented intervention will eventually cost the government more than £40 billion and that 8.3 million people could apply.” (link, paywalled)
Remainers want to keep us in regardless, to pay more Danegeld to Brussels, to support the floundering EU, even if, according to The Centre for Policy studies, the final Covid-19 pandemic bill for us could reach £246bn (link, paywalled).
Meanwhile, experts are being quoted right left and centre, about lifting Lockdown restrictions, about ‘a second wave’, about isolation, about provisions of PPE to health workers, about facemasks – the shambles, if not scandal, is staggering. Take facemasks for example, which we all might need to use if and when allowed out:
“Ministers have been warned by NHS bosses that advising people to wear facemasks to slow the spread of coronavirus risks jeopardising critical supplies to the health service.” (link, paywalled)
Yep, ’tis ‘stay in to protect ‘Our NHS’ alright. Mind you, given the reports about how PPE is still exported by British firms rather than taken up by ‘Our Sacred Cow’ via their PHE organisation e.g. (here), I’m not surprised. See this:
“UK businesses said they were making ad hoc deals to supply local hospitals as they failed to get a government response on offers to help the national supply chain, or clear guidance as to what was needed. At the same time British companies are still shipping millions of pieces of personal protective equipment to Germany, Italy and Spain despite the shortages here. Masks, respirators and other vital PPE kit is being packed on to lorries to supply hospitals in the EU. The wholesale companies involved said that they had to keep supplying it abroad because the government had repeatedly ignored their offers of help,” (link, paywalled)
This is what 40 years in the EU has done to our country, our businesses: they need ‘guidance’, they need bureaucratic input before they do something. And if they actually do act on their own initiative, they put their excuses in first: blame ‘Teh Government’, which is No10 – never “Our NHS” or PHE! Regarding those facemasks, see this and note the last sentence:
“Government scientists will examine the evidence about masks today before making a formal recommendation on whether the public should wear them. The World Health Organisation is understood to be ready to issue fresh guidance on wearing masks in shops, on public transport and in other crowded spaces as part of measures to exit the lockdown.” (link, paywalled)
Never mind that the WHO has been totally discredited – ‘government scientists’ need their hands held by the WHO!
As for PPE: a Teachers’ Union Boss has set out ‘Five Points’ which must be fulfilled before schools can be opened. You can read his demands here. One of his five points is that teachers must have access to PPE. Are they seriously thinking about standing in front of kids wearing suits and facemasks? Really?
According to yet another scientist, the peak of the infection has now passed and thus lockdown restrictions should be lifted because the economic impact of the lockdown is would now outweigh the damage of the virus (link, paywalled). This is another welcome stick for The Times to beat government with.
“Our MSM”, having driven Johnson to declare Lockdown through their Project Hysteria and Fear, now want that lockdown to be eased, a.s.a.p., regardless, bashing Johnson in the process, using what ‘senior Tory MPs’ told The Times – anonymously, of course:
“Senior Tory MPs have begun pressing the government to set out its exit strategy and begin lifting restrictions as soon as possible to protect the economy. Some have suggested that Boris Johnson’s illness has changed his approach to the lockdown. “The prime minister is in a funny place,” one said. “I think he’s quite frightened. His illness and the warning from the doctors has really hit him hard. To find himself floored like this has got into his head. He has become really tentative.” (link, paywalled)
What a shameless ‘assessment’ by those anonymous MPs! Do they actually think that Johnson ought to have been up and running right after having been taken off that oxygen supply? One thing obviously hasn’t changed in the Tory Party: the urge to stick knives in the back of a PM. Do they actually want a re-run of last year’s Tory leadership election?
As the ‘peak’ of infections is apparently past we now must be fearful of that ‘second wave’. The Times has a report – link, paywalled – where scientists from all over the University landscape put in their tuppence-worth. Basically, they don’t know if there will be one, if the virus might change (no evidence so far), if it will lead to another ‘peak’ or if a gradual lifting of the Lockdown might flatten that peak.
The point of this report is to make certain we’ll remain afraid. One expert warns that such second wave might coincide with an influenza outbreak – and who knows what else. Perhaps government should issue all of us with hazmat suits before lifting the Lockdown, as ‘precaution’?
