[Boiler]

Also said about Brexit, I believe.

[Nigredo]

Apparently 27 year old Tory MP for Bishop Auckland Dehenna Davison had a "Barnard Castle Eye Chart" poster on her background wall whilst asking a question at the Cummings hearing

It's all a laff innit? Winding up the lefties.

Seeing as she lost her dad in a random pub attack when she was 13, I would (incorrectly) think she would have plenty of empathy for those who've experienced unforeseen losses of loved ones in this pandemic.

Then again, I'm reading she married someone 35 years her senior so I reckon only a Freudian psychoanalyst is capable of unpacking what's going on in her head

[Crabcakes]

The covid news on the India variant isn’t good, and Johnson/Hancock appear to be passing the buck already so they can appease backbenchers and not stop opening up.

I suspect after all their trumpeting of “vaccines!” that when Johnson has to announce another national lockdown - and he will if he doesn’t do something fast, which he won’t - that their bounce may evaporate. They’re ahead in the polls because people think despite everything they’ve got us out of trouble. When it becomes apparent they’ve done no such thing people are going to become very angry very fast.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Johnson would take a small hit from putting the brake on reopening, but he got more popular when he stopped fucking about (belatedly). I don't know what he'll do if the situation continues to deteriorate.

[Crabcakes]

Regrettably, we’re about to find out:

[davidjay]

Is it ever going to end?

[mattomac]

The covid news on the India variant isn’t good, and Johnson/Hancock appear to be passing the buck already so they can appease backbenchers and not stop opening up.

I suspect after all their trumpeting of “vaccines!” that when Johnson has to announce another national lockdown - and he will if he doesn’t do something fast, which he won’t - that their bounce may evaporate. They’re ahead in the polls because people think despite everything they’ve got us out of trouble. When it becomes apparent they’ve done no such thing people are going to become very angry very fast.

I’m with you, I think it’s pretty damaging, some quite amusing takes came from the Eurovision stuff

The polls have bounced around like a pinball in a machine through the last year, they’ve sold this vaccine as the miracle it’s going dawn on a fair few this thing isn’t going anywhere even if Vaccines lead to less deaths.

I said when this roadmap was set out it was risky to open up fully when you didn’t have everyone offered one jab.

Won’t be setting foot in a gig or football stadium until 2 weeks after my second vaccine,

[kreuzberger]

It will end but the stumbling blocks are there for all to see. HMG knows this, of course, and that it why "certain communities" are being lined up for blame, and why the 21.07 date is now being put up for discussion and debate.

Those "certain communities" are of course Asians and that chimes easily in the minds of the easily-led with causation and the Indian variant.

Once the Spanish and Portuguese authorities realise that British pounds are just too damned expensive and follow the lead of France in shutting out British tourists, a domestic lockdown will be as good as guaranteed.

Racism and the resulting narrative of "vaccine hesitant Pakis" will get Johnson off the hook. Yet again.

The history books - admittedly only a year old - suggest that the early Autumn will be brutal but that that is just enough time for talk of Martha Kearney's precious Twithmaths being also under threat.

Facit: Johnson's idiocy has baked the better part of another year in to this.

[Tubby Isaacs]

[Boiler]

Is it ever going to end?

No.

On another forum someone is crowing that he predicted this would happen and when several months ago. When I repeated his thoughts on a motoring forum, I got flamed big time.

[Crabcakes]

Johnson would take a small hit from putting the brake on reopening, but he got more popular when he stopped fucking about (belatedly). I don't know what he'll do if the situation continues to deteriorate.

Key difference - last lockdown was in winter. If he has to put the skids on now, he'll have fucked everyone's summer. Being serious when it was needed earned him a bounce. Having to do it *again* when we all know exactly why the Indian variant got here is going to meet with a different response because his seriousness should have meant this didn't happen.

[Bones McCoy]

Is it ever going to end?

No.

On another forum someone is crowing that he predicted this would happen and when several months ago. When I repeated his thoughts on a motoring forum, I got flamed big time.

No, they will continue the search until they find the Dacre they want.

[Youngian]

Meanwhile in the Miliverse, PM Ed approaches Hugh Grant to replace the previous appointee Max Mosley.

[Watchman]

Any comment from The Board of of Deputies on the Prime Minister meeting with an unrepentant anti-Semite?

[Samanfur]

From the Good Law Project, on PPE contracts:

Patel, Mirza and the Middlemen

[Cyclist]

Labour is calling for an investigation into two donations allegedly made to the Conservative Party from companies which had ceased to exist.

Labour's chairwoman has asked political donations watchdog Electoral Commission to look into the £16,000...


...One was for a sum of £10,000 made in November 2019 by a company called Stridewell Estates. Government records indicate that the firm had been dissolved three years previously...


...The second donation was made in June 2017 by a company called Unionist Buildings Limited which had apparently been dissolved in January of that year...


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-57325474

Nothing to see here, move along.

[Bones McCoy]

Labour is calling for an investigation into two donations allegedly made to the Conservative Party from companies which had ceased to exist.

Labour's chairwoman has asked political donations watchdog Electoral Commission to look into the £16,000...


...One was for a sum of £10,000 made in November 2019 by a company called Stridewell Estates. Government records indicate that the firm had been dissolved three years previously...


...The second donation was made in June 2017 by a company called Unionist Buildings Limited which had apparently been dissolved in January of that year...


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-57325474

Nothing to see here, move along.

And they told us they didn't believe in ghosts.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Good thread here, by a guy from the excellent London Reconnections. More political than they allow their site to be.

[Cyclist]

Poor grammar? Or a statement of intent?

[Samanfur]

Yes.