Letter to the Business Secretary to get more back to work

Dear Alok,

It is imperative more is done to rescue and help businesses that rely on social contact. Too many companies in events, leisure, travel and tourism are badly damaged by anti CV 19 rules, and some remain completely closed.

One way forward which could provide urgent relief short of repealing the Controls that do the damage is to help businesses adapt their ventilation and heating systems to make them safer. There is plenty of research saying that if a restaurant, hotel, meeting room has a system for extracting stale air promptly and replacing it with clean air it can offer a safer environment. Extraction from the top and supply of new air from the bottom greatly cuts the spread of the virus and other contagions in the circulating air.

I understand your department is responsible for these policies for the public sector and has done work on suitable advice and shared technical research for the private sector. Will you now make this more public? Will you provide advice and where appropriate adaptation grants to business to get this done quickly for all who wish to go this way? Could there be a CV19 standard for air change which those who wished could reach, showing their certification to reassure customers? Will you lead the public sector in adapting government and Council buildings?

We must do more to save all those businesses. Best of all would be a clear exit plan from restrictions generally.

232 Comments

  1. Brian Cowling
    October 25, 2020

    I’ve filed this with the plan that Welsh supermarkets should sell raw carrots but not the pot to boil them in, although you can eat cooked ones if they are provided by the supermarket’s cafe (near someone else, unmasked naturally, close by).

    Enough! Let’s get back to normal and back to work. In the meantime if you want fresh air when you eat, then do so, outside, properly attired.

    1. Longinus
      October 25, 2020

      I see the man who pulled some cellophane off a shelf of ‘non-essential’ items in a supermarket in Wales is to be charged with criminal damage. In Bristol, the police stood and watched BLM demonstrators tear down a grade 1 listed statue and throw it into the harbour. The law should be applied equally to everyone or there will be trouble ahead.

    2. Sir Joe Soap
      October 25, 2020

      Good for the Welsh lad who pulled off the ridiculous polythene shielding over banned clothing, and for the chap who went into the supermarket practically naked on the basis that clothes aren’t essential. People finally wanting to stop the rot. People of this age have negligible chance of suffering badly with the virus.

      At the risk of providing ideas, why don’t we place a worldwide ban on the growing and sale of nuts, wheat, milk, shellfish, soy and many other things that harm 0.01% of the population in case they eat them by mistake?

      1. Sir Joe Soap
        October 25, 2020

        Of course this lad has now been arrested. Clearly a crime more worthy of imprisonment than tearing down and defacing statues. What on earth is going on?

      2. Martin in Cardiff
        October 26, 2020

        If you support criminal damage, then presumably you’re OK about the unauthorised taking down of the statues of slavers?

        For the record, I think that it is quite right that due process of law took place and the perpetrators were tried.

    3. Dave Andrews
      October 25, 2020

      Clothing is regarded as non-essential and can’t be sold, however booze is essential and can be.

    4. Narrow Shoulders
      October 25, 2020

      I tend to agree.

      The population needs to know how the infected are catching the disease, is it in pubs, supermarkets, gyms or more likely at home from their kids and in hospitals?

      If the R rate in leisure facilities is low then open up and lets get on with life. I have films I want to see.

    5. Enigma
      October 25, 2020

      Agreed. Enough! Letā€™s get back to normal and back to work.

      1. steve
        October 25, 2020

        Enigma

        Well to my perception it won’t be long before people rise up and force a return to normality.

        This government, and to be fair others previously have been dicking all over the people for far too long, a change is on the way.

    6. Stephen Priest
      October 25, 2020

      Just a warning about FAKE COVID MARSHALLs

      As if the real Covid Marshall aren’t bad enough.

      The fake ones are knocking people doors demanding entry.

    7. Peter Wood
      October 25, 2020

      The Welsh first minister now trying to legislate what is ‘common sense’…

      I think that’s a good definition of an oxymoron..

      1. Mike Durrans
        October 25, 2020

        +1

  2. Ian Wragg
    October 25, 2020

    Get rid of the ridiculous social distancing rules. They are crippling the country.
    There is no exit strategy as total deaths are down and hospital admissions are normal.
    We’re being conned.

    1. Hope
      October 25, 2020

      Ian,
      Since the beginning it was obvious we would need to protect vulnerable and elderly, Great Barrington Declaration, the govt failed. It killed elderly by moving them from hospitals to care homes, it allowed flights from China and other hot spots saying it would not make any significant difference in stark contrast to current local lock downs! Lies, lies lies. Johnson, Hancock, Jenrick, Witty, Ferguson and Cummings could not even comply with what they imposed on the rest of us!

      The govt under Johnson does not know how to get out of its self destructive economic death spiral so it continues in the hope something might happen.

  3. Frances Truscott
    October 25, 2020

    A disturbing article in the Times yesterday claimed that the nhs had had instructions to red tag anyone over a certain age while offering high level icu to younger people with co morbidities..
    firstly now it is known that cpap can be enough. Secondly can individuals who wonā€™t be treated be given resilience advice such as oxygen concentrators. No point taking people into hospital if they are then not to be treated. Whatever happened to the concept of individual and national resilience programs?
    Could someone be tasked to set up cpaps for non hospital patients.?

  4. J Bush
    October 25, 2020

    I want to know when the State will stop treating us like children and stop interfering in almost every aspect of our lives.

    Business owners and employees as a collective can’t be that thick, given politicians rely on what the private sector earn to keep themselves in their preferred lifestyles. Where else can an employee decide what pay rise and expenses they want?

    Or are are they, through their lack of experience of work in the real world and selfish greed, merely adding to the debt they create, which they pass onto the next generations to pay?

    I am of the opinion the loss of livelihood they are forcing on people and the debt they are creating is criminal.

    1. JoolsB
      October 25, 2020

      +1

    2. Hope
      October 25, 2020

      JB, I agree. 104% of GDP the worst figures since WWII! But this is self inflicted without good reason or scientific proof. Just spun bluster and lies.

      Johnson and the liberal left have No sense of family or loyality so do not care how many generations will pay for his stupidity. Generations not years. FFS wake up MPs

    3. Mark B
      October 25, 2020

      They can’t, they need to make themselves relevant. If people knew that politicians were not as important to our daily lives people would begin to ask why we need them at all ?

    4. steve
      October 25, 2020

      J Bush

      “I want to know when the State will stop treating us like children and stop interfering in almost every aspect of our lives.”

      It will stop when there’s a riot, a very big one.

  5. steve
    October 25, 2020

    JR

    “Could there be a CV19 standard for air change…?”

    I don’t see why not. After all, regulatory standards already exist for water storage etc to control legionnaires disease. So a regulatory mechanism is feasible.

    However, excellent as your suggestions are, I believe at this stage we have two principle issues –

    1) The crisis has been turned into political farce.
    2) The people themselves….poor standards of personal hygiene and lack of consideration for others.

    There is also the fact that many local authority office workers and GP’s are milking this crisis for everything they can get. They’ve become accustomed to a great number of coffee breaks and two hour lunch breaks while ‘working’ from home and not having to face those whom they are paid to serve.

    I suggest government tells publicly funded servants that if they do not return to their place of work it shall be understood they have resigned and forfeited their pensions.

