United Kingdom VI: Summer Lovin'

[Neon Ignition]

Is anyone getting more roadworks in their area?

Thought Hunslet Road was dying down with the roadworks and then I get the bus to town yesterday and there's now MORE roadworks than there were this time last April.

They must be terraforming the place.

Definitely, they popped up like mad in Lockdown 01 but it's worse this time because the road traffic is still around. They still never seem to make a good change or fix the right things either

Am I right in thinking that lower testing is probably a good sign?
I mean if less people are being tested it means less people are showing symptoms & therefore should be less cases or have I got that wrong?

In other Vaccine news Katie is booked for her first jab on Friday @ 5pm

Neil

In theory it should be but with this Government at the helm you can never rely on it being a good thing. It's dipped before only to see surges and seems at equally at the mercy of how its run as it is at demand. Hopefully it remains consistent so a pattern of confirmed cases falling becomes clearer.

[fallenangle]

It always happens at this time of year.

Local councils, particularly, Labour, love spending Council Tax payers money and every year in January and February they use up anything they have left over on the road budget for repairs and other 'projects'. Typical sign is new street furniture and pavements, roads and cycle lanes with with numerous spray painted areas for repair or new road markings.

If the winter has not been harsh ie. they've not had to spend money on road salting and snow ploughs then bigger road related 'projects' get the go ahead.

The number of half-arsed, poorly managed and, worst of all, poorly finished, road and related 'projects' my local council has wasted our money on over the last four or five years just in the small area within a mile of my home must be in double figures. That is all despite them bleating about wicked central government funding shortfalls. They still spend.

[QualityChimp]

Not the world's biggest Morgan fan, but love it when he gives 'em a good grilling.
It's important to remember just who watches GMB. It's not me, but it's a lot of Tory voters, who need to see this kind of evasion.

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[MartyG]

I really do think that if ministers refuse to answer simple questions put to them that the anchors should end the interviews. There's really little point in having them on for more than a couple of minutes if they are only there to gaslight, take that ability away from them.

[wheelaa]

A rather grim death toll announced today, but signs are there that infection rates are dropping. Deaths likely to go up for a while though as the earlier higher infecton rates follow through to those who recover and those who don't.

More personally, things are a lot quieter in my area right now, at least compared to the gap between L2 and L3. I'm not sensing L1 levels of inactivity, but mask wearing seems good (even before the supermarket bans). A good thing too, we were just sub 1000 cases per 100k, but the last week or so of rolling weekly figures has seen that steadily drop to 650 odd. Although I'm shopping a lot more as I cover some shielders, inside the stores has so far been superb, in terms mask wearing, people keeping a distance, stock, general experience.

[Golgo]

I really do think that if ministers refuse to answer simple questions put to them that the anchors should end the interviews. There's really little point in having them on for more than a couple of minutes if they are only there to gaslight, take that ability away from them.

I agree. That interview was absurdist, you might as well have spent 90 seconds listening to the Goon Show. But the trouble is I think government would very much like not having to appear in compromising situations like that.

[cutmymilk]

I cant stand either, and piers is great for being the simon Cowell of interviewers. In hancock's defence, there is a range of feeling between regret and no regret so I understand his inability to answer such a question.

[Cassius_Smoke]

Not the world's biggest Morgan fan, but love it when he gives 'em a good grilling.
It's important to remember just who watches GMB. It's not me, but it's a lot of Tory voters, who need to see this kind of evasion.

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Show's the Torys are soulless ****ers.

[Dogg Thang]

I cant stand either, and piers is great for being the simon Cowell of interviewers. In hancock's defence, there is a range of feeling between regret and no regret so I understand his inability to answer such a question.

What's in the range? "I kind of sort of regret it a little but actually not much"? "I don't really regret it but maybe a touch"? "I do regret it but I can still feel good about it"? He actually could have said any of those things. Even if it wasn't purely a yes or no question, he could have answered the actual question.

[Soundwave]

That was trumps reasoning we are only having a high number of cases because we test more stop testing cases go away

No - it just means it was the weekend and capacity was lower, the important bit is percentage of positive tests, not the overall number of tests.

Last 14 days of percentage of positive tests (oldest at top)

14.51%
13.29%
12.67%
13.73%
13.08%
13.71%
13.11%
12.50%
9.44%
10.98%
9.67%
8.86%
9.50%
8.48%

So it is starting to trend downwards, which you would hope you'd start seeing with another lockdown.

In theory it should be but with this Government at the helm you can never rely on it being a good thing. It's dipped before only to see surges and seems at equally at the mercy of how its run as it is at demand. Hopefully it remains consistent so a pattern of confirmed cases falling becomes clearer.

Thanks guys.
I wasn't sure if there was always a set amount of daily tests made available & based on that number could tell how many were going in for tests on a day & could work out how the transmission would be going.

Neil

[Nu-Eclipse]

I really do think that if ministers refuse to answer simple questions put to them that the anchors should end the interviews. There's really little point in having them on for more than a couple of minutes if they are only there to gaslight, take that ability away from them.

This I thoroughly agree with you on.

[Asura]

Concerning Piers Morgan, I haven't watched that interview yet - but I assume, like everything he does, his opinion is primed and maximally calibrated to produce the greatest amount of notoriety for Piers Morgan.

[cutmymilk]

At the time they said there were better ways to deal with families who can't afford to feed children in the holidays than to give them extra money (the original idea). They never fleshed it out as they were under so much pressure to provide packed lunches. He should have cited that but piers and his ways makes it hard for anyone to think.

[Dogg Thang]

I haven’t yet an interview that suggests he ever has an easy time thinking.

[Hohum]

I was never a fan of Piers, but during this pandemic he's called out various MPs on their lies, hypocrisy and utter incompetence, so fair play to him.