Is our PM, infallible and free of any blame?

Over 80% of care homes in the UK are privately owned. It is their owners who are responsible for following regulations and providing adequate care and safety precautions. I have not read of any care home residents at all dying of covid-19 in the area I live in.

As for the government or the NHS being blamed for discharging seniors to them at beginning of lockdown when they may have already had covid-19, there were no reliable tests at that time, I believe. I do not necessarily think the tests used today are that accurate either. If the majority of NHS beds had been full of over 80s, in what is often termed 'bed blocking' and there was no space for new flu cases, what comments would have been made then! That would have been wrong too.

More or less everyone on this site wants to blame the government or Boris or Cummings or Brexit or Trump for every ill in the world. They are not perfect by any means but I say, thank goodness it wasn't Corbyn et al in charge. He'd have probably been there having cups of tea and a nice chat with the care home residents because that's his usual modus operandi to everything!

It looks as if Gove and Cummings are hand in hand. They doubtless have a cunning plan to depose Boris.

I had to laugh though at Gove insisting, on national tv, that there was no plan to introduce face coverings the day before Boris made his announcement.

Complete lack of communication (possible) or Boris deliberately trying to make Gove look stupid?

furret yes foresight, something this lot singularly lack until it involves cash and either their interests or their mates.

Corruption continues with the awarding of contracts for which there have been no tendering or advertising, going absolutely against government guidelines.

Goves department awarded a contract to his and Cummings mates back in March for which there is no record of any sort until a June. £840k has been awarded to a company Public First run by James Frayne who worked with both Gove and Cummings. Wolf worked on the Tory manifesto. The contract was to test the effectiveness of the governments messaging on Covid19.

Wolf has also been awarded £500k to promote “free schools” by Gove.

It needn’t have got to this stage ... health v wealth. Has Johnson not been a complete waste of space, and AWOL as well, at the beginning of this pandemic then we wouldn’t have had 50,000 dead, business going bankrupt and mass unemployment.

And before his fan-club start shouting ‘hindsight is a wonderful thing’ look at the leaders in those countries who have this under control - their leaders had foresight.

The long awaited governments strategy for flood management has been published.

Nothing in it to prevent house building on flood plains. LAs do not have the power to stop it either

Just reading that the OECD have reported that the U.K. is suffering worse economic downturn in the developed world, and is expected to take longer than every other country to bounce back.

Due according to the OECD and the OBR to Sunak’s costly but mistaken measures.

Both France and Italy have bounced back even more than Germany, due in part to the strong leadership shown initially over covid with their population having strong confidence and trust in their governments.

Our trust and faith in Johnson has gone down through the floor.

The cost of failure to get a V shaped recovery will last for generations.

No this government should be held accountable

When secret coronavirus contracts are awarded without competition, it's deadly serious
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jul/15/coronavirus-contracts-government-transparency-pandemic?fbclid=IwAR0yo7rQxovIJlZ_kVzdoEM1nCwkkZFfYJzq7UCUtpC3TGiENGu4JS0MXt4

I see the French Health Workers have been awarded with an historic pay rise .

Clapping is all this government has done so far, that and capping car park charges.

Given the fact that covid is expected to come back with a vengeance this winter, I would have thought that it would be expedient to award health workers now to show our appreciation now and for the future.

I agree with both of you Eloethan and GillT.

The double whammy of Covid and Brexit would be the perfect opportunity to do something about green initiatives and provide a sustainable economy.

An economy which relies on people buying stuff they don't need or want and then buying even more of it just so there's "growth" is a broken economy.

Unfortunately, I don't really see that anybody in the current government (or even Cummings) has the vision or will to do anything.

Eleothan I have been banging on about green initiatives for months. I know it is not that simple, but the money which was going to be spent on the huge subsidies to foreign owned nuclear power stations could have trained battalions of skilled workers, improved insulation, installed solar panels/heat pumps/double glazed windows in every house that needed it. Win win. Everyone gets lower fuel costs, thousands of skilled jobs, green targets met. The recent announcements have gone some way towards this, but not enough in my mind. I would also make it a condition that landlords who have tenants receiving housing benefit must provide housing that is economical to live in.

Philip Pullman says 'UK is done for' in scathing attack on Boris Johnson and Brexit

www.indy100.com/article/philip-pullman-brexit-government-boris-johnson-9617476

One has to hope that large amounts of money for house building don't go to Persimmon who made a fortune out of the last government scheme to help first time buyers. For those with short memories, the then CEO, Jeff Fairburn who was ousted 4 months after receiving a bonus of £75 million.