    1. Ian Wragg
      October 25, 2020

      We have a sizeable capital gains tax bill to pay on the sale of a property.
      It’s over a month since the accountants submitted the calculations to the tax office, so far no response.
      Try contacting them by phone, impossible.

    2. Sir Joe Soap
      October 25, 2020

      not only LA workers and GPs.. the whole fabric seems to be torn between those in any quasi government role and the general public. After 7 months of stasis, bills not being sent by power companies, councils, courts etc, suddenly an avalanche of final demands just as redundancy notices also start rolling in.

      Council workers here were given 10 minutes to clear their desks and go home in March, but continued to charge businesses rates for their use of property when they themselves were working from home.

    3. Narrow Shoulders
      October 25, 2020

      Quite, the fallacy of “productivity” from home has now become embedded and due to fear from employers and government there is no counter argument being broadcast. Collaboration and team work has suffered, workers need to go in two or three days per week together.

      When everyone was fearful that they were being judged at the beginning I suspect that many workers might have been more productive: but as moving from bed, to breakfast to the kitchen table to work has become the norm so has a more relaxed attitude to output.

      It was noticeable before this all kicked off that in my organisation the workers who always claimed to be the most overworked and lacking time were indeed the home workers.

      The business does not get the commuting time back from the worker (and nor should they expect to) but there must be some quid pro quo from the worker, it is a two way street.

    4. Martin in Cardiff
      October 25, 2020

      If you are going to bring in regs for aircon and filtration, then there has to be an inspectorate, to make sure that the systems are installed and operated properly.

      The Tories don’t do inspectorates very well.

      Remember Grenfell Tower?

      1. Edward2
        October 25, 2020

        There already is a trade standard body which is called REFCOM
        HVAC companies cannot service and install such equipment without registering and complying with the standards required.
        Bit like GasSafe for plumbers.

    5. No Longer Anonymous
      October 25, 2020

      The virus has been likened to throwing a vial of glitter into a room. No amount of hygiene will stop it contaminating people.

      The fact is that the death rate is around 0.04% of those infected and 90% of those are very old and have identifiable comorbidities which can be shielded.

      Indeed. It seems that those most in favour of lockdowns are the ones least likely to lose their livelihoods.

    6. Alan Jutson
      October 25, 2020

      Covid air changes etc

      Perhaps someone should look at what cruise ships are doing/planning with regards to this subject.

      Installing hospital quality air filters into the systems and taking in more air from outside rather than recirculating existing.

      Problem is will the Greens object on the grounds of heating too much new cool air, and releasing too much “HOT AIR” into the atmosphere.

      Just needs some one to monitor the filters and the performance.

  6. Everhopeful
    October 25, 2020

    Hepa filters have been around for a while and they are supposed to filter out viruses. Assuming there are viruses around that is.
    I read about them at the beginning of this panto and wondered why they were not being used to …um …quell the terror.
    However it was then put about that air con actually exacerbates the spread of the wee spiny monster. Well…there couldnā€™t be a sane solution could there?
    So never mind…masks were discovered!

    1. Everhopeful
      October 25, 2020

      However one ordinary air con cost us nearly Ā£2000 so a struggling business may not be able to afford a specialised bigger/more units system.
      And would they want to get into even more hock with the untrustworthy ā€œ govtā€ if a loan were offered?

      1. Mark B
        October 25, 2020

        Correct. They also need to be properly maintained. And who is going to carry out the work ? It is not if there are a surplus of engineers and fitters just hanging around waiting for work.

    2. Dave Andrews
      October 25, 2020

      Our filtration for solder fumes uses high voltage to ionise contaminants and pull them out of the air using electrostatic attraction.
      As I understand it, the virus infection doesn’t move around as individuals, but teems in small droplets of water people expel. Once dried out, the virus is exposed to corrosive atmospheric oxygen and doesn’t last long. For a filter to be effective it just needs to remove the water droplets before they are inhaled by another victim.

  7. Mark B
    October 25, 2020

    Good morning.

    Throwing money at a non-problem is not going to solve anything. It will take time to implement such measures and by then this thing might just be over. Can we please stop with these panic measures and constant government interference ?!?!?!

    I am reading that English police officers are guarding the border between England and Wales , stopping UK citizens from going about their rightful business. It seem quite gauling that the police can do such a thing to our own people yet, cannot stop and arrest people who enter my country illegally.

    Governments are there to govern. If you cannot do that, then why bother ?

    1. Simeon
      October 25, 2020

      Sir John’s letter would have read far better had it consisted solely of the final sentence rejigged;

      Exit from all restrictions now.

      His failure to say so clearly, but instead propose more state spending, and then call for an ‘exit plan’, whatever that might be – and it would at least be a government plan, and therefore guaranteed to be damaging – is apparently the limit of what it is possible to say whilst remaining in the Conservative Party. Given which, what is the point?

      Sir John, you are, very simply, guilty by association. One can judge a man by the company they keep, and you have been keeping very bad company for three decades now. The most charitable explanation is that you have a bad case of Stockholm Syndrome. Are you one of the good guys, held captive against their will, and now, after many years, sadly Conservatively conditioned? Or are you a fully conscious and cognisant Conservative, standing shoulder to shoulder with weak-minded authoritarians (or instruments of a global conspiracy – or quite conceivably both) engaged in the destruction of people’s lives and livelihoods?

      1. No Longer Anonymous
        October 25, 2020

        I’ve long given up trying to defend our back benchers, Simeon.

        They are in on it.

        That the 30,000 doctor/scientist The Great Barrington Declaration is hidden from broadcast media view is sinister.

        So it’s over.

        I now blame the Tories (all of them) entirely for the economic and social catastrophe that is about to hit this country.

        The worst government and Prime Minister in British History.

        1. Simeon
          October 25, 2020

          I have a great deal of sympathy for the GBD, but even that lends Covid more credence than it deserves. I understand why they might not simply come out and say that it is no worse than a nasty strain of flu (though there have been much nastier strains of course). But given they’ve been ridiculed by the MSM anyway, why not?

          In the end, plenty of people have arrived at an appropriate response to Covid, but not yet enough to make a difference to public policy. And depressingly, a substantial majority will believe whatever the MSM tells them to believe. It is this virus that is the most damaging by many degrees of magnitude.

    2. Hope
      October 25, 2020

      Mark,
      Worse, read all the uman rights cases preventing foreign murderers being deported. More spin, lies and crap from Ueseless Patel today in the papers. She has the cheek to write her article to con people after her sneaky mass immigration policy put through on Thursday! Her dept bragging last week it has resettled more refugees than any other country! One of whom in the papers balding claiming to be a child! Cut salaries to allow more to come in, No number targets, come in and help yourself.

      My question to Patel would be: is she completely devoid of fact and reality? Her article discredits her and makes her look less than disingenuous.

      Highest historical figures on record for All forms of immigration.

    3. formula57
      October 25, 2020

      @ Mark B “…by then this thing might just be over” – ha ha!

      Alternatively, we may have years and years available in which to take ameliorative measures. How long should we wait to see?

    4. Narrow Shoulders
      October 25, 2020

      Priorities dear chap, priorities

      1. Mark B
        October 25, 2020

        PRIORITIES !!

