Jeremy Hunt says Britain should be the most prosperous country in the world

[Bentley Bullet]

BB.

Go on. Talk me through how the Opposition hindered the Johnson Government's handling of COVID. I'm all ears.

BST, use your ears to ask someone to find you the Youtube channel, and type in Captain Hindsight Starmer and Covid.

Meanwhile, if you can answer just one of my questions put to you on this thread I'll be ever so grateful.

Oh no! BB has refused the fence. Just when he was charging down the home strait.

There was me thinking you must have a dossier full of examples of the Opposition hindering Johnson's handling of COVID, and that I must be misunderstanding how our Parliament works when the Govt has nearly twice as many MPs as the official.Opposition.


Instead you send me off to search for someone else's opinion. Amazing how shy you get in these circumstances.

Na BST, I tend to only trot when I'm the only horse in the race. You see, I always have a distinct advantage over you. I make sure I'm right before I discuss owt, whereas you seem to get more fulfilment out of arguing the toss when you're wrong.

My job is far easier than yours! I suggest you try it sometime.

Now, I'd look on YouTube for the videos I mentioned, but I've seen them before and repetition bores me. There are loads of instances out there in the media talking of Captain Hindsight, and if you haven't seen them that is because you will have turned a blind eye to them.

It seems to me that you have closed your eyes, put your hands over your ears and whistled when it didn't suit your agenda for far too long for me to change you.

[BillyStubbsTears]

BB.

I'm wanting to know this important insight you've had into our constitution that means an opposition can hinder a Govt with an 80 seat majority.

Not how they can suggest alternative policies.

Not how they can ask difficult questions.

How they can actively HINDER a Government. Your phrase. I want YOU to explain that to me, because it's something that no constitutional experts have ever imagined was possible.

Don't get shy now. Come on. You're onto something big.

[Bentley Bullet]

They didn't suggest many alternative policies! A lot of them were already in place and Starmer and co jumped on the bandwagon claiming they were their ideas!

https://theweek.com/keir-starmer/951591/is-keir-starmer-becoming-captain-hindsight-on-covid-restrictions

[drfchound]

There's some great debating techniques going on from the Tories here.
Waving thier little wrinkled maggots about an phishing.
Phil Neal and Graham Taylor style.
What a pair of Kitsons they were.

Have you nothing to say about the thread content.
It seems to be your standard (phishing) line when you come out  from under your bridge.

[Bentley Bullet]

Don't discourage him, Hound, it's really good for the cause knowing what kind of trolls BST's opinion attracts.

Hand on heart, would you want Iberian Red and  Sydnaye to agree with you?

[drfchound]

No mate, definitely not, but I do like reading their posts.
They are so funny.
Waldorf and Statler, they were Muppets as well.

[BillyStubbsTears]

They didn't suggest many alternative policies! A lot of them were already in place and Starmer and co jumped on the bandwagon claiming they were their ideas!

https://theweek.com/keir-starmer/951591/is-keir-starmer-becoming-captain-hindsight-on-covid-restrictions

That's good BB.

You post an article giving opinions by journalists and Tory MPs. And one of the things the article pins on Starmer is a request for a lockdown in October 2020. A lockdown that Johnson refused, allegedly saying "Let the bodies pile high."

It's been said by leading epidemiology experts that Johnson's refusal to go for a lockdown then led to tens of thousands of avoidable deaths and meant the lockdown that finally came was much longer and more damaging than it should have been if Johnson had done the sensible thing when pressed.

But yeah. Captain Hindsight eh? You just keep parrotting that Tory line, ignoring the facts, eh?

[Bristol Red Rover]

I can understand some people being suckered in to support Tory plans and promises, but defending what they've done by pretending they've been unlucky? A bit like the drunk driver blaming the brick wall for not getting out of the way.

[Bentley Bullet]

Billy boy, did you HONESTLY think I'd find evidence of my point by searching the media sites that you frequent?

Anybody, ANYBODY can give an opinion of what route to take when they are not in a position to make a final decision, after all, where's the pressure or come back, for that matter?