I'm wondering whether some of the money being given to certain businesses might be better directed to more valuable and long term skills training and initiatives - measures to ensure that all homes and public buildings have top grade insulation, solar panels where possible, water and energy saving measures, etc, and innovative schemes to encourage use of public transports or make better use of privately owned cars, etc, etc., and in actually manufacturing goods that other countries want to buy from us. Additionally, many of our public services claim that their technology systems are clunky, badly integrated and way behind the curve of modern systems.

Why is it such a good idea for our economy to be so dependent on service industries whereby a substantial part of the population buys services from another part of the population, eg businesses such as: nail bars, hairdressers, fast food outlets, personal trainers, fashion consultants, greetings card designers, beauty salons, advertising agencies, image consultants, events organisers, etc, etc, etc. Also, of course, we rely heavily on the status of the City of London as a global financial hub. With our exit from the EU, this reliance becomes increasingly risky and is, in my opinion, ethically questionable.

Years ago we used to be on the front line of producing high quality goods that many countries wished to buy from us. I realise that there has, since then, been a lot of competition from countries that can supply goods at much lower prices. But perhaps there is still a market for good quality, long lasting products in this country and abroad. The focus on exporting quality could both boost our own economy and decrease the amount of exploitation of workers here and in other countries. It appears that Germany still produces much of what its population requires - and exports abroad also. Shouldn't we be encouraging this, rather than propping up, for example, the myriad fast food outlets and nail bars that can be seen throughout our towns and cities and which do very little for the health and long term prosperity of our nation - or for the people employed in them?

Petunia made some excellent comments, unfortunately ignoring the most obvious, as to why the Gov have ignored pre lockdown all the Older People charities concerns about cross infections in Care homes. AgeUK, Ageing Better, the Jos Rowntree Foundation to name just a few of the Charities providing in-depth reports did not produce those reports to gather dust in Downing Street.
The UK Advisory Forum on Ageing brought the concerns to the attention of the DoH as far back as 2015. Sorry, Petunia Such inertia negates your otherwise valid comments.

I watched BoJo being asked a question about the N Irish border yesterday. His reply seemed to consist of exclamations along the lines of "Yarooo. Fiddlesticks" or some such nonsense. And then I realised who he reminds me of. It's Billy Bunter- www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-YgdujYR1Y

growstuff

No, I'm not at all hopeful. It's very hard not to feel totally despondent and worried sick about the future. I feel more alienated than ever from the people dancing for joy about going out for a pizza, having their hair done or even having a holiday. It's a waste of time and energy feeling angry. Oh well!

Is there any way you can bring your pension forward?

The MPs supporting ExcludedUK are an interesting mix.

No, I'm not at all hopeful. It's very hard not to feel totally despondent and worried sick about the future. I feel more alienated than ever from the people dancing for joy about going out for a pizza, having their hair done or even having a holiday. It's a waste of time and energy feeling angry. Oh well!

It needs vision, intelligence, a real commitment to the people of the UK - and, most of all, leadership.

The IFS is publishing a response to latest mini budget later today.

growstuff

Whitewavemark2

growstuff that is really hard and frustrating, and you can’t be the only one.

There's even an APPG with 200 cross party members called ExcludedUK.

Are you hopeful growstuff?

Whitewavemark2

growstuff that is really hard and frustrating, and you can’t be the only one.

There's even an APPG with 200 cross party members called ExcludedUK.

growstuff

Whitewavemark2

growstuff that is really hard and frustrating, and you can’t be the only one.

No, I'm not. I'm lucky that I have got savings and will receive my state pension in 10 months. Other people are being evicted and there is little prospect of finding a new job. Millions of people are about to be thrown on the scrap heap and yesterday's announcement will do very little to help. It was pathetic.

Yes it was, much much more is needed.

Maybe the restaurants will be serving pigs ears as a main course.

Whitewavemark2

growstuff that is really hard and frustrating, and you can’t be the only one.

No, I'm not. I'm lucky that I have got savings and will receive my state pension in 10 months. Other people are being evicted and there is little prospect of finding a new job. Millions of people are about to be thrown on the scrap heap and yesterday's announcement will do very little to help. It was pathetic.

growstuff that is really hard and frustrating, and you can’t be the only one.