Sir Keir’s Kerfuffle

[ianch99]

All this energy trying to validate historical "mistakes" made by the new Leader of the Opposition when the current Government's mistakes are literally killing people.

Tribal politics at its best ..

[Sephiroth]

Originally Posted by ianch99

All this energy trying to validate historical "mistakes" made by the new Leader of the Opposition when the current Government's mistakes are literally killing people.

Tribal politics at its best ..

As you clearly and outrageously demonstrate yourself.

There are better, less tribal ways of criticising the government in this novel situation.

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by Sephiroth

As you clearly and outrageously demonstrate yourself.

There are better, less tribal ways of criticising the government in this novel situation.

I await your objective critique of the Government's failures in handling this pandemic with baited breath.

[Sephiroth]

Originally Posted by ianch99

I await your objective critique of the Government's failures in handling this pandemic with baited breath.

Can't be bothered. We all know what they are; some think more, others think less. To my mind, btw, their biggest failing was not to suspect the worst at the outset - February or earlier.

I couldn't find a Public Health England quote from a couple of months ago, but there are several like this:

Message from The Department Of Education regarding
Coronavirus - Update 19.02.2020
We are continuing to keep you updated on the government’s response to
Coronavirus. Public Health England advises that the risk to individuals remains low.

https://www.walpolecrosskeysprimary....d=1&storyid=94

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by ianch99

All this energy trying to validate historical "mistakes" made by the new Leader of the Opposition when the current Government's mistakes are literally killing people.

Tribal politics at its best ..

A bit like all that historic rubbish that some threw up to discredit Boris. All a bit pointless really, but what's good fpr the goose....

---------- Post added at 20:35 ---------- Previous post was at 20:31 ----------

Originally Posted by ianch99

I await your objective critique of the Government's failures in handling this pandemic with baited breath.

Stop it, mate. The time for a review is when this has ended, and we will learn from this.

Right now, the government is concentrating on minimising impacts and chasing supplies. It really doesn't need a bunch of smart alecs criticising from the comfort of their armchairs.

Most people are reassured by what the government is doing, so I think we can take from that the government cannot be that far off track.

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

A bit like all that historic rubbish that some threw up to discredit Boris. All a bit pointless really, but what's good fpr the goose....

---------- Post added at 20:35 ---------- Previous post was at 20:31 ----------



Stop it, mate. The time for a review is when this has ended, and we will learn from this.

Right now, the government is concentrating on minimising impacts and chasing supplies. It really doesn't need a bunch of smart alecs criticising from the comfort of their armchairs.

Most people are reassured by what the government is doing, so I think we can take from that the government cannot be that far off track.

Stop what exactly? Seeking the truth and stopping mistakes being repeated? You may be content with a Ministry of Truth but many are not.

You know what you have said could be have been taken almost verbatim from a 1950's Soviet Party handbook Sort of ironic ..

This is not a coronavirus thread, or the school playground.

Stop acting like children and get back to the topic at hand.

[ianch99]

Johnson clearly out of his depth at PMQ:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1258006926778150912

Starmer begins on UK’s death toll & says this is not “apparent success” (reflecting words of the PM on steps on Downing Street Apr 27). “How on earth did it come to this?”
PM: “At this stage I don’t think the data is there to draw conclusions”
Starmer: “These your slides’

[papa smurf]

Originally Posted by ianch99

Johnson clearly out of his depth at PMQ:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1258006926778150912

Starmer was like a damp rag, pmq's are going to be lack luster with him questioning Boris. at least jezzer had passion.

[1andrew1]

Originally Posted by papa smurf

Starmer was like a damp rag, pmq's are going to be lack luster with him questioning Boris. at least jezzer had passion.

Getting nostalgic for Jezza? I thought I'd never see the day!
I almost had to call 999 as Johnson was being murdered by Sir Keir in PMQ today!