 It is no surprise that Captain Hindsight might have gotten the odd prediction right. So did I, and I know f**k all about pandemics, but I might not have put those forecasts into practice if it was my final decision. Besides that, there was a balance between lives and livelihoods to be made by the government.

In my opinion, Keir Starmer exploited his position by ignoring the effect that an early lockdown would have on the livelihoods of people for the popular and possibly ill-informed (in hindsight) view that an early lockdown should be applied to save lives. After all, the more livelihoods that were affected by the pandemic, the more popular the opposition (his party) would become.

[SydneyRover]

Billy boy, did you HONESTLY think I'd find evidence of my point by searching the media sites that you frequent?

Anybody, ANYBODY can give an opinion of what route to take when they are not in a position to make a final decision, after all, where's the pressure or come back, for that matter?

 It is no surprise that Captain Hindsight might have gotten the odd prediction right. So did I, and I know f**k all about pandemics, but I might not have put those forecasts into practice if it was my final decision. Besides that, there was a balance between lives and livelihoods to be made by the government.

In my opinion, Keir Starmer exploited his position by ignoring the effect that an early lockdown would have on the livelihoods of people for the popular and possibly ill-informed (in hindsight) view that an early lockdown should be applied to save lives. After all, the more livelihoods that were affected by the pandemic, the more popular the opposition (his party) would become.

I guess that's why you have COBRA meetings ....... or not ................. and why you have scientific advisors to listen to ....... or not.

''The UK should have gone into lockdown at least a week before it happened, Patrick Vallance has told the UK’s Covid inquiry, saying also he was reprimanded by two senior civil servants after he called for action to be taken in mid-March 2020.

Vallance, the UK government’s chief scientific adviser until earlier this year, said that while Boris Johnson first announced a lockdown on 23 March, by the weekend of 14-15 March it was clear to him that action was needed.

Data arriving that weekend showed “there were many more cases, it was far more widespread and was accelerating faster than anyone had expected”, Vallance told the inquiry. He added: “This was an occasion when I think it’s clear that we should have gone earlier.”

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/nov/20/uk-covid-inquiry-patrick-vallance-lockdown

[SydneyRover]

And it's understandable that ''I know f**k all about pandemics'' ............... johson didn't have a clue either so rather than listen to the experts on hand he decided the economy came first and f**k the old people.

''Former British PM Boris Johnson was 'bamboozled' by COVID stats, inquiry hears''

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-11-21/boris-johnson-was-bamboozled-by-covid-stats-inquiry-hears/103129320

[Bentley Bullet]

So, we've learned from the pandemic that we can get a balance between lives and livelihoods bang on, in hindsight.

We've also learned that the opposition party can gain favour by going along with the popular (uninformed) opinion of the public to gain political smarty points.

[SydneyRover]

whatever

[Bentley Bullet]

I can understand some people being suckered in to support Tory plans and promises, but defending what they've done by pretending they've been unlucky? A bit like the drunk driver blaming the brick wall for not getting out of the way.

No comprendo

[Bentley Bullet]

Maybe in future, we should have politicians who are qualified scientists in case of another pandemic. 

[drfchound]

Out of interest, does anyone know what the next pandemic will be and what the cause is going to be.

[roverstillidie91]

So, we've learned from the pandemic that we can get a balance between lives and livelihoods bang on, in hindsight.

We've also learned that the opposition party can gain favour by going along with the popular (uninformed) opinion of the public to gain political smarty points.

tories will still blame the NHS waiting list on covid and the strikes when it is their running of the NHS which has caused all the issues.

And it is hardly like the NHS was so busy and overwhelmed either during the pandemic.

It was an absolute shambles and they should never be elected again for their handling if brexit.

The decisions made wasn't between lives and livelihoods.

It was pure stupidity and recklessness. Like with the eat out to help out.

And also VIP line.

[SydneyRover]

Which takes us back to the title of the thread, except after 13+ years of tories it's definitely not.

[BillyStubbsTears]

So, we've learned from the pandemic that we can get a balance between lives and livelihoods bang on, in hindsight.

