The Sunday Times article. Can anyone defend Johnson after reading this?

The Times is anti Boris and staunchly anti Brexit. I tend to give it a wide berth personally but if it fits your narrative I daresay it’s a good read!
?
I prefer the Telegraph.

So - will they learn from this?.....

- that austerity was a disaster, and an unnecessary one, founded in political dogma and faulty economic theory: “but pandemic planning became a casualty of the austerity years "

- that we need to become more self-sufficient in every commodity, particularly food: Contracts for emergency PPE "were mostly with Chinese manufacturers"

- that we need to conserve our assets, for the good of the population rather than making profit: “Orders (for PPE) undoubtedly went overseas instead of to the NHS "

- that prevention is worth spending money on - in health, and in social services for preventing family breakdown.

- that BJ is a disaster for us all - he is playing at power, cherry-picking the bits that he thinks will bring him glory (e.g. Brexit) rather than a real desire to serve the country in good times and bad and to deal with the unpleasant nitty-gritty.

Lives have been sacrificed unnecessarily - people's loved ones, dedicated health workers, decent caring people.

I feel so sad.

Good post Luckygirl you said it all, except for the bit we lost time before lockdown so and then stopped tracing contacts. I blame him for all the deaths. So sad

Okay, against my better judgement, I read it.

This bit, is telling:

A senior politician told this newspaper: “I had conversations with Chris Whitty at the end of January and they were absolutely focused on herd immunity. The reason is that with flu, herd immunity is the right response if you haven’t got a vaccine.

Boris was relying on expert advice remember?

But hey folks, let’s blame Boris!

WHO in February were still following Chinas line nothing to stop people flying, low risk of human to human infection etc.......

As for COBRA these meetings are chaired by the appropriate minister (floods - Enviroment Minister, Health Issues the Health Secretaru etc) with the PM kept fully informed.

The Government was taking advice from WHO, CMO and CSO.

Who is “they” Urm?

And CW told Johnson to miss 5 COBR meetings and sod off to the country for 2 weeks to sort out his messed up private life did he? And to send PPE to China? There is no such thing in this situation as definitive expert advice btw - only alternatives based on different assumptions - the choice is then made for ideological reasons and in doing that Johnson relies on Cummings.

Perhaps all should have watched Marr this morning...Gove slapped that journalistic drivel down.
As GG says, Cobra isn’t always chaired by the PM,in any case.
The Sunday Times is a Labour newspaper doing it’s best to discredit a Conservative government.
The danger of believing all that you read ...!

Sending PPE to China when they needed it was not only humanitarian but diplomatic....now we have millions of gowns from them on their way here.

I don't think that you can blame Boris Johnson solely for the mess the UK has made of the Covid 19 episode. Flights are still being allowed in from virus hot spots and no enforced quarantine as Australia has done. We must get away from being reliant on China for PPE and other essential equipment and accept that if we want an excellent healthcare system then we must pay more for it and ensure that only those that have paid in access it. One thing this has exposed is that the NHS is not up to scratch even if the staff are fantastic. We must learn from other countries and get ready for the next virus.

Just remember this is a new virus about which we know very little even now. At the start we knew virtually nothing except it was more dangerous to elderly and vulnerable people. It was thought that younger people would deal with it like a dose of the 'flu. Therefore herd immunity was sensible, all you had to do was isolate the elderly and vulnerable and let the virus spread through everyone else. Since then we have discovered the virus is very random and unpredictable, and more dangerous than we thought. Younger people seem to be dying and sometimes for no apparent reason, so herd immunity then becomes a much more dangerous option. You cannot judge yesterday's decisions on today's knowledge. This pandemic is fast moving and we are learning all the time.

Since when has the Sunday Times been a Labour newspaper.?

Lots of eyes firmly shut and fingers in ears here!

who the heck reads the remainer times these days?

The Times ( during the week) is Conservative biased but The Sunday Times ( a different newspaper) is Labour biased.
You have to remember that all newspapers are slanted in various political directions.

Nothing new about this virus, it was first announced in 1960 as a corona.

Fairy tales too!

Crafty one . I DO. Sorry but what a silly post.
Urm you read the telegraph ? Gosh I’d never have guessed.

This whole thing has been a disaster. We went into lock down much too late, we didn’t shut the borders , we still haven’t shut the borders so that people are flying in but not being put into
isolation. In fact I think it’s manslaughter, too strong a term, not really, so many deaths were avoidable. Perhaps the “science” was wrong, “herd” immunity means let’s just let the vulnerable die to save the young and strong!

Since some people have cherry picked quotes, I'll pick on just one from a senior Department of Health adviser:

"We just watched. A pandemic was always at the top of our national risk register — always — but when it came we just slowly watched. We could have been Germany but instead we were doomed by our incompetence, our hubris and our austerity."

Yep! Just about sums it up!

Luckygirl Thank for your this incisive, thoughtful post. I completely agree with you.

Sorry, should read Thank you for ......!!!

I watched Andrew Marr interview Michael Gove this morning, MG refuted the article.

*The Times ( during the week) is Conservative biased but The Sunday Times ( a different newspaper) is Labour biased.
You have to remember that all newspapers are slanted in various political directions.*

Lemongrove. I ask out of genuine curiosity....how do you know?