        1. glen cullen
          October 25, 2020

          Correct – its been a priority of the voters in the past general and european elections……its the people’s priority

    5. Lifelogic
      October 25, 2020

      Indeed.

      Throwing money at a non-problems is what government and bureaucrats just love to do. Then they they claim they solved the non problems (or hugely exaggerated problems). Climate alarmism, slightly faster trains to birmingham, the tiny Covid second ripple not all but over, swine flu, bird flu, SARS, the millennium bug, passive smoking, the asbestos exaggerations, bee extinctions …..

    6. glen cullen
      October 25, 2020

      You will not find a single policeman at the Kent beaches

      1. Sea_Warrior
        October 25, 2020

        Our Army is big enough, and un-tasked enough, to put an observation post on every beach prone to assault by the dinghyists.

        1. glen cullen
          October 25, 2020

          They’re all on furlough

    7. Alan Jutson
      October 25, 2020

      Mark

      Should be the `Welsh Police force surely, as its their regulations that are threatened not the English ones.

      1. JoolsB
        October 25, 2020

        Doesnā€™t really matter as it will be the English taxpayer picking up the bill as usual courtesy of Johnā€™s Government. Johnson is yet again allowing the tail to wag the English dog.

  8. Stred
    October 25, 2020

    Alok and his like minded goons have already forced pubs and restaurants info so many one way circulation rules, closure of tables, registration procedures by apps and ordering by company apps that anyone who just wants to pop into the pub for a pie and pint would prefer to eat and drink at home.

    1. Lifelogic
      October 25, 2020

      Indeed and the food and drink is usually conserderable better too, more confortable. Plus we do not have the dire music – so I can hear what people are saying (and save on the VAT – indeed it is about 30% of the cost of eating out).

    2. DennisA
      October 25, 2020

      Exactly right. My wife and I have not been going out, not because we are afraid to, but because of the hassle of doing so.

      1. hat man
        October 25, 2020

        Same here. My wife and I won’t go out to a pub or restaurant until you politicians remove the restrictions.

        The sooner you get on with it, the fewer people will lose their jobs.

        No excuses.

      2. JoolsB
        October 25, 2020

        Ditto

      3. Martin in Cardiff
        October 26, 2020

        We were just saying the other day, how pleasant the pub gardens have been of late.

  9. SM
    October 25, 2020

    Sir John, I have just been given news of a dear cousin, in his late 30’s, who has had a severe mental breakdown that has been attributed to his being forced to work at home, holed up in a tiny boxroom, for months. Like most people, he had family demands on him, and despite being a usually cheerful and dependable chap, the sheer loneliness of home-working triggered this disaster.

    From what I have heard, this is by no means an exceptional occurrence now, so all the more reason to encourage, wherever possible, a return to the norm.

    1. SM
      October 25, 2020

      I should add that a few days ago, my cousin attempted suicide, but was found in time.

      1. Everhopeful
        October 25, 2020

        The cruelty of all this is staggering! Barbaric.
        The walls seem to close in and panic rises….
        What next one wonders.

      2. J Bush
        October 25, 2020

        So cruel.

        On a related matter, my son survived the first wave of redundancies the Business he works had to implement due to lost orders, but he is extremely worried he will not survive the second wave in December.

        What happens to people who lose their job through no fault of their own and there no other jobs to be had?

        The government is wholly responsible for what happened to your cousin and the worry my son has, along with, probably, millions of others.

        Despite all the weaselly words, the actions of this government scream it doesn’t care.

      3. Hope
        October 25, 2020

        How sad and unnecessary. If they live here the Govt should hang its head in shame.

      4. piglet
        October 25, 2020

        Very sorry to read this. This is the real legacy of the Govt’s policy response to the virus: prevention of the build-up of natural immunity among the population, and lives made miserable and (as some would see it) not worth living. Well done, Boris.

      5. Mark B
        October 25, 2020

        SM

        This is terrible news. Sorry to hear it and hope he can turn things around.

        On top of other contributor stories like Seawarrior there is going to be a terrible price to be paid from the ‘hidden harm’ this government has caused.

      6. Original Chris
        October 25, 2020

        Re my comment above and the comment on police using reasonable force, it should read (as Christopher Hope repored) “Yesterday MPs passed a law by 333 to 1 to let police use ‘reasonable’ force to detain and lock up people for not isolating”.

    2. Longinus
      October 25, 2020

      Same thing happened to a neighbour’s son. Psychotic breakdown.

    3. fedupsoutherner
      October 25, 2020

      SM. My condolences. I know exactly what you are talking about. My nephew is working from home in a small flat with wife and baby. The baby is in the room that is now his ‘office’ and the whole scenario is driving him mad. He feels like he never gets a break from noise and commotion and misses his work colleagues. My sister says he is really down and that’s not like him.

    4. Narrow Shoulders
      October 25, 2020

      And the darker mornings and evenings during Autumn and Winter are not going to help those stuck in their cramped surroundings.

      I wish your cousin well.

      1. Peter
        October 25, 2020

        +1

      2. Fred H
        October 25, 2020

        This latest clock ‘fall back’ an hour is a big mistake. Dark at 5pm, light in the morning for 2 hours before anybody needs it.

    5. Lifelogic
      October 25, 2020

      +1 and his risk from Covid is probably negligible anyway at that age.

    6. Alan Jutson
      October 25, 2020

      SM

      Yes, the majority of people are not suited to work from home for a whole range of reasons.

      Companies will eventually find this out as well when all of the working from home mistakes come to light through lack of updated information (workers being kept in the information loop)

  10. Everhopeful
    October 25, 2020

    Actually, seriously I donā€™t think they want to save anything.
    They are psychopaths.
    Hell bent on establishing communism, fascism, NWO ism…whatever unbalanced hellish scheme they are implementing.
    And of course,we,the ordinary folk havenā€™t got a clue. Whereas presumably MPs do!
    But we do know that civilisations have never destroyed an economy for a virus.
    And that is because the healthy need to keep going and the sick need economic support.
    We are in an abusive relationship with our ā€œgovernmentā€.
    It is terrorising and weaponising us.

    1. Caterpillar
      October 25, 2020

      Everhopeful,

      I have no idea what the UK’s governments are trying to establish if anything, but the rest of your comment is undoubtedly correct. Your concerns about psychopathy are well founded. Your comment about previous viruses is valid (e.g.UK flu from early 70s to early 80s and 1993 to 2000. A couple of decades as bad as CV, in the early 70s proportionately worse, but the economy was not closed awaiting the 2000 vaccine programme). The relationship is abusive; there is neither democracy nor freedom, we are spied on and the market system actively ripped up (in Wales the govt again decides what can be traded – children’s clothes are clearly a threat to society). And clearly for the Govt things are working, many have been successfully brainwashed, and the police have taken on the role of active persecution of those who only a year ago were simply members of society.

      The liberty destroying evil has won. The House of Commons is no such thing.

      It is time to change your name.

      1. Everhopeful
        October 25, 2020

        +1
        Notahopeinhell? Abandonallhope?

    2. Christine
      October 25, 2020

      Iā€™m beginning to wonder if this virus affects the brain. Our politicians seem to have lost their common sense. The idea of banning the sale of non-essential goods in supermarkets will only increase sales on-line. Like the man ripping the plastic off the illicit goods isle in Wales, itā€™s time people started to protest these nonsense restrictions. Prohibition never worked in the 1920s and it wonā€™t work now. How have these tin pot dictators been allowed to remove our liberties so easily?