We've also learned that the opposition party can gain favour by going along with the popular (uninformed) opinion of the public to gain political smarty points.

Christ, you actually believe this shit don't you?

If there was one thing that we knew by Autumn 2020, it's that there WASN'T a balance to be struck.

If you were stupid like Johnson was then, and like you still appear to be now, you thought there was a trade off. Don't lock down. Strike a balance.

But a virus doesn't strike a deal like that. If you don't control it, it spreads like wildfire. So if you don't lockdown when numbers are low, you sure as f**k have to lockdown when the numbers get high and out of control a few weeks later. And by that time, you have millions more infections, and tens of thousands more deaths. AND here's the rub. When you DO lockdown late, it takes much, much longer to get the situation back under control. Spit does far more economic damage than acting quickly would.

That was blindingly obvious by Autumn 2020. It's understandable that you didn't get it then, because Johnson was pushing back against that logic and you could not find it in yourself to ever criticise him.

The fact that you stick to that line now is, frankly, scary. You're so fixated on political bias, you can't see truth even on top of a pile of 50,000 avoidable corpses.

[Bentley Bullet]

Stop being silly or I'll just ignore you. I've NEVER, EVER been against lockdowns, although I understood the difficulties involved in deciding when to start/end them without hindsight. Some people were, and still are against lockdowns of any duration and were giving the government dogs abuse for implementing them. Some people still talk about them being some form of government control!

It all boils down to opinions, and not everyone agrees with yours, or mine for that matter. It was a desperate situation in which the government couldn't be right in everyone's eyes. Some people even sought political smarty points, like you did.

I bet if another virus (God help us) comes along when your great leader Starmer (God help us) is PM you'll back him to the bloody hilt!

[SydneyRover]

gibberish, it's down to science

[BillyStubbsTears]

Stop being silly or I'll just ignore you. I've NEVER, EVER been against lockdowns, although I understood the difficulties involved in deciding when to start/end them without hindsight. Some people were, and still are against lockdowns of any duration and were giving the government dogs abuse for implementing them. Some people still talk about them being some form of government control!

It all boils down to opinions, and not everyone agrees with yours, or mine for that matter. It was a desperate situation in which the government couldn't be right in everyone's eyes. Some people even sought political smarty points, like you did.

I bet if another virus (God help us) comes along when your great leader Starmer (God help us) is PM you'll back him to the bloody hilt!

Turn the gas off, cool down and concentrate on what my criticism of your take is.

Even now, three years on, you are parrotting the patently wrong line that there was a balance to be struck between lives and livelihood when it came to implementing the late 2020 lockdown.

There wasn't.

Rapid action to suppress the virus was the best thing that could be done BOTH in the interests of saving lives and in minimising the economic hit. It doesn't matter that some flat-earthers were and are still saying that lockdowns were unnecessary. The job ob Government isn't to steer a middle way between the right policy and something that a few head bangers want to do.

I've said time and again that you can excuse the Govt for getting that wrong in March 2020, because everyone was on a learning curve. What you cannot ever excuse them for, is getting that wrong in October/November 2020, when they lost control of the virus through deliberate policy choices.

You are still giving Johnson a pass on that and ignoring the fact that Starmer and Labour were calling the situation absolutely right before it got out of hand, and without the benefit of hindsight. Prof John Edmunds is just one of several experts who have said that mistake led to several 10s of thousands of entirely avoidable deaths, and there was no benefit to the economy because we still had to go into hard lockdown anyway, and for much longer, just as anyone who thought hard about it in Autumn 2020 knew we would.

The fact that you refuse to see that, and you still fire off that ridiculous Captain Hindsight jibe at a politician who made the correct call in advance, says everything about how twisted and biased you are. You'll turn a blind eye to maybe 50,000 avoidable deaths and maybe £100bn of avoidable economic loss in order to make a party political point. And I think, deep down, you know that's exactly what you are doing. But you can't stop yourself.

[Bentley Bullet]

By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless.

.... And that was even without considering the lives versus livelihoods equation.

[Filo]

By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless.

.... And that was even without considering the lives versus livelihoods equation.

Employers claimed furlough, not employee’s!

