How can anybody take them seriously now? When they tell you to do something and they don't do it themselves, with no repercussions. Its massive hypocrisy. People will not listen anymore.
Westminster Politics
- Thread starter altodevil
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So, in the face of hundreds of people dying every day in the UK due to Covid-19, Dominic Cummings' car journey to Durham is the most important thing on your agenda? You don't feel you have a societal and moral responsibility to ensure the safety of civilians because the PM's adviser got away with breaking the rules? Seriously?
FYI I think Cummings should be sacked, but anyone who continues to consider this some vile social injustice that needs to take precedence over ensuring the safety of those seriously at risk, are doing so only because it helps their own political views. As a parent of a CEV child, anyone who uses this as a reason to flagrantly ignore social distancing guidance is a ignorant prig.
The media had an opportunity to ask for elaboration and clarification on some very important statements today. They had the opportunity to ask the PM's chief medical advisers absolutely anything on COVID-19, on what the government is doing and how they're doing it, but instead they want to focus on a scandal because it sells more papers and garners more clicks.
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No the act itself isn’t that big of a deal.
The constant lying, gaslighting, and dodging is a big deal though. This could have been nipped in the bud ages ago but they just have to keep digging that hole.
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Oh absolutely, for me there is little doubt that Cummings incident is the single most damaging thing to have happened to BoJo and his government whatever way you look at it - going against public opinion, undermining authority of the PM, contradicting your own recommendations. It not only shows deep hypocrisy of Johnson and his team (this would not be that important) but I think it also has profound effect on how British public will approach government's advice now.
The fact that Cummings was straight up lying on that conference and that the PM and his cabinet are going to extreme lengths and are willing to look like fools in defending their advisor makes it extremely important for the media.
Sacking Cummings wouldn't have abated the mobs anger.
So you agree then that it's more important to ask questions about Cummings than it is to ask the PM and his chief medical advisers to elaborate and clarify the statements and new guidance laid out today? That it's more important to pressure the PM on this than it is to ask the questions that could quite feasibly save lives?
Our Government has had the chance all week to unify the nation behind them.
We’ve ended up at a place where we are all entitled to our own discretionary opinion, so I respect yours. If you have a complaint about others, take that up with the Government.
Also I don’t agree with you at all on your last paragraph.
So again, its more important to grill the PM on that than it is to clarify the new procedures, ease the anxiety and concerns, and ask questions that could literally save the lives? feck me.
I think it’s the straw that broke the back though. This government has kept lying to us, and they never face repercussions. This incident has completely undermined what they’re doing. They would rather compromise lives over admitting fault, being transparent and sacking Cummings. They want us to move on. They lie, they get exposed, and then in a week it’s forgotten.
Why not do both?
You're not going to comment on your statement that you're willing to knowingly endanger the lives of others because the PM's adviser hasn't been sacked?
Is it really one or another? Even if today or yesterday they could have asked some more precise questions, don't you think the bigger issue here is that the government has lost its credibility and in fact conceded the fight of looking reasonable and honest in the eyes of many millions of people? That has to have a huge impact on how anxious society is and in my eyes few more detailed questions about procedures of easing the lockdown would not help the public in dealing with current crisis.
You mean, the same way the media are willing to compromise lives of innocent people in order to grill the PM on his dickhead of am adviser.
They only got a short time to ask questions. 6 of them decided to ask the same question instead of gathering vital information.
I've lost my car and my job. My mental health has taken a battering, but we've all gone along with it and made sacrifices for the greater good. In the meantime the people in power are doing whatever they want with no repercussions.
Why should i listen to hypocrites? This virus has caused more harm for my finances and general well-being than it would of done if i actually caught it.
We should move on, but the PM is further causing distraction by a) not sacking his advisor and b) dodging questions from the media. The government have brought this upon themselves.
No matter how much scum large part of the UK’s media are, it’s not their responsibility to run the country. It’s their job to report & investigate news.
As long as Cummings remains he’s undermining the Government’s Covid guidelines and distracting from what really matters. If it wasn’t for Covid I wouldn’t mind Cummings staying, because by doing so he’s wounding the Government the more this goes on.
No. Sharing as much information and guidance as possible is the bigger issue. Call me old fashioned, but the PMs integrity here pales in comparison to saving lives. We know he isn't going to answer questions on Cummings, but instead of using that time more wisely, the media pisses it away asking the same question anyway. They'll be the first ones to complain when some parts of the guidance aren't as clear as they like, despite them choosing to pass on the opportunity to actually
Those ITV revelations are scandalous but most people fully suspected that had been government policy all along. We not only have the highest toll of excess deaths in the world, we deliberately deprived care home patients of access to hospital and returned them to homes knowing they had the virus but without making anyone aware. That alone should be enough in any functioning democracy with an accountable government to bring them down.