    3. Hope
      October 25, 2020

      +1

      Measures should always be to help the sick and prevent its spread, as per the Health Act 1984, not lock up the healthy! Which the Health Act was not intended to be used for.

      It is an abuse bof the legislation by the govt. and ultra vires. The correct act not used because it would require scrutiny and parliament approval. JR and chums know it but do nothing to force govt to act properly. A bit like the huge salary hike, while imposing suffering on others, during lock down, accept it and keep quiet.

    4. Mark B
      October 25, 2020

      There is much truth in your second sentence.

      It is believed that the kind of person that can be a Barrister or a Solicitor usually draws from being a psychopath.

      No prizes as to what is the most common profession in politics šŸ˜‰

      1. Ed M
        October 26, 2020

        I know someone whose really successful in business – but who is also really honest and trustworthy (he also works hard – strong work ethic) and is actually too shy to be charming and manipulative. A lot of people have commented on this. He also has a lot of courage to be really honest in this world we live in today. He is, in other words, the complete opposite of a psychopath.

        I think psychopathy today is more and more the result of the kind of world we live in. That teaches the LIE that you have to be a charming, manipulative liar to do well in life.

        Charming, manipulative liars can do well in – in a way – but always at a big loss to themselves in some personal way – and deep down are miserable for it.

        1. Ed M
          October 26, 2020

          I also think psychopaths can choose not to be psychopaths. But takes a big amount of work (and frankly, I believe really requires divine grace to happen).

    5. bigneil(newercomp)
      October 25, 2020

      I agree with your words – even if they are completely opposite to your blogging name.

    6. DavidJ
      October 25, 2020

      Indeed, dancing to the tune of the globalists who are promoting a truly massive reduction in population.

    7. RichardP
      October 25, 2020

      +1

  11. Harry
    October 25, 2020

    It is imperative that more is done to bring to justice all those responsible for the destruction of the economy and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people denied treatment now an in the future. The entire political and media class is guilty of, at the very best, cowardice and incompetence and at the worst a criminal conspiracy to loot the country and enslave the people. None of the narratives put forward make sense and none of the policies are based on any science except that put forward by “experts” in the pay of vaccine companies.
    Jointly the ruling class have done more damage to this country and it’s people than Napoleon and Hitler put together. They need to answer for it.

  12. Leslie Singleton
    October 25, 2020

    Dear Sir John–I think the less of you for your climax today adding your weight to the easy-to-say desire for an Exit Plan, but there isn’t and cannot be one because nobody knows what the future holds on Covid. Better to accept that, rather than invent a Plan and spout more hot air. We are all crazy now and don’t have consensus, nor even close, on an Entrance never mind an Exit Plan. Keep calm and plod on.

  13. Sakara Gold
    October 25, 2020

    Only a safe and effective vaccine will end the nightmare for the economy and the NHS. On this front, there is some cheering good news. The Oxford/Astrazeneca vaccine, now undergoing a Phase III global trial involving thousands of volunteers, has been shown to induce a strong immune response.

    Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at the University of Oxford and lead on the Oxford vaccine trial said on Thursday:- “We are using new technology to examine exactly what the vaccine does when it gets inside a human cell.

    “The study confirms that large amounts of the coronavirus spike protein are produced with great accuracy, and this goes a long way to explaining the success of the vaccine in inducing a strong immune response.”

    This study remains to be peer reviewed, but the next step will be to vaccinate a susceptible cohort that have tested negative for virus antibodies and then expose them to the virus. So far, there are good scientific reasons to think that a high level of protection will be achieved.

    Astrazeneca is a British/Swedish company listed on the London Stock Exchange.

    1. Martin in Cardiff
      October 26, 2020

      Oh dear, what will the wet-lettuce right wingers find, over which to bleat victimhood then?

  14. matthu
    October 25, 2020

    We are beyond the stag where we tinker with ventilation systems.

    A former home secretary is reported as saying “With the Government and the people diverging in their views of how to get Britain out of this crisis, I fear we are witnessing the beginning of the steady disintegration of democracy itself in our country.

    “We are witnessing evidence of a growing revolt against the coronavirus lockdowns. Many people think the rules wonā€™t work and are prepared to defy the law if necessary to see their loved ones. They believe it is time to ā€˜get Britain back to normal.”

    1. matthu
      October 25, 2020

      12:00 noon:

      Is the above 7:30 comment too controversial, Sir John? It is David Blunkett’s comment reported in a national newspaper today. Most people would say he expresses himself very carefully.

      1. Leslie Singleton
        October 25, 2020

        Dear matthu–I think it wrong to base real decisions on pure emotion. If I read about another granny’s unhappiness at not being able to hug her grandchildren (serious but not that serious given what we face) I shall scream. On this basis we have no hope of dealing logically and scientifically with the challenges we face and that is what counts. We have somehow to become things like accurate and logical and a lot more simply correct.

        1. DaveK
          October 26, 2020

          Yet, things are not being dealt with logically or scientifically. Diverse scientific statements are discounted or smeared. Since most on here are intelligent, may I request you look on a site such as worldometers at the cases or deaths graphs for each country and attempt to determine the dates when government interventions occured.

  15. Everhopeful
    October 25, 2020

    BTW
    Apparently viruses do not do ā€œSecond Wavesā€.
    They just donā€™t.
    The idea came from history of 1918 flu and of course what with at that time the biggest movement of humans in history WE HAVE NO CLUE NOW AS TO WHAT THEY WERE ACTUALLY ILL WITH.
    No doubt a whole handful of diseases.

  16. J Bush
    October 25, 2020

    IMO all politicians who agreed with this idiocy and/or voted for it, should have a 25% pay cut forced on them. Their ‘experts’ should have a 75% pay cut, to offset the cost of all those who are now unemployed, due to their ‘advice’.

    They can’t make the argument I can’t ‘survive on this’, or I have financial commitments etc, because the dictats they have put in place/voted for, are doing exactly this to 100s of 1000’s employees.

    1. JoolsB
      October 25, 2020

      Pay cut? Theyā€™ve given themselves a pay rise. When people all over the country are losing their livelihoods thanks to their actions and through no fault of their own, MPs receive a pay rise. You just couldnā€™t make it up. Apparently the public sector also received a 4.1% pay rise last year. So all the ones who havenā€™t had to worry about their jobs or loss of income have been generously rewarded whilst those in the real world, the wealth creating private sector are seeing their businesses and livelihoods decimated by those who havenā€™t got any such worries. What a selfish self serving bunch of morons our political class have become.

      1. Mike Durrans
        October 25, 2020

        +1

  17. Nigl
    October 25, 2020

    Ps. Please also publish the evidence that says that pubs and restaurants are responsible for a high level of infection.

    Bernard Jenkin in the Telegraph details the appalling fragmented state of our Test and Trace system, four different ITSystems, managed from different places in Whitehall and Westminster, ineffective telephone contact process, poor communications between agencies, a toxic culture leading to a high turnover of staff necessitating expensive consultants and refusal to accept a military style approach as ā€˜too sophisticatedā€™.