[Bentley Bullet]

By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless.

.... And that was even without considering the lives versus livelihoods equation.

Employers claimed furlough, not employee’s!

And?

[Filo]

By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless.

.... And that was even without considering the lives versus livelihoods equation.

Employers claimed furlough, not employee’s!

And?

You are saying some people claimed furlough and still worked, how did they manage that, given Employers claimed it?

[BillyStubbsTears]

By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless.

.... And that was even without considering the lives versus livelihoods equation.

Once again, there WASN'T a "lives vs livelihood" equation. It's your inability to see this that is the really scary thing.

I don't know how many times it has to be spelled out for you, but the fact is that delaying lockdown and letting the virus spread further had the dual effect of BOTH killing more people, AND meaning that when we did eventually have to lockdown, the lockdown was longer, harder and more economically damaging than it would have been if we'd locked down earlier.

That's an established fact. The fact that you simply refuse to engage with it, because you are emotionally committed to not countenancing any criticism of Johnson's policy makes me wonder if you';re actually Nadine Dorries in disguise?

[Bentley Bullet]

By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless.

.... And that was even without considering the lives versus livelihoods equation.

Employers claimed furlough, not employee’s!

And?

You are saying some people claimed furlough and still worked, how did they manage that, given Employers claimed it?

Self-employed?

[Bentley Bullet]

By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless.

.... And that was even without considering the lives versus livelihoods equation.

Once again, there WASN'T a "lives vs livelihood" equation. It's your inability to see this that is the really scary thing.

I don't know how many times it has to be spelled out for you, but the fact is that delaying lockdown and letting the virus spread further had the dual effect of BOTH killing more people, AND meaning that when we did eventually have to lockdown, the lockdown was longer, harder and more economically damaging than it would have been if we'd locked down earlier.

That's an established fact. The fact that you simply refuse to engage with it, because you are emotionally committed to not countenancing any criticism of Johnson's policy makes me wonder if you';re actually Nadine Dorries in disguise?

The government did consider that going into a lockdown too early could result in people getting bored and complacent and breaking lockdown rules before the lockdown was officially ended.

Johnson did make mistakes, along with probably every other leader in every other country.

Are you going to hold it against the Tories forever?

[BillyStubbsTears]

Billy boy, did you HONESTLY think I'd find evidence of my point by searching the media sites that you frequent?

Anybody, ANYBODY can give an opinion of what route to take when they are not in a position to make a final decision, after all, where's the pressure or come back, for that matter?

 It is no surprise that Captain Hindsight might have gotten the odd prediction right. So did I, and I know f**k all about pandemics, but I might not have put those forecasts into practice if it was my final decision. Besides that, there was a balance between lives and livelihoods to be made by the government.

In my opinion, Keir Starmer exploited his position by ignoring the effect that an early lockdown would have on the livelihoods of people for the popular and possibly ill-informed (in hindsight) view that an early lockdown should be applied to save lives. After all, the more livelihoods that were affected by the pandemic, the more popular the opposition (his party) would become.

By the way. Which media sites do you reckon I frequent?

And as for this:
"In my opinion, Keir Starmer exploited his position by ignoring the effect that an early lockdown would have on the livelihoods of people for the popular and possibly ill-informed (in hindsight) view that an early lockdown should be applied to save lives. After all, the more livelihoods that were affected by the pandemic, the more popular the opposition (his party) would become."

Let's get this right. You reckon Starmer proposed a lockdown because it would have been popular? Specifically, it would have been popular BECAUSE it would have hurt more livelihoods?

What are you going to say when you meet the BB who said this, just a few hours later?

"By October/November 2020 many (not just a few headbangers) were sick to death of lockdowns and were going through the motions of safe distancing etc. Some people never even adhered to the first lockdown and worked through it; some even claimed furlough while still working.

"People were becoming more non-conforming, putting the government under more pressure while deciding whether to put the country back into lockdown, which would have been an unpopular decision for many and possibly ignored enough to make a lockdown pointless."

I'll leave you and that other BB to decide what you actually want to think. Get back to me when you've sorted it out.