And I have enormous empathy for you. Now, as a parent of one of the 1m CEV people in the UK, catching this disease will do more than effect my finances and well being, it could kill my 2 year old child. So forgive me if I think the precious little time afforded to the media should be used productively.
Do you think that the actions of Cummings has undermined the lockdown?
Yes he is. I have absolutely no issue with people angered by that, but I do have an issue with them continuing to focus on that when more pressing things are at hand, I have an issue with them asking the same question SIX times instead of querying the government on the new guidance than will profoundly effect millions of people, and I have particular issue with people who seem to the integrity of our PM is more important than the safety of millions of extremely vulnerable people.
No.
Nobody is entitled to tell anybody what to ask, no matter how infuriating the line of questioning might be. If you don’t like their questioning then don’t buy their papers or watch their shows, etc. It’s the government’s job to inform the public, the media’s job to report news. If the government had done the right thing in the first place we wouldn’t be in this situation and the press would be asking different questions.
No I never said that did I, and I don’t think he even needed to resign. An apology and some ownership right at the start would have killed it.
But no, typical Tories, never admit fault, lie lie lie your way out.
And now just pretend it never happened.
Of course it has.
Especially amongst those who really, really do want to feel undermined.
If it wasn't this, it would be something else.
Cummings is a dickhead - not because of what he did, but because it's given all the Government's haters a stick to beat them with
No more entitled than the media or the public are to tell the PM to sack his aid. I don't buy their papers or watch their shows, no more than you voted for Boris. Bit of a baseless stance to take.
That’s probably why we’ve come to a different conclusion about the importance of what Cummings did. I’ve seen and heard of a lot of people who now view the lockdown as over. I’m sure you’ve heard and seen the same. When this came to light, they could have made a point about the importance of the guidelines, reinforcing the shared sacrifice in which we’re all going through. They didn’t though, they chose Dominic fecking Cummings over the people. They put him in front of cameras, and he brazenly lied to us. And now they want us to drop it. You argued that you didn’t see much merit about discussing the integrity of the PM and his posse. I think that’s the crux of the issue. We are continuously lied to by our government. How worried should we be about that? How easy should we make it?
I’m not quite sure your argument is a fair one either. Multiple questions can be asked, by holding the government to account over one incident doesn’t mean that nothing else can be asked.
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Specifically because Cummings went to Durham? Forgive me if I find that unlikely. I imagine they believe the lockdown is over because of recent easing of measures. The irony of that of course is today was the perfect time for that confusion to be cleared. There was a very real opportunity to scrutinize the government on the vagueness of guidance and an opportunity to clarify it. That wasn't taken.
Multiple questions can be asked you're right. There was a finite amount of time to ask those questions and 6 of the 7 journalists chose to ask the SAME question after explicitly being told they would not entertain discussion on Cummings, this after a week of those same journalists asking those questions repeatedly.
I get it. As I've already stated, I think Cummings should have been sacked. But to genuinely think this matter is more important than discussing the new guidance, validating the numbers and information given, and scrutinising new and existing measures, shows to me that people are taking it about as seriously as those they (rightly) vilify.
I'm a parent of a CEV child. The answers given to questions on guidance have a profound impact on me and my family, and I rely on other people understanding that guidance in order to keep my child safe. So to have that time taken away in order to continue the Cummings debacle is a bit of a sore point. Those journalists would prefer to twist the knife than actually ask questions on an incredibly important statement.
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Not to pry, but how come you havent been furloughed?
You've got a point.
Ensuring government are answerable to media and public scrutiny is more important in the long term than any pandemic or emergency. Cummings has lied and broken the rules, the Tory government has shown blatant double standards by backing him and now want to bury the story and pass it off as some sort of media witchhunt. If that is allowed to happen you in Britain are no different to Trump and the tin pot dictatorship he has attempted to drag the US down into.
The very fact that there are other, more important things happening in Britain than Cummings taking his wife on a jolly for her birthday is precisely the reason not one of you should stand for him staying in his job. Not used as some perverse form of guilt trip, designed to shame those holding him accountable into silence.
They are shameful enough on their own. They don't need intelligent and reasonable members of the public doing their dirty work for them.
The very fact that there are other, more important things happening in Britain than Cummings taking his wife on a jolly for her birthday is precisely the reason not one of you should stand for him staying in his job. Not used as some perverse form of guilt trip, designed to shame those holding him accountable into silence.
They are shameful enough on their own. They don't need intelligent and reasonable members of the public doing their dirty work for them.
People trying to justify doing what they want because of the Cummings affair are as bad as him.
Of course they are as they will be doing the same thing he did but it was obvious that would happen which is why the governments response to this has been catastrophic. If they hadn’t responded like they have a lot less people would be so emboldened.
