At the beginning of all of this, I really was prepared, and I did try (I did, I did, I really did), to give the government the benefit of the doubt over their handling of the Covid-19 crisis. But as time goes on and more information comes to light, I'm no longer willing to do that. So, to business and another rant. Being in isolation (and up a ladder painting) gives me plenty of time to mull things over.
I'm not alone in thinking that, when the history of this pandemic is written, one of the villains of the story will be our beloved PM. At a time of global emergency, he seems to be living down to the very worst expectations of his critics and was absent from duty (no, not just because of his illness). In a seriously damning article – and moreover one in a traditionally Tory-supporting newspaper – the Sunday Times laid out the evidence for BJ’s disturbing lack of diligence and interest in performing the task which he so eagerly sought. The position of Prime Minister is one which he has lied in order to get and, let's be honest, it should come as no surprise that he is not performing honestly or with honour in a position which he acted so dishonestly and dishonourably to win. No surprise then but, even so, it’s still shocking to see the extent of it laid bare. The article itself is accessible by subscription only, but some kind soul has published an archive version which is free for all to read. If you haven’t already done so, you should read it now. And you should also make sure that everyone you know reads it too, especially those who still have some lingering trust in the good faith of this British government to look after our interests. The link to the full article is HERE.
It has been known for some time that a pandemic was one of the most serious threats that the world faced. Like an earthquake in California, no scientist could say when the big one would strike, they could only warn that it was inevitable that at some point it would. It would be bad enough if the British government was warned that a serious crisis was in the offing and it did nothing. But it's worse than that. Between 2001 and 2010 the UK was a world leader in terms of its preparations and planning for a pandemic. However, when the Conservatives took office, the British government ran down its preparations, defunded them and deliberately neglected them in order to focus on Brexit and austerity. They knew the earthquake was coming, and they deliberately undermined the foundations of the house in order to give tax breaks to the wealthy. Calls to order PPE fell on deaf ears. Scientific warnings went unheeded.
At the start of February, when it ought to have been clear that a major catastrophe was about to befall us unless immediate action was taken, Boris Johnson gave a speech in London in which he likened the UK to a superhero defying the virus to keep free trade going. It was the crassest example imaginable of delusional British exceptionalism. Boris Johnson was determined to keep the economy running, while other nations went into lockdown. We obviously were made of sterner stuff than the Italians or Chinese. In the words of a senior Downing Street advisor quoted by the Sunday Times article, “We were the envy of the world but pandemic planning became a casualty of the austerity years when there were more pressing needs.” Those more pressing needs were to run down public services and to pursue a no-deal Brexit. People are dying because the British state, the Conservative party, could only handle one idea at a time.
We have learned that, even as the true dangers of this pandemic were coming to light, Boris Johnson couldn’t be bothered to attend the first five Cobra meetings, being too preoccupied with his personal life. He wasn’t interested in chairing meetings. Colleagues were told to keep briefing papers short, because the Prime Minister couldn’t be arsed to read anything longer than a page. And instead of attending and chairing vital meetings to plan the UK’s response to the looming threat of Covid-19, Boris Johnson preferred to spend time relaxing with his girlfriend, and trying to repair the rift his new relationship had created between himself and his children.
Now the UK is on course to be the European state with the highest death toll from this virus, both in absolute terms and per head of population. It’s for good reason that the Conservative government only publishes the statistics for deaths in hospitals, because there are reports that there could already be as many as 7500 additional death in care homes on top of the 15,464 that the UK government’s figures admit to. This is the estimate made by the care home organisation Care England, and it’s several times higher than the estimate of 1500 made by the British government. If this estimate is accurate this would take the true number of deaths from the virus in the UK to around 23000, a death toll which is the same of that of Italy and greater than Spain’s. And we’ve not seen the last yet. The blame for this lies squarely with Boris Johnson and the British government which he leads. Still want to clap for Boris? There are 15,464 people plus God knows how many more who won’t be clapping for anything ever again.