Finally, there’s a nasty article in the DT, about isolation (link), The author gives his game away by saying that he’s been trying to influence ‘The West’ by explaining how well China has done and why. He sounds a bit miffed that his ‘sage advice’ hasn’t been listened to, as of yet. And what is the lesson he thinks we ought to learn from China? It is to isolate infected people centrally, in what amounts to ‘isolation camps’, combined with ‘advice’ how to sell it to us:
“The first people who went into central quarantine in Wuhan did so reluctantly but it proved to be an overwhelmingly popular measure. The best way of framing that it is like going to hospital, except that the idea is not just to safeguard your health by ensuring rapid access to medical help if needed, but also to maintain the health of the people you would accidentally infect if you stayed at home.” (link)
See – ‘it won’t hurt’ going into a central isolation camp! You’ll like it, especially when it’s sold, ahem: ‘framed’ properly. Forget the videos we saw about Chinese people being dragged from their homes by force, screaming!
Read the whole thing if you must, but note that the author is based in … Shanghai. Frankly, I cannot eat as much as I want to vomit!
Today’s reports and articles in ‘Our MSM’ show clearly that Covid-19 is hugely detrimental – not so much to the Nation’s health, but to the fabric of our society. When experts and journalists think out loud, approvingly, about keeping one group of the population totally out of society even as immigrants are picked up at our coasts and allowed in, roaming free; when the much vaunted ‘government scientists’ are now incapable of issuing ‘advice’ without having their hands held by the discredited WHO, then we really should ask if ‘government’, if ‘Our Sacred Cow’, if ‘government scientists’ are fit for purpose. That ‘Our MSM’ aren’t is self-evident. I’m worried that this virus isn’t just affecting our health – it seems to have affected the minds of our governing classes, especially of the Westminster Bubble denizens.
So – keep vigilant, question your MP (perhaps he or she is one of those ‘anonymous’ ones talking to the MSM?), keep well and
KBO!
Photo by Tim Dennell 
Yes Kim, but is their an effective force available to know what change is needed and what’s more have the ability to carry it out.?
To be quite honest I am doubtful about the first and pretty dubious about the second.
I feel we have been immersed in EU inertia for so long that ALL necessary skills have been dulled. I would doubt anybody in this country could organise a decent inebriation in a Brewery and as for revelry in a house of disrepute Nash!!!
I am hearing of many people now saying the Chinese virus is a scam or being used to take our freedoms.
When they were asked to vote many couldn’t be bothered, or when they were asked to support of getting out of the EU, again not interested. Now people are waking up because these things are affecting them personally and ‘in their face’, They are thinking about what is going on and trying to make sense of it. The virus has been politicized and people are being inconvenienced at best and ruined at worst. They are becoming skeptics.
I say good! Perhaps they will pay more attention to the incompetence of our our ‘Leaders’. The next step will be for them to want change. I say even better!
Mum’s the word…
https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/coronavirus/3886452-The-hospital-I-work-in-is-so-quiet?pg=1&order=
So – keep vigilant, question your MP (perhaps he or she is one of those ‘anonymous’ ones talking to the MSM?), keep well and KBO.
It might be useful if my MP would answer my questions. (Ben Everitt -Milton Keynes North). It took three attempts by me to prise an acknowledgement our of him and a holding reply. Jack Thomas’ comment: Trust them at your peril’ are wise words.
Hi All, it would appear that Sky News in Australia reports a lot differently from the Sky News we receiver here.
Best wishes, Brian.
Politicians ‘freaked’ about ‘plainly wrong’ coronavirus predictions
https://youtu.be/X0e5teu2Vm0
Sky News host Andrew Bolt says the Australian public are being fed “absolute porkies about this coronavirus” with the latest “whopper” being delivered to scare everyone even further.
Mr Bolt said when he again raises the point now is the time to relax “some of the less useful” social distancing bans, he is often subject to criticism.
“They say, it’s precisely because of the bans that the infection rate is so low, and I should shut up with my dangerous talk,” he said. Mr Bolt said while he believes some measures are important,
the threat of coronavirus, “which is real … has been wildly exaggerated”. He said, “models that our politicians were listening to a month ago when they freaked, 150,000 could die, were plainly wrong”.