    On the basis that from Boris down the government has said this is the main plank for Covid containment please tell the U.K. public why you and other Ministers have allowed this to happen, why you all continue to deny its shortcomings and what are you going to do about it.

    The public is not stupid and recognises your spin over substance and rightly feels very let down and angry.

  18. steve
    October 25, 2020

    Everhopeful

    “Hell bent on establishing communism, fascism, NWO ismā€¦whatever unbalanced hellish scheme they are implementing.”

    Wise to suspect all governments have a sinister motive.

    Personally I think the people should demand the reintroduction of the treason laws and as a capital offence in some cases.

    life sentence for attending a bilderberg secret meeting, 15 years with total confiscation of assets for colluding with foreign hostile countries i.e EU / France.

    1. Everhopeful
      October 25, 2020

      Yay!

  19. Lifelogic
    October 25, 2020

    The figures rather suggest that, by the time such work is organised and done, the pandemic with be largely over anyway. Especially if a vaccine will be available to NHS staff within weeks as is reported today.

  20. Lifelogic
    October 25, 2020

    Alok Sharma read Physics and Electronic at Salford. One of the very few MPs with a reasonable science degree. Perhaps if is can he could explain to the Transport Secretary that electric cars are no zero emmission and Hydrogen trains are a pointless expensive gimmick.

    1. Lifelogic
      October 25, 2020

      Also the renewable make almost no difference to CO2 levels and destroy and export jobs pointlessly.

    2. Sea_Warrior
      October 25, 2020

      The last time I checked, only 10% of Conservative MPs had science degrees. CCHQ should be ashamed of itself.

      1. SM
        October 25, 2020

        You cannot force individuals – whatever their career choice – to become Parliamentary candidates.

        1. Lifelogic
          October 26, 2020

          No and the problem is that those who aspire to bossing people around, wasting money, grabbing power (and perhaps even being corrupt as we see with the green crap, pandering to vested interest and the expenses scandal) tend to be the ones we have to suffer.

          Choosing people by lottery with some IQ test would give far people.

    3. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      Salford!

  21. fedupsoutherner
    October 25, 2020

    Once more John, leading from the front with some more great ideas to help businesses. Pity you are not the health secretary or PM.

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      PM.

    2. jane4brexit
      October 26, 2020

      If or perhaps once Boris agrees a deal with the EU and if he does not cancel the WA, please will you consider starting a new ‘Real Brexit, Cancel EU Deal, WTO and Freedom Party’ (or something along those lines) Sir John?

      Perhaps to increase its chances of being elected in eg: to not allow 56 seats to be chosen at times by less than 1m anti English voters, it could be an England/English only party and you have the name here already “Speaking for England”.

    3. Fred H
      October 26, 2020

      Sir John could probably do a better job of any of the Cabinet positions such as the quality we get treated to daily.

  22. steve
    October 25, 2020

    I’d also like to see Nichola Sturgeon do as she’s told by Westminster, given that the UNITED KINGDOM is supposed to be in a NATIONAL crisis.

    Banning Welsh people from entering England might also help restore a sense of fair play.

  23. Polly
    October 25, 2020

    I’m impressed with Piers Corbyn.

    There’s a brave man with brave followers.

    Why not get involved with Piers?

    He’s not afraid of anything.

    Polly

    1. Peter
      October 25, 2020

      Fair play to Piers for organising the Trafalgar Square demonstration etc.

      My one big issue is that those attending these events are not well prepared and are a soft target for the police.

      Mention of how this may be countered get deleted from this site – but you can use your imagination.

    2. Lifelogic
      October 25, 2020

      He is certainly sound on climate alarmism and damaging war against CO2. First class BSc degree in physics from Imperial College and a postgraduate MSc in Astrophysics from Queen Mary College. So rather less daft than his brother!

    3. glen cullen
      October 25, 2020

      Agree

  24. Caterpillar
    October 25, 2020

    Airflow has been one of many micro level interventions available from the beginning of this fiasco. Clearly such interventions to reduce R were not considered or simply rejected (as the early fast but less accurate tests were).

    The Govt needs to use such approaches alongside a Level 0 (http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2020/10/24/how-should-we-live-with-and-control-cv-19/#comment-1169365) exit.

  25. Caterpillar
    October 25, 2020

    Sir John,

    Do you know if any MP has written to Mr Hancock to ask the two questions here

    http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2020/10/24/how-should-we-live-with-and-control-cv-19/#comment-1169364 ?

  26. Andy
    October 25, 2020

    You addressed it to a bloke called Alok. You should have written it to Dominic. He makes all the decisions. I remember precisely nobody voting for him.

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      We would certainly no longer be subject to the EU or in lockdown if Dominic were in charge as you allege.
      But that will not stop you repeating the rubbish oblivious of,the fact that you are condemning the EUā€™s Ursula, who is in charge and for whom no one voted.

      1. Andy
        October 25, 2020

        Actually, Ursula was nominated by elected heads of government and then the election was approved by elected MEPs – between them representing everyone.

        Boris Johnson was selected by a bunch of old white men to lead his party – and then became prime minister despite the majority of the electorate rejecting his party and half of the electorate in Uxbridge rejecting him.

        Still, even that is better than Trump. Who lost the election and became president anyway. You know the Republicans have only actually won the most votes at one presidential election in the last 30 years – (2004). And yet theyā€™ve held the presidency for half that time. Hopefully not for much longer.

        1. Longinus
          October 25, 2020

          Governments have been elected in this country with a lower overall number of votes than their main opponent.

          Ursula was the only candidate proposed.

          Tory party has plenty of female and ethnic minority MPs who all voted for their leadership candidate.

          Remind me which party has never had a female PM.

        2. Edward2
          October 25, 2020

          All wrong as usual.
          Ursula never had any citizen vote for her.
          She is an appointee of an elite group.
          She never faced any voter.

          Boris was elected twice by the citizens of London.
          Then he was elected as an MP by the citizens of his constituency.
          Then he was elected leader of his party by party members.
          Then he stood for election as PM in a general election and gained the biggest majority for decades.

        3. rose
          October 25, 2020

          The “election” of Frau von der Leyen was stitched up at the same time as that of Mme Lagarde. The Eastern Europeans were left out of the process altogether.

  27. Lifelogic
    October 25, 2020

    On Any Answers yesterday, the touchy feely, BBC think lefty, Anita Anand (English Kings London) questions if someone very elderly, who dies say two weeks early, is a less serious death than someone of say 15 who losely 70 years of life by dying early.

    Surely even a BBC lefty dope like Anand can see that it surely is?

    If you had one transport transplant organ and could only save one person them which would you choose Anita?

    1. Peter
      October 25, 2020

      Can you tell us Anitaā€™s A level subjects as well ?

      School reports would be useful too.

  28. Fred H
    October 25, 2020

    ‘Extraction from the top and supply of new air from the bottom’.

    Sounds like a campaigning slogan from either or both major failing parties.
    After all the electorate will want a breath of fresh air in the next GE.

    1. Fred H
      October 25, 2020

      Well Sir John, my post passes moderation on brevity, non-abusive, no racial undertones, non-subversive BUT fails on political message, eh?
      Surrounded by a variety of subject matter, but not mine.
      I’m laughing actually, not angry.

