UK Politics: Fishing for a deal

[Fragile Bird]

4 hours ago, Heartofice said:

Looks like Xmas cancelled in London. Moved into tier 4

I loathe people saying this. Christmas has not been cancelled. You’ll just have to celebrate it differently. I was disgusted when Trump kept saying “if you elect Biden, Christmas will be cancelled!”, which was incredibly stupid since the Christmas he was talking about is going to be in Trump’s presidency, but also because he was speaking to his religious base who aren’t going to be cancelling Christmas ever. They are idiots, of course, so they likely won’t cancel Christmas celebrations either.

[Derfel Cadarn]

Brexit talks nearing an (alleged) end.

Thank God we never voted for Ed Milliband. Imagine the chaos!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-55364470

[Which Tyler]

Well that went well...

Started preparing Mum that we might call Christmas a day trip, and not stay overnight. She's in tier 2, 6 miles away from tier 4; our numbers are higher than they were going into Lockdown2.

Her worry is that she gives someone else the virus. We're not allowed the same concern.
"If I don't see you at Christmas I might not be around for Easter! Click... Bzzzzzz"



FFS Mr Johnson, this decision should be coming from you, not left to people like me to make under extreme duress and manipulation. Your job is to lead, not dodge every decision that comes your way. Yes, you got the job with shitty timing, but it's a job you've spent the last 30 years building towards. You wanted the privilege, you HAVE to accept the responsibility.

[Zorral]

Keeping the English out has been a goal of  Wales and Scotland for ages.

[polishgenius]

2 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

I loathe people saying this. Christmas has not been cancelled. You’ll just have to celebrate it differently.

On the one hand for the most part sure, you're right. On the other hand, I'm stuck in Germany, unable to visit my family back home and with everyone I might have celebrated with here away. Obviously my case is extreme (and I wasn't coming before today anyway, that decision was made a while ago) but there are gonna be plenty of people just within the UK who, if they follow the rules, are indeed gonna be on their own at Christmas due to tier-crossing restrictions and the like.

And I mean yeah I will celebrate it on my own to some extent and I'll be going to online church so in a literal sense I'll be celebrating anyway, but... yeah, no, in any real apart-from-purely-religious sense my Christmas is cancelled.

[lessthanluke]

3 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

I loathe people saying this. Christmas has not been cancelled. You’ll just have to celebrate it differently. I was disgusted when Trump kept saying “if you elect Biden, Christmas will be cancelled!”, which was incredibly stupid since the Christmas he was talking about is going to be in Trump’s presidency, but also because he was speaking to his religious base who aren’t going to be cancelling Christmas ever. They are idiots, of course, so they likely won’t cancel Christmas celebrations either.

Nahhh. It's defo cancelled for me. 

[williamjm]

3 hours ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

Brexit talks nearing an (alleged) end.

Thank God we never voted for Ed Milliband. Imagine the chaos!

I think you could have posted this at any point over the last year and it would still have seemed true.

43 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

On the one hand for the most part sure, you're right. On the other hand, I'm stuck in Germany, unable to visit my family back home and with everyone I might have celebrated with here away. Obviously my case is extreme (and I wasn't coming before today anyway, that decision was made a while ago) but there are gonna be plenty of people just within the UK who, if they follow the rules, are indeed gonna be on their own at Christmas due to tier-crossing restrictions and the like.

I'm pretty much in the same situation. We had already decided a couple of months that I wouldn't be making my usual trip back home to Scotland for Christmas since it seemed unlikely that the country would be able to get its act together in time, but it's still disconcerting that it would now be illegal to visit my family.

[Varysblackfyre321]

11 hours ago, SerTarod said:

to the first bolden: the Prophet was married and lived with Aisha (his third wife), so no - not supposed.

Eh. Supposed or not we’re talking about a guy in 600 ad so the “he’s a pedo” gripe will always be a little stale to me.

Like again the age of consent in England was like 10 for girls in the 1800s.

I don’t think English people are hypocrites if they don’t like pedophilia.

To be clear I’m not saying everything and everyone in the past can’t be judged especially if they’re acting in a way that’s deviant from their peers—nazis for instance should be looked as heinous—but a little historical empathy could be useful.

11 hours ago, SerTarod said:

to the second bolden: so do you agree that the tearing down of the Edward Colton statue was wrong? being as it was erected by popular support in a "time period that had different views" to our contemporary values/views?