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by ianch99

Johnson clearly out of his depth at PMQ:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1258006926778150912

Not as I see it.

Starter must learn that he has to take the public with him.

[Mr K]

Originally Posted by Pierre

Not as I see it.

Starter must learn that he has to take the public with him.

That's not how the Torygraph saw it.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics...starmer-looks/

.Bring back Jeremy Corbyn. At the despatch box he was a Conservative prime minister’s dream opponent. Forever asking questions that were vague and garbled. Barely seeming to listen to the answers. And so easy to dismiss by quoting something absurd he’d said in his distant, or indeed recent, past.

Suddenly, though, PMQs has become markedly harder. Mr Corbyn’s successor, Sir Keir Starmer, is efficient, well prepared and deadly calm. His questions, meanwhile, are as precise as a dentist’s drill – and about as much fun to face.

Today Boris Johnson encountered him at PMQs for the first time. The Prime Minister did not look entirely at ease. In fact, he seemed unusually subdued: polite, cautious, conciliatory. Very much on his best behaviour. It was a bit like watching Bertie Wooster in the dock for pinching a policeman’s helmet on the night of the Boat Race. Gamely attempting to answer the prosecution’s questions as best he could, while averting his eyes from the withering glare of the beak.

Sir Keir asked Mr Johnson why he thought Britain had the world’s second highest death rate. The Prime Minister argued that it was pointless to compare the death rates of different countries. Sir Keir reminded him that the Government’s own scientists do exactly that, by publishing a daily chart plotting Britain’s death rate against other countries’. He held up a print-out of the latest chart, as if to jog the Prime Minister’s memory.

Next Sir Keir asked why the Government had “not got to grips with” the crisis in care homes: deaths there, he noted, were continuing to rise. Mr Johnson insisted Sir Keir was “not right... If he looks at the figures in the last few days, there has been a palpable improvement.”

Sir Keir held up another sheet of paper. It was, he explained politely, a print-out of the slide that the Government had published at its news conference the previous evening – “which sadly shows that deaths in care homes have been rising every time they have been reported.”

There was no scorn in Sir Keir’s tone. Nor any sense that he was proving the Prime Minister wrong to score a point. It was just a composed, methodical straightening of the facts. Yet this was not about some trivial, nitpicky little detail. It was about whether the Prime Minister knew if deaths in care homes were going up, or going down. Apparently he did not.

The Labour leader turned to testing. On the last day of April, Matt Hancock had claimed to have hit his target of carrying out 100,000 tests a day. Since then, however, the number of tests had fallen significantly. “What does the Prime Minister think was so special about April 30,” asked Sir Keir, “which meant that testing that particular day was so high?”

A deftly worded question, because Sir Keir knew there was no real way to answer it. Except perhaps to say, “Well, Your Honour – I mean, Mr Speaker – the Health Secretary had publicly set himself a target of 100,000 tests a day ‘by the end of the month’. And the day before, he was still nowhere near it. So he fudged the figures on April 30 by chucking 40,000 home-testing kits in the post. And after that… well, the numbers didn’t matter so much then, did they? He’d already won, hadn’t he?”

[jfman]

Originally Posted by Pierre

Not as I see it.

Starter must learn that he has to take the public with him.

The death count will do that eventually. No amount of puff pieces by a favourable press will cover it up in the end.

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by Pierre

Not as I see it.

Starter must learn that he has to take the public with him.

You need to be more objective. Andrew Neil, a renowned labour supporter, is complementary of the new Labour leader:

Six, forensic, fact-based, important questions from Keir Starmer to the PM, asked in a courteous manner. The PM did not always give full and proper answers. But one thing clear in the waffle: we stopped track and trace March 12 because we simply didn’t have the testing capacity.

Yeah Starmer did well, definitely a step-up from Corbyn. He is getting clear and pointed questions across instead of dithering and failing to follow up on gaffs. I think he has managed the balance between not going on full attack mode during a crisis but questioning the response.