COVID-19

There’s a bit of grass at the back of my house that the council normally cut, it hasn’t been cut yet this year. Right now, a group my neighbours are attempting to cut it with a flymo electric mower, knocking on folks houses as they move up asking if they can plug it in...I get on with neighbours, and they obviously mean well, but I’ll be ignoring ‘em today..People just like to make excuses for their own needs.

 

Agree with both of these comments.

I've been generally complimentary of Canada's handling of this crisis, but there are certainly things that should have been done better here as well, creation and more importantly management of stockpiles being just one item. The health people and governments toed the WHO party line a touch too long with regards to closing borders and limiting travel -- as late as early March there was still a sense of travel being fine, even encouraged. Moreover, news has come out that a small department -- concerned with worldwide health issues -- in the military was warning of things to come back in January, but their reports either didn't get high enough up the chain, or were dismissed when they did. Thus complacency, and a general feeling of "it won't happen here / it won't be bad here" did prevail, until the evidence just became too compelling.

Care homes / nursing homes have been another major problem, nationwide. Take them out of the totals and our numbers would be a lot better than they are. Too many are staffed by low-waged, no-benefits part-timers, who have to work at two or three places just to make a living. In other words, the owners rake in the cash from residents, and avoid paying benefits etc. to their workers. This crisis may just have the benefit of greater governmental oversight of these institutions, and the imposition of better working conditions.

One thing this has shown is just how mobile the whole world is nowadays. When the government here announced restrictions on travel, and urged all Canadians and permanent residents to get back as soon as possible, they did -- over a million in the first week after the announcement. This in a total population of what, some 35 million? I think 960,000ish were citizens, the remainder permanent residents. That surprised me somewhat. There are still some repatriation flights happening, at least I think so.

RCB

 

Here is pretty much the same article from yesterday's Guardian. When the Tory Times and the soft left Guardian are both nailing them to the wall for sloth, hubris and breathtaking levels of incompetence then you know it's not just press sensationalism.

The first duty of a government is to protect its citizens. Ours ran down our stock of PPE; ignored and buried warnings of massive unpreparedness for a pandemic; failed to implement its own disaster plans, and actually sold some of our tiny stock of PPE to China when it was clear to anyone with half a brain that we were going to be infected.

It's hard to imagine a more gross dereliction of duty.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/18/how-did-britain-get-its-response-to-coronavirus-so-wrong?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Copy_to_clipboard

 

Keep him charge for me Tony. He delivered brexit but he’s absolutely useless on everything else. As his time as London mayor proved

 

It was the same yesterday. Dropped my mum some stuff off , went back up home up Oak Lane past the hospital and it was quiet but not lock down quiet. As long as people are in cars its no big deal to me.

 

A gross dereliction of duty would be a sackable offence in most jobs. But this is the public sector where getting fired is nigh on impossible.

 

Actually Al, dismissal for gross misconduct (which amounts to the same thing) is not at all uncommon in the public sector. I know this from my many years of shop stewarding in Bradford Council.

However, running the economy like it is a household budget for the last ten years, in complete opposition to all sound economic theory, is apparently ok and gets you re-elected.
Britain had PPE and pandemic planning that was the envy of the world under Blair and Brown. The Tories placed their crackpot anti-state ideology ahead of public safety and ran it all into the ground, ignoring all scientific warnings to the contrary.
I understand why people regarded the bumbling Corbyn as a threat to national security. But what they didn't know was another one was going on behind their backs in a different guise.
There's no excuse. It's shameful.

 

Hard to disagree with that. But all that spending of Blair is still huring hospital trusts now. I am in favour in investment in the NHS but not in a way of just putting extra on income tax. The whole PFI scandal showed Blair up for what he really was, just Tory Lite. Its not a case of money not being there in the NHS for things like extra supplies of PPE, its more of a case of where that money goes. The NHS is like a leaking sieve when it comes to public funds, this is its achilles heel and its why the service needs a complete strategic overhaul.