      1. Martin in Cardiff
        October 25, 2020

        You didn’t try to be funny, did you, Fred?

        1. Fred H
          October 26, 2020

          I would never try to compete with Andy, Gloomy Martin rules!

  29. agricola
    October 25, 2020

    You seem to ignore things that can be done were they not in the hands of government, like test and trace for instance, and end up going off on tangents at the wrong end of the problem. Confirm peoples state of health before they go to the office or restaurant. then the vast majority can achieve the end that they and we all desire.

  30. Bill B.
    October 25, 2020

    Dear Sir John

    We don’t need an ‘air change’, we need a complete policy change.

    If you politicians’ idea of helping businesses escape collapse is just technological tinkering, God help us all.

    It’s Sunday, so let’s all say a quick prayer, beginning ‘Forgive them, Lord…’.

  31. Andy
    October 25, 2020

    I wonder why Conservatives are so desperate to save businesses from Covid? It is clearly not because they genuinely care about business – Brexit shows they do not. Indeed the now incompetent prime minister summed up the genuine Tory attitude to our businesses in just four letters – starting with F – when he was merely an incompetent foreign secretary instead.

    So the real motivation for these Tory MPs is not about our jobs. It is about their jobs. They know their government has been an absolute car crash. They know it is lunging from crisis to crisis. And they are worried about their jobs. 2024 will come around soon enough – though we may not allow this Parliament to last that long. They can see the gravy train of discount meals and massive expense claims coming to an end. And theyā€™re frit.

    As well they should be. Anyone who votes against feeding hungry children has badly lost their way and needs to be expunged from our politics. Hard rain is coming.

    1. Edward2
      October 25, 2020

      Complete nonsense.
      How do you get re elected if you cause loads of businesses to go bust and create millions of people unemployed.

    2. No Longer Anonymous
      October 25, 2020

      Tell their mums to stop smoking fags and having tattoos. I live near them and you quite clearly don’t.

      Obesity is the clear sign of deprivation these days.

      1. Andy
        October 25, 2020

        That is still not the fault of the children.

        1. No Longer Anonymous
          October 25, 2020

          It is the fault of the politicians that reward bad parenting and penalise good parenting.

      2. Mike Durrans
        October 25, 2020

        +1

    3. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      There is a massive difference between capitalist business owned by the people and Corporations run by employees.

    4. Mike Durrans
      October 25, 2020

      Feeding hungry children??? thats a parental responsibility

      No one else’s

  32. Lifelogic
    October 25, 2020

    A better letter ot Sharma might be:-

    Sharma – if you want more people in business, more and better jobs and higher profits. Get the bloated government out of the way, give us cheap energy, relax planning, cull red tape, go for easy hire and fire, reduce and simplify taxes, stop blocking the roads, fire at least 70% of the civil service …..

    Excellent piece in the Spectator by Griff Rhys Jones in the Spectator (or on Spectator Out Loud podcast) on the moronic road blocking going on in London under the dire Khan!

    1. Lifelogic
      October 25, 2020

      You could also tell Alok that shop and super markets having to cordon off areas selling kettles, blankets and such deemed ā€œnon essentialā€ items in Wales is moronic as is blocking of the border.

      But politicians in Wales & Scotland are even worse than some of the appalling ones we suffer at Westminster or the appalling Mayors we suffer in London and elsewhere .

    2. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      Only conclusion is that they donā€™t want ā€˜more people in business, more and better jobs etcā€™.

  33. Sir Joe Soap
    October 25, 2020

    Id do it more to protect my building from damp than for any protection from the virus. Personally I quite prefer being in fresh air to being cooped up, but that’s just a personal preference. It might or might not have a small effect in preventing transmission of colds and flu but of course it isn’t green as your heating bills will increase.

  34. wab
    October 25, 2020

    Who is going to pay for this transformation and how long would it take to implement? Unbelievable that the author did not even bother to mention these issues. The “herd immunity” fans continue to grasp at straws.

  35. Richard1
    October 25, 2020

    The SAGE shroud waving which is driving this economic catastrophe needs to be subject to a US-style red team-blue team exercise (btw wasnā€™t Dominic Cummings supposed to be introducing these?). We need to see the lockdown mantra challenged forensically by figures such as Profs Hennegan and Gupta, and if we can hire a few hours of his time, Stanfordā€™s Prof Innonadis. In other words people who know what they are talking about and wonā€™t by bamboozled by selective statistics. We need this because U.K. opposition and backbench politicians canā€™t or wonā€™t do it, and there is no proper challenge to the prevailing policy of lockdown which is causing such damage.

    Meanwhile the Labour Party are fielding up evidence for lockdown not working in northern cities. While urging for lockdown for the whole Country. What a joke.

    1. Richard1
      October 25, 2020

      Actually it looks like Starmerā€™s lockdown call is just cynical political opportunism. As pointed out by Dan Hannan, heā€™s done it at just the moment the evidence and scientific opinion has moved decisively away from lockdown, and even public opinion is starting to follow. What a booby, heā€™s going to fall flat on his face. Serves him right!

  36. a-tracy
    October 25, 2020

    Businesses were slowly recovering, your government has cut off their oxygen and sent them into a tail spin! Your favoured social enterprises and big business get big chunks of money with no provisos i.e. x number of people need to be engaged to get this as a benefit per head employed. A certain number of people have been constantly getting all the work from one state supported enterprise to another, its just grossly unfair. The imbalance for the sheā€™s and freelancers if it is this group youā€™re trying to do away with is working.

    As for air conditioning and expecting Smes to take on loans to open their business with air on when their is no scientific evidence that this cuts down the virus transmission is just more loans for fakery again this just supports favoured businesses who know how to get all the grants.

    1. a-tracy
      October 25, 2020

      Smeā€™s not sheā€™s

  37. Bryan Harris
    October 25, 2020

    Interesting idea – Certainly cannot hurt, as long as the air coming in is fresh.

    If restrictions are kept in place much longer there will no leisure industries to save.

  38. David L
    October 25, 2020

    I heard Professor John Lee (retd. Pathologist) state “The notion that social distancing and a mask will prevent someone from getting an airborne virus is total bunkum.”
    When (!) this is all over will the scientists from the SAGE panel be able, with pride, to tell their grandchildren “I was part of the team that steered our country through a terrible crisis.”?

  39. ukretired123
    October 25, 2020

    Risk Management should be taught to schoolchildren as Panic Mania is the default at top of the Public Sector and Govt.
    Life is risky, everything is risky but most folks in business learn it pretty darn quick – in at the deep end.
    Failure is not rewarded and it is time everyone was taught his to live with Risk the big R not Aah!
    When you run out of cash that’s it! Curtains!
    Marcus Rashford’s lobbying is commendable but there are no Magic Money Trees left if ever they existed. Time for getting the economy moving and accept Managing the risk.
    Devolution. isn’t working as NHS in both Wales and Scotland have a decade of failures.
    The Police don’t know all the rules and Joe Public can plead ignorance too….

    A a retired self-employed who toiled under IR35 and worked in Third World countries I have no guilt now that I am retired esp after my “pension” was decimated by the Equitable Life mismanagement (please note Andy)….

