Westminster Politics
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How didn't he breach guidelines exactly? He travelled 260 miles in a car to his parents' house. Where in the guidelines does it state anything about that being essential travel? Genuine question, because I've heard Cummings say that the guidelines say his case is covered and yet nobody can provide what it is that he's talking about.
He's saying the public can draw their conclusions but he has drawn is.
yes I struggle to read massive blocks of text, don’t you?
that’s why you have gaps between paragraphs - if you need an example, just pick up a book and go to any page.
This is massively embarrassing and cringeworthy for the UK.
It's literally up there with Trump levels of "go feck yourselves" to the public.
We'll do what we want.
The man had at least two people in the car that potentially Covid19.
The whole idea of lockdown is to prevent spreading the virus by keeping people in the area they reside. Preferably at home.
He broke that rule. He has no excuse.
He works for the government for feck sake he could have asked for help.
Boris shouldn't be defending him. That's also another feck you to the public. A bigger one
Massive embarrassment and shame.
What a mess the UK govt is. A total shambles lead by a cretin
It's literally up there with Trump levels of "go feck yourselves" to the public.
We'll do what we want.
The man had at least two people in the car that potentially Covid19.
The whole idea of lockdown is to prevent spreading the virus by keeping people in the area they reside. Preferably at home.
He broke that rule. He has no excuse.
He works for the government for feck sake he could have asked for help.
Boris shouldn't be defending him. That's also another feck you to the public. A bigger one
Massive embarrassment and shame.
What a mess the UK govt is. A total shambles lead by a cretin
Dom-estic abuse.
At least Trump would sack him as it
Think on the day he took them to Durham was either his mother or fathers birthday and on the day he took himself for an eye test to a beauty spot was his wife's birthday. I'm happy to be corrected on this.
Come on, he absolutely broke the guidelines, even if you believe his story he still broke them.
he read out the relevant guidance in relation to childcare.
Can i interest you in a bridge I have for sale?
sure, why not?
Honestly, I find it quite easy to read in a structure of paragraphs consisting of more than one sentence.
I think your definition of "massive" is on a rather scale different to mine.
The cynic in me says he has had a few days to pore over the Guidelines and make sure his version of events fits them.
Lets just call it what it is from him - complete bullshit.
99.99999999% of the country had the message drilled into them - if you or somepne you have been in contact with show symptoms, stay at home and self Isolate. What he has done flies in the face of that despite his story.
Exactly. We already knew Cummings is a cynical unscrupulous liar from the Brexit campaign. What isn’t acceptable is that one of the most important figures in the government breached it’s own guidelines.
Staggering. Not just the clear BS, but that an unelected adviser gets a press conference in the Downing St garden.
Utter shit show, unless anything else damaging comes out over the next few days, he's in the clear now.
Utter shit show, unless anything else damaging comes out over the next few days, he's in the clear now.
I’d say a paragraph of 23 lines of text is massive.
This! Otherwise the entire country would be able to do what they want.
He's 100% in the clear, none of the vocal Tories will take a stand (whilst he clearly has serious dirt on vast amounts of the others) and the Labour leadership want to punt the issue into the long grass. The most Cummings has to worry about is a 3 minute segment on HIGNFY.
Good stuff. That'd be a very common number of sentences in those book things you obnoxiously suggested I look at earlier.
To follow the spirit of your line of questioning regarding distances travelled earlier: how many lines would you consider to not be massive? 19? 12? 8? Or would it simply be whatever length of paragraph Dominic Cummings happened to use that would just the right length of paragraph to avoid the wrath of your partizan belligerent pedantry?
I don't disagree with any of that. Of course you can pick holes in the legislation or use the examples of other people's selfishness to justify your own rule breaking but that's the attitude and behaviour of a cretin who isn't taking the guidance in the spirit it was intended.
We are doing this to save lives and help the NHS not to serve our own needs.
To these two points:
- the chief advisor to the prime minister very very possibly broke lockdown.
- Up until this point a few figures in the government and on scientific advisory boards have been pushed to resign for breaking lockdown, therefore there is precedent.
-All of the noise coming out of the government when this broke out is that he would be backed.
- it is well know that the only way to hold someone accountable is to put pressure on them. The most recent example being Boris finally reversing his decision for the health care worker fee.
Therefore, should time and effort be put into working out the true nature of his actions? Yes. He holds a position that makes everything he does accountable. An incredible amount of people have had to sacrifice quite a lot during this lock down. You can’t have an advisor flagrantly disregarding the rules.
Is the opposition politicising this? Well yes, in terms of this being politics by its very nature it is politicised. But no. They are putting pressure on a government that has embarrassed itself on the global stage with its response to this crisis. It is their job to put this pressure on the government. If the Tories don’t have an opposition to hold their actions accountable then they can do whatever they want. By your line of argument every time the opposition disagrees with something it’s them ‘taking advantage’ rather than doing their job.
