The Thin End

The UK government incompetency has cost lives.   So many voters invested their hopes in Prime Minister Boris Johnson.  That hope has been cruelly dashed.  It will take time for this to impact in opinion polls, although the first signs of shifting public opinion are there. The Leader of the Labour party, Keir Starmer, now offers a different style of leadership.  The contrast is stark.  The rambling, incoherent dishonesty of Boris Johnson, or the clear, inciteful, yet compassionate approach of Sir Keir.   The one evokes doubt and uncertainty; the other, confidence in an ability to deliver. Faithfully doing as they were advised, UK citizens have been suckered into a strategy to protect, not the NHS, but the Tory government. Thousands of lives have been lost in so doing.  That is the tragedy. So many voters put their trust in Mr Johnson as the Prime Minister to deliver Brexit.  However, it is now apparent, he had little else to offer.  Of c...

Test, track and treat must be an essential ingredient coming out of COVID-19 lockdown.  This was acknowledged by the British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, in his statement to the House of Commons today spelling out a little more detail of the strategy moving forward.  With more testing, it will be possible to predict at a more localised level in the community where infections will spread and target both community testing and more social interventions on high-risk areas in the future.  This might then prevents further national lockdown in response to any rebound of the virus.  The Prime Minister rightly refers to the R-value in informing strategy. It represents the rate of infection - or how many people can be infected by another.  At the outset, this was above 3, and anything above one means a dramatic increase in infections and deaths.  The Prime Minister also, on that basis, is right that there might be a need for differences in approach in di...

Prime Minister Boris Johnson was surprisingly upbeat at his news conference in saying effectively that the United Kingdom will see the Covid-19 crisis through in twelve weeks, or as he put it 'turn the tide'.   Was he right to be so optimistic? It is always good for leaders to offer hope and maintain morale, but where is Boris getting his twelve-week estimate from? Boris' twelve weeks probably comes from the modelling.   The models predict that 50% of cases will come in the first three weeks and 90% over nine weeks.  Currently, we see cases doubling about every four days, which is very much in line with the modelling. The governments objective is to delay the peak, pulling it out so that the burden on the NHS is reduced.  It is a strategy to buy time.   If it works, it might save lives because it will free up resources to deal with the severity of cases. Nonetheless, challenging life and death decisions will have to be taken by clinicians about who ...

Boris Johnson is accused of using divisive language and stirring up hatred.  He doesn't care, because the division is precisely the current Tory strategy.   The Johnson strategy is the country will divide on Brexit lines; yes, he could lose some soft-Brexit Tories, but they hope to sweep up those who voted for The Brexit Party.  It is a strategy of going for broke.  What they lose on the swings they hope to gain on the roundabouts. The LibDems have also gone for broke.  They hope to gain from the division on Brexit lines, with Remainers deserting Labour.   Labour it is feared will be squeezed in the middle. Labour's only hope in a general election is that a sufficient number of remain voters will see that the only way to stop Brexit is to have a people's vote.  For that, a sensible and credible deal is needed. So, currently, the proposition for voters is: Vote Tory for a no-deal Brexit; vote LibDem to stop Brexit; or vote Labour for a negotiate...

Former Prime Minister David Cameron, who fled the scene following the Brexit vote in the referendum in 2016 has now rejoined the fray.  He rode into battle waving his new book and stating what we all knew, that Boris Johnson doesn't believe a word of what it is that Boris says about Brexit.  David Cameron knows Boris well, alas. They were at Oxford together in the notorious Bullingdon Club, noted for its wealthy members, grand banquets, boisterous rituals, and somewhat destructive behaviour, including the vandalisation of restaurants and students' rooms.  Wrecking things is for them a strategy, good fun for the elitists they feel they are.  I suppose that is why Boris has set about wrecking our constitution.   Meanwhile, students at Boris Johnson's former Oxford College have launched a petition calling for him to be banned from College grounds.  I have no doubt, if I were a student at Balliol, I would support this motion…well almost…I would, how...