The catalogue of errors and missteps is legion. Far from ensuring that the UK possessed sufficient stockpiles of PPE to see the NHS through a pandemic, in January this year this British government exported hundreds of thousands of items from its stockpile to China. The government initially believed that this epidemic was going to act like the regular outbreaks of flu, and so pursued its disastrous herd immunity strategy. It was only after the realisation dawned that Covid-19 is not like the flu, that as many as 250,000 would have to die before sufficient natural immunity built up within the population was the policy abandoned. Or at least we were told it was abandoned. We are still nowhere near the level of testing required in order to achieve the kind of test, trace, isolate policy which has allowed countries like South Korea or Singapore to contain the epidemic successfully. The Sunday Times tells us, in the final indignity, that the British model of epidemic preparedness was adopted by Singapore, the difference is that Singapore implemented it whereas the UK abandoned it to pursue Brexit and austerity.
We see the UK’s lack of planning and preparedness in the fact that it’s one of the few places in Europe where travellers can fly in without having to go into quarantine. As a consequence the UK is now a magnet for the super rich who are using their private jets to come to the UK to escape more severe restrictions elsewhere.
We’re living in a state where a 99 year old man seems to do more to assist the NHS than the British government. Tom Moore is rightly hailed for his magnificent efforts, but a society only needs to rely on charity when government has failed. It is a scandal that public services have to be funded by the efforts of an elderly man doing a marathon around his garden on a zimmer frame.
Boris Johnson has given abundance evidence to those who said that he merely wanted to win the job of Prime Minister, he didn’t actually want to do it. It was always, and is now, an exercise in entitlement and egoism from a supremely privileged charlatan. As a result of the negligence, lack of preparedness, complacency, and sheer outright British exceptionalist arrogance of the Westminster government which he leads, thousands of British citizens may have died needlessly. We are paying for his entitlement with our lives.
In any other profession, Boris Johnson would be facing charges of negligence. As it is, he will try to ride out this storm, and then deflect criticisms by promising a public enquiry after the crisis is over. This will be a public enquiry in the long tradition of British public enquiries, full of activity, witnesses, and earnest promises which will conclude by telling us that a couple of minor civil servants may have been less than diligent in performing their duties while letting the likes of Boris Johnson off free.
What ought to be written on the political tombstone of this Conservative government are the words of a senior advisor within the Department of Health who told the Sunday Times, “We could have been Germany but instead we were doomed by our incompetence, our hubris and our austerity.”
40 new hospitals was a lie. We are better prepared for a pandemic than anywhere else was a lie. £350M for the NHS when we leave the EU was a lie. 50,000 extra nurses was a lie. There’s plenty of PPE to go round was a lie. There’s plenty of opportunities awaiting the UK once we leave the EU was a lie.
Anywhere where there’s a properly functioning democracy, a government would not survive a scandal of this magnitude. Where incompetence and deceit on such an epic scale has been revealed, the Prime Minister would resign and the government would fall. But this is the UK, not a properly functioning democracy. This is a government which cannot be held to account. And let's remember, Boris and his dysfunctional team were only elected to deliver Brexit, not to give us competent governance.
I'm not alone in thinking that, when the history of this pandemic is written, one of the villains of the story will be our beloved PM. At a time of global emergency, he seems to be living down to the very worst expectations of his critics and was absent from duty (no, not just because of his illness). In a seriously damning article – and moreover one in a traditionally Tory-supporting newspaper – the Sunday Times laid out the evidence for BJ’s disturbing lack of diligence and interest in performing the task which he so eagerly sought. The position of Prime Minister is one which he has lied in order to get and, let's be honest, it should come as no surprise that he is not performing honestly or with honour in a position which he acted so dishonestly and dishonourably to win. No surprise then but, even so, it’s still shocking to see the extent of it laid bare. The article itself is accessible by subscription only, but some kind soul has published an archive version which is free for all to read. If you haven’t already done so, you should read it now. And you should also make sure that everyone you know reads it too, especially those who still have some lingering trust in the good faith of this British government to look after our interests. The link to the full article is HERE.
It has been known for some time that a pandemic was one of the most serious threats that the world faced. Like an earthquake in California, no scientist could say when the big one would strike, they could only warn that it was inevitable that at some point it would. It would be bad enough if the British government was warned that a serious crisis was in the offing and it did nothing. But it's worse than that. Between 2001 and 2010 the UK was a world leader in terms of its preparations and planning for a pandemic. However, when the Conservatives took office, the British government ran down its preparations, defunded them and deliberately neglected them in order to focus on Brexit and austerity. They knew the earthquake was coming, and they deliberately undermined the foundations of the house in order to give tax breaks to the wealthy. Calls to order PPE fell on deaf ears. Scientific warnings went unheeded.