  40. Sir Joe Soap
    October 25, 2020

    I think you’re diluting your focus here.

    Get the NHS working properly would be a million times more effective and important than putting vents in restaurants.

    1. Lifelogic
      October 25, 2020

      I tend to agree. But the NHS will never work properly until it charges and we open up the health marked to real fair competition and choice.

      Do the same for education, broadcasting, housing and energy too.

      1. Lifelogic
        October 25, 2020

        Open up the health market to real and fair competition and real choices for ā€œcustomersā€

        Freedom and Choice please not take it or leave it dross and rationing.

    2. Mark B
      October 25, 2020

      +1

    3. Leslie Singleton
      October 25, 2020

      Dear Joe–Discussion these days is far too often artificially turned in to a spurious either/or but is it not unarguable that both should be done, each of course on its merits. Ventilation & air conditioning is good but comes at a price if only in terms of the extra electricity needed to run it and when necessary the compensatory heating–think climate change of course.

    4. bigneil(newercomp)
      October 25, 2020

      There are plenty of people who are having NO trouble seeing NHS staff. All those the BF are ferrying in are met with taxpayer funded ambulances and crew as soon as they get here.

  41. are all MPs blind?
    October 25, 2020

    Has it not turned on you all how serious this lunacy is?
    Even the madmen Boris and Raab have admitted the tests give 93 percent false positives?

    1. DaveK
      October 26, 2020

      Hence in a 7 day period 433,000 positive cases and 1400 deaths. Dr Yeadon explains to the layman the basics of immunology and how coronavirus fragments interact with T cells. Well worth a listen.

  42. The PrangWizard
    October 25, 2020

    It’s time we started some real protests. I’m no longer interested in the details of the restrictions; they are the product of an authoritarian and dictatorial mindset in our incompetent leaders. They are not listening to anyone outside their elite group, they are told that anything critical they do hear is as usual nonsense and they should dismiss it, and they should set the police on us. They think that using stupid slogans is all we can understand – ‘Firebreaks’ and the like.

    It’s time we took to the streets, and to mean it. This danger to our freedoms must be swept away. We need diversionary tactics and then a big one. Research – Organise – Act – Repeat.

    1. a-tracy
      October 25, 2020

      If someone made a v for vendetta face mask muzzle right now theyā€™d be making a fortune, could you be arrested for taking your hours daily stroll wearing a mask in protest.

  43. Ex-Tory
    October 25, 2020

    I take your point, but

    “… Could there be a CV19 standard for air change …”
    “… certification …”

    Do we need yet more bureaucracy?

  44. Narrow Shoulders
    October 25, 2020

    Completely off topic but current and you do not appear to be engaging with your readership about it.

    When will your government make the case that there are very few “poor” children. There are many living in families whose priorities are skewed who do not know how to budget or cook low cost nutritious meals.

    Universal credit is a generous benefit. As I regularly write here I could TAKE HOME Ā£36K on Universal Credit. as a shelf stacker or fruit picker.

    Why should someone who is already picking up Ā£23K in benefits from the taxpayer get another Ā£1K per child for free school meals?

    Do not demonise the tax payer, demonise parents who can’t fed their children. Some of us have to pay our own bills.

    Give a family a fish and they will eat today, teach a family to fish and they will eat for ever.

    1. Anonymous
      October 25, 2020

      Universal credit is a generous benefit. As I regularly write here I could TAKE HOME Ā£36K on Universal Credit

      ….
      it is peanuts, no idea where you get that figure

      1. a-tracy
        October 25, 2020

        If you include housing benefit, child tax credit, working tax credit, then they add on adhd benefits, those that know how to work the system dont suffer its all those with mortgages, whoā€™ve been both working as a couple for years, put savings by for their childā€™s university or wedding – theyā€™re stuffed.

        1. Narrow Shoulders
          October 26, 2020

          Also including Child benefit which I would start to lose if I was earning a gross salary that allowed me to take home Ā£36K

          1. a-tracy
            October 26, 2020

            NS – Ā£401.00 per week if the single parent doesn’t work at all, more if they do just 16 hours on minimum wage (about Ā£27k net).

            I forgot the Council Tax reduction. I know a woman who kicked out her fella and just has a visit three times per week because she was two times better off without him.

          2. Narrow Shoulders
            October 27, 2020

            a-tracy it is indeed a generous benefit which has been vilified by the campaigners. The five week wait is an open goal.

            It is supposed to encourage work but why have the hassle of management and heavy tax when the same can be earned stacking shelves?

      2. Narrow Shoulders
        October 26, 2020

        Online calculator entering my circumstances, including working full time at minimum wage (e.g fruit picking or online delivery driver)

  45. Anonymous
    October 25, 2020

    I walk in grave yards speaking to mourners
    There is an epidemic of suicides

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      18 per day.

      1. margaret howard
        October 25, 2020

        Lynn Atkinson

        18 per day
        ==

        “In 2018, there were 6,507 suicides registered in the UK; the latest rate is significantly higher than that in 2017 and represents the first increase since 2013.”

        https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/suicidesintheunitedkingdom/2018registrations

        So about 18 a day 2 years ago. Hardly an epidemic caused by covid.

    2. Martin in Cardiff
      October 25, 2020

      That’s this dismal brexit for you.

  46. Anonymous
    October 25, 2020

    I catch the bus home from Nuneaton and the little children on the school buses deprived of oxygen wearing face masks breaks my heart.

    1. glen cullen
      October 25, 2020

      Due to a direct intervention of this government

  47. Gremilgob
    October 25, 2020

    Death rate of CV-19 infected = 0.04%

    Average age of CV-19 fatality = 82 years

    Average age of death = 81 years

    The vast majority of the o.04% who die have recognisable comorbidities.

    WHAT IS THIS GOVERNMENT DOING ?

    It is not taking charge. It is responding to the 24hour rolling news agenda. The Rashford issue a case in point. Most parents of free-school-meals kids smoke and get highly expensive tattoos. Lower middle class parents can’t afford school meals and aren’t eligible for free ones either, so we put together Ā£1 a day sandwich boxes… but that takes a bit of discipline and forethought, doesn’t it !

    1. Gremilgob
      October 25, 2020

      Start taking a count of parents who send their kids to school with lunchboxes.

      They are your working poor. The ones who voted for you.

      Don’t you think they would opt for school lunches if they could ? Yet they are the ones that will end up paying for the Rashford meals.

      What does Mr Rashford think that welfare payments are meant to cover ? Tattoos and fags ? To sit outside their flats in their dressing gowns, smoking and awaiting the next Deliveroo arrival ? If you want me show them to you then I will be happy to do so.

      1. margaret howard
        October 25, 2020

        Gremilgob

        Isn’t it bad enough for children to be born to the sort of parents you describe? Should society add to their misery by letting them go hungry? Don’t they need our help so those who can escape the awful circumstances of their childhood will be able to do so?

        It is not their fault to be born to social misfits. But abandoning them to their fate will not help them escape a similar future. Are you suggesting that they should be punished further instead of being given a helping hand?

        1. steve
          October 25, 2020

          MH

          Well said, absolutely +1

          1. No Longer Anonymous
            October 25, 2020

            Well…

            Why not carry on rewarding misfit behaviour and cause it to carry on generation to generation !