Australians must “start asking questions of our politicians” such as “why did you panic and when, please when, will you stop?” he said.
Sky News Australia is breath of fresh air. The antithesis of all our news media; factual and sensible, and anti-PC, anti-Leftism, anti-woke, and climate realists. If you can find Outsiders, broadcast on their Sunday mornings, you’ll have a treat. Not especially slick but that is irrelevant. Sensible opinions, self-deprecating humour (always a good sign) and plenty of regular guests like Toby Young, Nigel Farage, Dellers, Aussie anti-warmist MP Craig Kelly and interesting US right-thinkers too. They tend to end with features like Leftie Lunacy, Weekly Wokely and Hyperbowl, ridiculing their ‘great and good’.
Brian yes. They’re like a breath of fresh air. For my money this whole scare is beginning to look more and more like another communist China scam, like global warming. Yes I know people are dying but more and more are saying in numbers much like any other outbreak of the flu.
This supposed failure of Boris to ‘man up ‘ and do what used to be called ‘face up to the challenge’ is in my opinion, symptomatic of what has been wrong amongst those in government for many years.
Take the governments handling of Brexit, Cameron and May in effect bottled it, they did say they/we must accept that we were leaving the EU, but they and their government never engaged with it in a positive manner.
It was only after more than 3 tedious years of increasing acrimony and frustration that Johnson came along with a fresh approach, but more importantly ATTITUDES, yes he saw it as a problem, but he also saw it as an opportunity, but the main thing he saw it as a CHALLENGE that would have to be met head on, I.e. The whole Commons was required to man/woman up which in the face of his positive attitude they did.and he called a General Election and won it hands down.He rightly called the WA for what it was a SURRENDER document)
That we have now successfully exited the EU is testimony to Boris’s success in identifying and completing that challenge, his next one the completion of a trade agreement process and not involving our continued enslavement in the EU is still progressing, as far as we can ascertain on our terms, I’m sure if he maintains his Cando attitude in the face of all blandishments to the contrary, he will successfully complete that challenge.
Regarding Boris’s attitude to CV 19 and what it will be on his return to the fray after sickness, I haven’t a clue, but I am not sure how he embraced the task of conquering the virus as a challenge from the beginning, but I suspect he was badly advised or deliberately misled by the head of the WHO from the beginning, he who “liaised” so closely with his pals in the Chinese hierarchy, that he omitted to treat the whole matter in his customary fashion and see it as a challenge to be fought by this country in its capacity as an independent nation.
Unfortunately Viv’s articles over the period have revealed an absolute failure of all those in the system from Parliament down to take up this challenge from an independent point of view and so at best all we get are talking heads with apparently none of them having a real clue as to what is going on and what is worse how to fix it.
All I can hope is Boris emerges from his sick bed, full of rage and wields the big stick and forces them to work to OUR own home devised Independent plan solely in this independent nation’s interest – after all that is his mandate from his people.i also hope he will emphasise National considerations over rule any Global control ambitions which I understand are current in some sources commercial and political at the moment.
We’ve got to win that battle to put us in a position to win the even bigger economic battle that is to follow.
Now that will require real organisation allied to cando ambition. Do we still have it in this country, I.m not sure from the evidence of the handling of the Chinese Virus
“Shopping in our High Streets after Lockdown …” LOL.
“This used to be the baker’s and here there used to be the most adorable little florist’s… Oh that one? Oh it was a hairdresser I think. You forget after a while I find.”
Rag Evening Standard has something for a change. Centre for Evidence Based Medicine in Oxford says self-isolation when sick and distancing PLUS END OF WINTER reduced transmission by 44%. Then lockdown added 29%. We’d heard little about the fact that the annual virus epidemic tails off in spring. Plus lockdown does not do most of the job. But it causes most of the economic damage.
Behind all the reporting is one simple fact. CVD has enabled government to exercise an unprecedented level of control (at least in recent times) over the general population.
It remains to be seen what they have learned from it and what they think they can get away with in future. Trust them at your peril.
I believe the British government could get away with anything. A lot of our people are so stupid that they would happily walk into a sci-fi disintegration chamber if requested to do so. Or wear silly hats, cover their faces and dance in the streets banging tins together (oops sorry we’ve already done that one).