Personally don’t have a problem with bringing down all statues meant to glorify individuals.

Statues like that don’t teach anyone anything about the individuals in question other than other people thought the individuals in question were great enough to have a statue.

And they cost a fuckton to keep up. 
 

[Zorral]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/dec/20/belgium-italy-and-netherlands-ban-flights-from-uk-over-new-covid-strain

Wish the US would do the same (and flights from the US be banned in other countries).

It was said this new strain wasn't really 'real' -- do I recall correctly? -- merely a political ploy?

 

[A wilding]

It might have been me that said that. The UK government was using the new strain to excuse cases getting out of control in South East England. When the fact that they have imposed tighter restrictions later than the experts were saying they should on at least 3 occasions in the last month or so clearly was at the very least a major contributing factor.

I stand by the argument that at the time there was no evidence that the new strain was any more infectious. However it seems that evidence is now beginning to trickle in that in might be somewhat more so.

[Heartofice]

I think what this shows is that when it comes to the new strain, the Tier system doesn’t work, at all. It’s questionable that the tiers have any real function. 
 

I think it is now almost a given that the entire country will need to go into a Tier 4 lockdown pretty soon. There is simply no way to contain the spread in the south east.

[ljkeane]

New strain or not I think having a local lockdown in London but not in other areas of England at Christmas is crazy. Maybe it'd work at other times but look at how many people piled out of London to travel back to other areas of the UK before the rules came into force. That was always going to happen.

[Impmk2]

Declarations of a new strain are premature. There'll need to be peer reviewed epidemiological studies and months of lab work to back it up before its accepted. There's none of that. At the moment it's basically "coronavirus is spreading in the UK quickly"... well no shit that's what the virus does, it's slim evidence at best.

[maarsen]

1 hour ago, Impmk2 said:

Declarations of a new strain are premature. There'll need to be peer reviewed epidemiological studies and months of lab work to back it up before its accepted. There's none of that. At the moment it's basically "coronavirus is spreading in the UK quickly"... well no shit that's what the virus does, it's slim evidence at best.

There seems to be a new strain of stupidity in the world judging by the evidence of its fast spread.

[polishgenius]

1 hour ago, Impmk2 said:

here'll need to be peer reviewed epidemiological studies and months of lab work to back it up before its accepted.

It was first detected in September. It isn't yet proven to be faster-spreading but judging by reports they're going on more than just 'it's spreading quickly here' and are acting to contain it on the basis it's better to be cautious and be proven wrong then let it go and turn out to be right.

eta: anyway, these flight suspensions and eurotunnel closure seem like a big deal. Gonna fuck the country economically right when it needed a boost just before it all got limited permanently.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Is it fair to refer to London as Europe's petri dish?

Anyway, just wanted to blow my own horn. Thread title seems really on point with fishery really being the last big (fish) bone of contention in the talks.

[Impmk2]

14 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

It was first detected in September. It isn't yet proven to be faster-spreading but judging by reports they're going on more than just 'it's spreading quickly here' and are acting to contain it on the basis it's better to be cautious and be proven wrong then let it go and turn out to be right.

 

Yes I'm not suggesting basing public health policy on the lack of scientific consensus in this case. Assuming the worst is a very good idea. If everywhere had done that we'd be in a better position. I'm just very sceptical of this without a few high quality papers. Proclamations of new strains of sars-cov-2 are frequent and often turn out to be nothing.

Working for a decade in infectious disease research has made me have a pretty high bar for claims like this.

[polishgenius]

22 minutes ago, Impmk2 said:

Working for a decade in infectious disease research has made me have a pretty high bar for claims like this.

 

Fair enough, I can't argue with you on that one, but yeah, I think they have to find a balance between 'rigirously scientifically proving it exists while it potentially spreads' which as you say they can't do and going too hard too early without a real plan and panicking the shit out of everyone, which is basically what seems to have done and burned Christmas to the ground.

Actually, in the best traditions of this government they've managed to combine going too late and too early simultaneously, which is quite a feat.

But hey, at least it's good practice for hard Brexit.

[Maltaran]

Oh look, France has taken back control of its borders

Covid-19: Dover port halts exports to France for 48 hours https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55389505

[The Anti-Targ]

It made sense for the UK to operate at different tiers when infection rates were as they were in summer. But now that infection is free-wheeling in several different places trying to play whack-a-mole with different tiers does not seem epidemiologically sound.