At the start of February, when it ought to have been clear that a major catastrophe was about to befall us unless immediate action was taken, Boris Johnson gave a speech in London in which he likened the UK to a superhero defying the virus to keep free trade going. It was the crassest example imaginable of delusional British exceptionalism. Boris Johnson was determined to keep the economy running, while other nations went into lockdown. We obviously were made of sterner stuff than the Italians or Chinese. In the words of a senior Downing Street advisor quoted by the Sunday Times article, “We were the envy of the world but pandemic planning became a casualty of the austerity years when there were more pressing needs.” Those more pressing needs were to run down public services and to pursue a no-deal Brexit. People are dying because the British state, the Conservative party, could only handle one idea at a time.
We have learned that, even as the true dangers of this pandemic were coming to light, Boris Johnson couldn’t be bothered to attend the first five Cobra meetings, being too preoccupied with his personal life. He wasn’t interested in chairing meetings. Colleagues were told to keep briefing papers short, because the Prime Minister couldn’t be arsed to read anything longer than a page. And instead of attending and chairing vital meetings to plan the UK’s response to the looming threat of Covid-19, Boris Johnson preferred to spend time relaxing with his girlfriend, and trying to repair the rift his new relationship had created between himself and his children.
The catalogue of errors and missteps is legion. Far from ensuring that the UK possessed sufficient stockpiles of PPE to see the NHS through a pandemic, in January this year this British government exported hundreds of thousands of items from its stockpile to China. The government initially believed that this epidemic was going to act like the regular outbreaks of flu, and so pursued its disastrous herd immunity strategy. It was only after the realisation dawned that Covid-19 is not like the flu, that as many as 250,000 would have to die before sufficient natural immunity built up within the population was the policy abandoned. Or at least we were told it was abandoned. We are still nowhere near the level of testing required in order to achieve the kind of test, trace, isolate policy which has allowed countries like South Korea or Singapore to contain the epidemic successfully. The Sunday Times tells us, in the final indignity, that the British model of epidemic preparedness was adopted by Singapore, the difference is that Singapore implemented it whereas the UK abandoned it to pursue Brexit and austerity.
We see the UK’s lack of planning and preparedness in the fact that it’s one of the few places in Europe where travellers can fly in without having to go into quarantine. As a consequence the UK is now a magnet for the super rich who are using their private jets to come to the UK to escape more severe restrictions elsewhere.
We’re living in a state where a 99 year old man seems to do more to assist the NHS than the British government. Tom Moore is rightly hailed for his magnificent efforts, but a society only needs to rely on charity when government has failed. It is a scandal that public services have to be funded by the efforts of an elderly man doing a marathon around his garden on a zimmer frame.
Boris Johnson has given abundance evidence to those who said that he merely wanted to win the job of Prime Minister, he didn’t actually want to do it. It was always, and is now, an exercise in entitlement and egoism from a supremely privileged charlatan. As a result of the negligence, lack of preparedness, complacency, and sheer outright British exceptionalist arrogance of the Westminster government which he leads, thousands of British citizens may have died needlessly. We are paying for his entitlement with our lives.
In any other profession, Boris Johnson would be facing charges of negligence. As it is, he will try to ride out this storm, and then deflect criticisms by promising a public enquiry after the crisis is over. This will be a public enquiry in the long tradition of British public enquiries, full of activity, witnesses, and earnest promises which will conclude by telling us that a couple of minor civil servants may have been less than diligent in performing their duties while letting the likes of Boris Johnson off free.
What ought to be written on the political tombstone of this Conservative government are the words of a senior advisor within the Department of Health who told the Sunday Times, “We could have been Germany but instead we were doomed by our incompetence, our hubris and our austerity.”
40 new hospitals was a lie. We are better prepared for a pandemic than anywhere else was a lie. £350M for the NHS when we leave the EU was a lie. 50,000 extra nurses was a lie. There’s plenty of PPE to go round was a lie. There’s plenty of opportunities awaiting the UK once we leave the EU was a lie.
Anywhere where there’s a properly functioning democracy, a government would not survive a scandal of this magnitude. Where incompetence and deceit on such an epic scale has been revealed, the Prime Minister would resign and the government would fall. But this is the UK, not a properly functioning democracy. This is a government which cannot be held to account. And let's remember, Boris and his dysfunctional team were only elected to deliver Brexit, not to give us competent governance.
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