(I hope the final paragraph wasn’t too long for you - if it is maybe you should stop off at Castle Barnard to test your eyes)
What would your response be to a member of the public using a “but Cummings did it”-type excuse for breaking lockdown regs?
Watched the 7pm conference, Johnson played it as expected.
Surely the journalists should've just ignored him and gone straight to Yvonne Doyle? She actually said in her quick precis to not make any unneccesary long journey (amusingly the transport graphs were dropped from today). Was a waste of time her being there as I don't think she was referred to once which makes a complete mockery of their presence considering you had an actual case study of what not to do.
Surely the journalists should've just ignored him and gone straight to Yvonne Doyle? She actually said in her quick precis to not make any unneccesary long journey (amusingly the transport graphs were dropped from today). Was a waste of time her being there as I don't think she was referred to once which makes a complete mockery of their presence considering you had an actual case study of what not to do.
As said to Maxi I'd just explain that that's not the attitude to adopt and the reasons why it isn't. If your mate put his hand in the fire would you kinda thing.
I’m not so sure about that!
I would say if it was necessary, then you can write a paragraph of however many lines are needed.
if you want, I am sure you can rewatch the press conference and see approximately how many lines were in each of his paragraphs.
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As a Tory, it's all fecking shite, but he's distancing himself to leave the option open. Hopefully it'll still bite them all on the arse. I'm done with them in their current guise. My parents the same. They're haemorrhaging votes from the people I speak with.
During Boris's press conference , every time he asked me to continue his Government request to "stay alert etc", I felt myself physically tense up and get aggravated, because it sounded so hypocritical. And I have very little skin in this game, so cant imagine how a single parent who caught covid19, but still struggled self isolated alone at home (many more examples) must have felt. How will young tearaways, street gangs and other nefarious sections of society now react. This literally could be the tipping point for a 2nd wave and all the death and economic damage that could bring. Just so he could save an unelected team mate.
Im not sure how Cummings can do his job now as 'the enforcer', when anyone he instructs in Government or civil service will now just tell him to fcuk off? Despite what he thinks of himself, his self confidence and authority is decimated. I can understand that Boris feels loyalty and sympathy for him, but to think Cummings can be a trusted and capable advisor in the short term is naive and laughable.
Boris kept saying 'up to people to decide for themselves' meaning I think he's hoping Tory MPs, Tory media and his vote bank will now rally around Cummings in sake of party interest. That's the ball game, and will determine how this ends up.
But even if Cummings manages to survive the week or his influence on matters is done for a while. Which makes this strategy all the more baffling. Would have been better for Cummings to resign now, and find a way for him to rejoin in a few months, once things had calmed down eg when Brexit agenda becomes more top of mind.
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You do realise it’s only that long because you’re on your phone? I’m intrigued as to whether you read any long form articles?
“Ello, ello, ello, what are you doing driving round these parts Sir?”
“I was just getting my eyes tested!”
“Cum again?!”
“I was just getting my eyes tested!”
“Cum again?!”
Girlfriend maintains it was a violin. Being played deliberately badly. Slow deliberate wrongness.
If true, that’s fab.
Edit : She plays Violin.
There’s this. There’s also his wife’s birthday being the day of the day trip “to test his eyesight”. But more importantly not a single journalist across two conferences asked about the fact that Cummings went back to #10 after spending time with his heavily symptomatic wife. That’s a massive error that cannot be explained away with the kids.
I think he survives now in large part, because the journalists had the chance to skewer him and failed. He’ll never be in front of a camera again, and only really Sky’s Beth Rigby and the Daily Mail chap took their shot. A sad day for British politics and a missed opportunity to hold the government to account.
But like genuinely, why are you doing this?
It's demonstrably clear that Cummings thinks you are stupid. If he didn't he'd have spent some time creating an excuse that actually makes sense, but they know that there's a mass of people that will lap up and repeat whatever bullshit they put out.
But why? What do you get out of this? And why do you spend so much time going in to bat for people that hold you in utter contempt?
That's brilliant if true.
Completely agree! They had a great chance and should have been more factual as opposed to ‘Are you sorry’ and asking the same question slightly differently, they could have asked better and more probing follow up questions as simple as 1) why did you go out testing your eye sight with your kid in the back? 2) you said that you 17 year old niece offered to babysit, why didn’t you say no as it was a violation of lockdown and approach more local help?
much easier to read, thanks. I am glad you have taken on my feedback
well articulated reply, unlike most of the drivel written in this thread.
I have no issue with the opposition holding the government to account, and it what they should be doing - but trial by media, and calling for his resignation before he even gave his record of accounts is opportunism, and just dilutes the effect when there are more important issues to address.
of course it should be established what happened/ didn’t happen, but I’m not convinced 3-4 days of this being the most important story, and taking away time and resources from the police and the government is the best use of time.
I cannot believe some tories are actually buying his 260 mile journey to Durham story. It's a fecking lie!
Fair enough. I expect there to be some public indignation directed at police trying to enforce the regs. Nice position to be put in
And Boris Johnson didn't allow follow up questions during his daily press briefing..