 

Bradford Council are still out cutting grass, they did some round us on Friday

 

It goes deeper. We have a criminal, cultural disregard for the older generations. Look at the attitude of -albeit a few - people on here and elsewhere. 'Its only the over the 70s, just keep em isolated and let every else crack on'. Or worse 'selfish buggers for wanting to live, itll be the rest of us that carry a burden'

 

Yes, PFI was a disaster, no doubt about it. But a lot of the waste in the NHS is caused by the fecking stupid internal market system that the Tories introduced before Blair. That's what causes the mushrooming armies of non clinical staff,managers and 'commissioners' on big salaries. Blair and Brown failed to reform it, which was a mistake.
But even allowing for that, we spend less per capita on our NHS than various other European countries and we have one of the lowest tax rates. The Tories, since Thatcher, have made low taxation a mantra, so that the very suggestion of raising them to fund health and social care services is political suicide. The countries that have top notch public services tend to pay more tax than us. You don't get something for nothing.
As for PPE, there's no excuse. We had the best pandemic plans and PPE stocks in the world. The Tories chose to run them both down to save money. They gambled and lost, but the public is paying for it.

 

So which countries have a 'top notch' health service and how does it compare to ours at this moment in time and how did it compare to ours when the Tories came to power. It's a genuine question because i'd like to see some comparisons. Throughout my life neither me or my family have wanted in terms of hospital treatment or care, i'd say where i have had problems is with organisation and management. And this isn't a party specific thing. I do agree that things like social care amongst other public services have been hit by austerity measures but i cannot stand by and see taxpayers money thrown at an organisation that at its managerial core is rotten. Get that right first then you can worry about other countries helath spend if you want.

 

The NHS public satisfaction rate, waiting times and pretty much any other measure you care to mention were at an all time high under Blair and Brown. I'm not denying that mistakes were made, but the basic function of the NHS - to provide good quality universal healthcare - was working very well before the Tories returned to power in 2010.

The Tories have simply run the system into the ground by inadequate funding for the past ten years. Yes, they've increased funding, but not enough to maintain standards. France and Germany spend half as much again as we do on healthcare. Germany has four times as many doctors per capita as us. The Scandinavians all have well funded health systems because their public has bought into the idea that if you want good services you have to pay for them through taxation.
I agree about the management issue. But the Tories have been in power for ten years. They've had plenty of time to sort this out. If they really cared about the NHS they would have reformed the disastrous internal market that they introduced and which Blair and Brown worsened. But they didn't do that - they actually made it even worse by their top down major reorganisation (that they previously promised they wouldn't do) in 2012 which introduced even more 'competition'. Don't forget that a significant number of senior Tories are on record as favouring a private healthcare system - they aren't in the business of making the NHS look good because they want an excuse to sell it off.
It sticks in my craw to see people like Raab now praising the NHS staff as heroes when he and his ilk are the reason why so many of them are having to work with inadequate PPE, and if he had his way there wouldn't even be an NHS.

This article from the, ultra Tory, Spectator, sets it out brilliantly:

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/wasting-away

 

Just noticed a report on today’s press briefing and plans for schools reopening. The announcement of providing laptops to disadvantaged kids and 4G routers says to me the school closures are not ending in next few weeks. As with all these schemes it will probably take at least 2/3 weeks for kids to be identified and then provided with laptops, and that is ignoring sourcing the laptops.

 

@Offcomedun says " It sticks in my craw to see people like Raab now praising the NHS staff as heroes when he and his ilk are the reason why so many of them are having to work with inadequate PPE, and if he had his way there wouldn't even be an NHS."

That's an absolutely shameful comment to make...thank God you lost...

 

He was implying for the older kids will get the equipment.

I believe primary schools will open in May like in other countries.

Who is going to pay the bill for the 4G routers?

 

you are paying it.

the 4G bill will be less than the cost of the laptop

 

Social distancing is harder the younger the kids

 

I’d be very surprised if schools opened in large number in May. At most, there maybe an expansion of schools used as daycare services for any industries that reopen. Which I think will be minimal anyway.