PMs message

Authoress
Do you really need to be told how to make your workplace safe for workers??
How do you manage the H&S aspect normally?
I would have thought that 2 metre spacing even if it involves fewer workers to facilitate that plus plenty of hand sanitisers, rules about using toilet facilities, covered bins to dispose of used wipes and tissues.
Plenty of soap, hot water and disposable paper rolls on which to dry hands.
Open windows to allow fresh air to circulate.
No using kitchen facilities if you have any.
If you need to be told this...what can I say...??

Sorry Lucca but that’s complete rubbish. There are plenty of left wing posters on Gransnet. I could name many of them now for you but feel that would be an intrusion of their privacy.

Gabriella
Thank goodness for the voice of reason.
What’s the matter with people? Do they really need need to be spoon fed?
GrannyGravy has said that all the guidance is available online anyway.

Yes I thought he explained it well. At the moment we are caught between a rock and a hard place. It's up to each individual and each family to decide the best way forward for them. No one wants to die and no one can live for free. So the government is enabling common sense and each individual to decide how they can make it work for them. We can't ALL stay in lockdown and we can't ALL get back to work.

Of course we could always think for ourselves. Is that such a novel idea?Would you get on a crowded tube without a mask?

GabriellaG54, unless employers are instructed to do health and safety measures they won't do them. There must be fixed and specific rules and regulations with adequate policing and punishments for rule breakers. To think otherwise is to have too optimistic a view of human nature.

The PM has been very clear that we need to -

Stay alert. If not staying home. Stay home if not being alert. Go to work. If not working at home. Work from home if possible. If not working from home don't use public transport to get to work. Even though public transport is available. At work do work. Safely. In a socially distanced manner. Where possible. If not possible do some other thing. Don't work at work if work is closed which lots of work is because work isn't reopening if work is one of the places of work we were told to close. After work play sport and sunbathe but only with people you live with not people you work with. Unless you live with someone you work with. Or work with someone you live with. Stay alert for the alert system which will wave about madly on a dial between green and red where red means everyone is dead. If you are sufficiently alert you might be allowed to be less alert after the 1st of June. But likely everyone will go mad on Wednesday and the needle will lurch to orange so being alert will revert to stay home and it's back to March 23rd. So, stay home. No, hang on, stay alert. Not home. But you should stay home. Unless you're at work

georgenottheoldone

I think heritage railways are way down the list of people's priorities at the moment.

Maddyone,

like 'nanny state'', 'spoon fed' is a right wing slogan.

I agree Rosalyn69 but therefore we can't think for those who don't think. There as been quite a few people who have done what they want all the way through. Not many people will have the option not to use trains, or tubes especially if your construction worker and need to get across town. Will these workers have the energy to cycle? Or to start to cycle? It's a mess!

I feel clear about my own situation in view of what Boris said. I have no problem with it. The most important point is the ability to reverse anything if figures start moving in the wrong direction.

Crystal clear - quote the Guardian this morning from interview with Raab -
'Asked if people could meet both their parents outside like this, at one point he agreed with a suggestion that you could meet one parent in the morning, and another in the afternoon. But in another interview he said you could meet both at the same time, provided you kept two metres apart. (See 8.59am.)

UPDATE: As BuzzFeed’s Alex Wickham and the BBC’s Nick Eardley report, Raab’s team subsequently retracted what he said about people being allowed to meet two other people outside at the same time. It is just one person (including just one parent) you’re allowed to meet.'

I find it hard to understand that on the one hand so many on GN are chafing at the restrictions imposed on us, complain that we are old enough and perhaps wise enough to exercise common sense but are now up in arms when Joe Public is asked to stay alert, be aware of the dangers, use common sense and be prepared for a staged return to normal which can be suspended at short notice if the infection rate starts to rise again.
What do you want?
Total lockdown - your AC possibly unemployed, certainly worse off, a failed economy where your pensions are at risk (especially if the depression leads to inflation - remember the rate of inflation in the 70’s?) and still not able to cuddle your grandchildren ?
Or what other countries such as Denmark and Germany are doing?
Our efforts need to be targeted at those most at risk.
Sadly, it is the elderly, the frail and those in care homes who are most vulnerable and they need protecting. I am not claiming that younger people can’t catch it, but we cannot as a country all skulk in indefinite fear - the country will go bankrupt and that affects you, me , our children’s and our grandchildren’s future.

All ordinary citizens who are not health and safety experts need to be given specific rules to be followed for the sake of everyone and for their own sakes.

It is not good enough the leader of the nation says in effect "do as you think fit". We do need leadership; not laissez faire and slogans.

If you are running a business, your workers should be your priority. No workers = no business, therefore employers should be made to abide by strict employment criteria and fined if they ignore the law.

Pigsmayfly that is why the plan is in stages

Alexia
What’s that got to do with it?

Authoress. If you can run a business surely you can work it out for yourself.

Icanhandthemback going back to work today was what BJ spoke about, did u not hear the gasps from everyone furlonged?Everyone trying to get their heads arround being told at such short notice.

I feel very sad and upset reading some of the comments. It would be nice to think that the world would be a kinder and more considerate place to live after this terrible pandemic.

Alexia
like nanny state, spoon fed is a right wing slogan
Excuse me, what’s that got to do with it?

Anyway we live in a democracy, and people are allowed to be both right and left wing. So I ask again, what’s your comment got to do with the Prime Minister’s speech?

Stay alert. What a load of tosh.

I totally understand my responsibility under the new regime and bot a lot will change for me. I agree that there needs to be clear guidance and safeguards for people returning to work to prevent pressure and exploitation of workers. I am more concerned about working parents and potentially schools not returning until September

MawB
Thank goodness for the voice of reason.

I should be interested in the opinion of our “resident “ Health &Safety expert Granddad - and would hope to be be reassured that businesses of all sizes have the capacity and willingness to comply with the necessary measures.
I would like to think we are no longer living in a dystopian Victorian era where 7 year olds picked up fluff under the weaving looms or helped drag coal trucks down mines.
And if sweatshops do still exist - this must highlight that scandal and put an end to them for once and for all.