Oh yeah I agree. The government had a chance to unite the nation and Boris a golden opportunity to win over many of the people who he is trying to convince that the Tory's have changed and he is leading a party more in touch with the working class.
Epic fail on his part. Could have been a masterstroke.
I’m not saying you do or did, it was meant as a figure of speech.
I don’t agree with the sacking part, we’re all entitled to ask for the PM in this instance because somebody from the heart of Government broke the lockdown rules whilst the rest of the population have been struggling & making sacrifices to abide to those rules. (Well personally I don’t feel entitled to because we only have lockdown light here in the Netherlands. But the British public definitely are entitled to!)
Boris has a chance to have the hardest possible brexit and when the economy stalls it simply gets put down to covid
It will probably take a couple of years for the economy to recover... but that recovery is now because of brexit
And all those people loosing their jobs thats going be all covid nothing to do with a hard brexit... but any jobs that come back in the next couple of years... thats all brexit
And when the economy is in the toilet and nobody wants to come here... nah thats not the economy its the post brexit points based immigration system delivering the "will of the people"
There is plenty of time to cement their gains and I suspect cummings will be somewhere in the background churning out pithy 3 word slogans making out hes some kind of genius.
Have they really been giving out consistent information on key questions before the Cummings debacle?
NHS workers have been writing to PHE, MPs on vital questions not asked during debriefing and not getting answers.
If I was there I would have asked
- are we on course to meet the 200k target towards May?
- why has the chief coroner said the covid deaths for NHS staff will not consider PPE shortages?
- why is the track and trace service launching without the app? what about the security flaws? have they focus grouped how widely it will be utilised and if not doesn't that defeat the purpose?
- with the Cummings scenario have they really thought about how it will affect their credibility when they tell people about what their "civic duty"
- what about the independent SAGE group's advice and the BMA who've advised against school reopening and will we revert back to lockdown if the R0 gets more than 1 or will there be enough sociopolitical will to curtail back on freedoms again?
- when will the CEV groups who are socially shielding get a letter to say how long if at all they have to shield beyond 30th June and shouldn't this be looked at now to facilitate planning for work etc.
Plenty plenty more. The key thing is that we have been asking these questions, sending them in, tweeting them without a proper answer on critical questions but have never received satisfactory answers on a lot of things. What they could do is allow along with the one or two layperson or public questions to allow doctors to ask questions to, but they haven't.
I do not believe that any of the Cumming's questions have been illegitimate though nor do I think there should be a let up in journalists asking them either. Its not mutually exclusive. Would be nice for the debriefing to not be rushed and also the fact that questions are still being asked is because of the evasive, non-sensical answers given for most of the rest.
I've had similar childcare issues that would have been solved had I commuted from the midlands to London but I'm being accused of being a bad parent for following guidelines and insulting being told I didn't understand them in the first place.
It is perfectly reasonable to ask for example Sir Patrick Vallance's and Prof Whitty's take on this, I don't get the whole stay-away-from-politics thing, the whole of COVID is political. The question of if it’s okay to travel 60 miles round trip with symptoms of COVID 19, to test your eyes pre-driving is not political, physicians are well aware of matters relating to fitness to drive. Presumably if they had no objection to what Mr Cummings did they shouldn't be gagged and government should be happy for them to face questions and say so?
I don't have a gripe with Boris being called to account for the Cummings debacle. It's inexcusable the way he has tried to justify it. The media have rightly focussed on it. But we already knew he wasn't going to entertain any further questions on the matter. I could forgive it being asked the first time. But it was asked six times. Boris just announced some pretty significant changes in guidance. Could they really not think of a question to ask relating to that? Do they genuinely think asking a question they know they won't get an answer to, and a question three/four/five journalists have already asked before them without success is a more prudent use of their limited time?
It shouldn't be. Anyone using COVID for political maneuvering should be ashamed of themselves. By all means, scrutinise, highlight failings and lambast the government when it's justified, but as soon as it becomes an obstacle to treatment, which I think it does when it clogs our modes of relating information, it should stop.
Precisely. Wouldn't it be more beneficial to you if additional coverage was dedicated to actually educating the public on the guidance, and then using those precious Q&A sessions to sharpen the soft edges, question the new guidance, and highlight what isn't working?
Face it you people it won't make a difference. Cummings is more secretive than the Illuminati. He'll forever be working in the shadows. A ghost. His name doesn't come up online because it gets blocked for sounding porny. This is our era of internet censorship. Stay indoors? Lock your doors. The small face man cometh.
But, seriously, the only thing I can think of that we'll get from him being sacked is that it'll be embarrassing for him. He'll still make his money. But at least his name can get trashed.
But, seriously, the only thing I can think of that we'll get from him being sacked is that it'll be embarrassing for him. He'll still make his money. But at least his name can get trashed.