            You can put a nutritious lunchbox together for Ā£1 per day and millions of working poor parents are proving it.

            As with BLM, Greenism, Globalism and Welfarism the Margaret Howards of this world are weaponising issues for their own wicked ends.

            They lost all of the votes and are winning by making the country ungovernable.

            I don’t blame her at all.

            I now firmly blame the Redwoods, the backbenchers and the rest of the Tory party with their 80 seat majority for the sort of shite that has been posted as the above line article today in our time of crisis – pusillaminous tinkering instead of manly decision making.

            Boris out of office by January.

            An emergency back-me-or-sack-me general election for Sunak by next summer after the worst rioting this nation has ever seen.

            For a death rate below 0.04% of which most are over the average age of mortality in the UK.

            The Tories have destroyed Britain.

        2. a-tracy
          October 25, 2020

          No Margaret they shouldnā€™t suffer they should have ready made meals delivered and the benefit cash to the parent who canā€™t function reduced. Dis functioning parents should be on training courses. The child should also be taught how to cook properly at the age of 11. Big food supermarkets should donate flour and basics to the schools to help the children to prepare wholesome family food.

          I agree with Gremilgob its the parents whose kids are getting by with paste sandwiches and a beaker of tap water we should be looking at. I bet they are the skinny ones not the ones that claim are being starved. A simple weight check would spot problems early.

        3. Fred H
          October 26, 2020

          good grief Margaret – I agree with you.

  48. WARNING FROM GOD
    October 25, 2020

    You will not be forgiven unless you repent. No saving face allowed.

    1. Peter
      October 25, 2020

      How about face covering?

    2. Everhopeful
      October 25, 2020

      I agree.
      They have gone too already.

      1. Everhopeful
        October 25, 2020

        *far

  49. Roy Grainger
    October 25, 2020

    The general restrictions in Germany are more-or-less identical to UK except for the fact they emphasise good ventilation right near the top of their priority list. I never heard this mentioned at all here until a couple of remarks in passing at one of the recent briefings.

    One very surprising study has recently shown that worldwide only 50 or so cases of infection are attributed to contact during commercial flights. Given the millions of travellers involved this seems very surprising. However, most planes are equipped with hepa filters.

  50. glen cullen
    October 25, 2020

    Tinkering at the edges isnā€™t going to work

    This government needs to stop acting with god like powers believing that they can stop or slow the spread of covid-19

    Business and the economy donā€™t need grants, furlough or loans ā€“ they need lockdown stopped and full return to work without any caveats

    Six months later weā€™ve all had a dose of covid-19 ā€“ the cure is worst than the virus

    Instruct the department of health and all UK media to only show (1) daily covid-19 death rates against none covid-19 death rates and (2) number of covid-19 patients in hospital against the number of none covid-19 patients in hospital

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      All these Ministers will do is tinker. You have to work with them to get the country open again, even if it is tinkered! The alternative is not opening it, itā€™s closing it.

    2. steve
      October 25, 2020

      glen cullen

      “This government needs to stop acting with god like powers believing that they can stop or slow the spread of covid-19”

      It’s more to do with government stupidly colluding with SAGE con merchants.

      Government can’t get out of this without admitting it was always a syndemic, never was a pandemic. The BMA has lifted the lid on this.

      The only way they can get out of this is to come clean, so they’re trapped. Nothing to do with God, and everything to do with fear of being implicated in the con trick of the century.

  51. a bad dream
    October 25, 2020

    putting vents in restaurants.


    he was surely joking?

    1. Alan Jutson
      October 26, 2020

      a bad dream

      Most restaurants already have an extraction system in the kitchen, why not just put it on full blast and open all internal doors, may/may not help, but certainly a cheap and rapid possible help to the air change suggestion.

      Our domestic kitchen extractor fan at home would eventually suck all the air out of the house if the kitchen door was left open.
      Sounds odd but absolutely true the inwards opening kitchen door is harder to close when the extractor is on, due to the lower air pressure inside the kitchen.

  52. DOM
    October 25, 2020

    Party political protection above the national interest and the now dominant force of racially-gender infused fascist left activism that has infected Labour and the public sector is an attempt to circumvent and destroy democracy and diminish democratic accountability

    What we are now seeing is a concerted, hard left direct attack on our democratic traditions and the exploitaition of innate apolitical nature of the British people.

    We don’t have a party inside the political system that is prepared to confront and defend our libertarian, civil and democratic heritage

    We are walking into an age of oppression and terror last seen in 1917 and subsequently 1929 and that word Socialism keeps popping up like a cancerous sore

    1. No Longer Anonymous
      October 25, 2020

      Proven by this blog post. Tinkering the only proposal.

      As with Richard Madely – I utterly despair.

  53. cornishstu
    October 25, 2020

    Covid 19 is new but has turned out to be nothing that unusual, just another coronavirus, doing its thing no more infectious and deadly than flu so why do we need to do anything more other than reopen society? Protect those that are incapable of looking after themselves subject to their wishes. I came across a paper from the National Library of Medicine dated 2005 that showed chloroquine is a potent inhibitor of SARS coronavirus infection and spread so that explains why many medics were using it to great effect until they were stopped. So we have a viable means of prevention for those who are vulnerable, serious questions need to be asked. If you look at the Swiss deaths graph you can see the increase when it was stopped however they started using it again and there was a corresponding drop in deaths.

  54. glen cullen
    October 25, 2020

    Isnā€™t it about time we stopped moving our clocks between GMT and BST(DST)

    Weā€™re no longer living in the 1916

    Nor are we now still subject to Daylight Saving Time (DST) EU directive ā€“ instructing us to end DST on the last Sunday in October

    Lets just use GMT throughout the year

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      October 25, 2020

      Yes! GMT – even the cows work on it.

    2. Caterpillar
      October 25, 2020

      I would prefer BST, but with a referendum we could settle somewhere in the middle!

      Ideally the ensuing arguments could distract any future Govt from being so tyrannical and destructive as the current one.

    3. a-tracy
      October 25, 2020

      I would prefer BST, it is now going dark at 5pm.

  55. RichardP
    October 25, 2020

    I think what you suggest is a very good idea for the medium to long term, especially when premises are being refurbished.
    Unfortunately the clear and present danger for this country is the wrong kind of ministers being advised by the wrong kind of experts.

    1. steve
      October 25, 2020

      Richard P

      “wrong kind of ministers being advised by the wrong kind of experts.”

      They’re not scientific experts, they’re expert conmen after big fat research grants.

      Biggest con trick in British history, and Boris & his ministers are in it up to their necks.

  56. Norman
    October 25, 2020

    People are socially malleable, especially when it comes to health. Having let this obsession loose, governments are now hostage to fortune. They, or anyone who pushes back, stand accused of risking lives. Co-incidentally, this accords with other coercive narratives. It’s a choice between herd immunity at cost, or a self-directed stampede over a cliff.
    “And David said unto [the prophet] Gad, I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the Lord; for his mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man.” (Cf. 2 Samuel 24)

  57. Sharon
    October 25, 2020

    Reading a variety of articles this morning and on other days. I believe there definitely some places of authority who would love our country to be run on socialist lines, and indeed have been working towards and conditioning us all for some time. Thereā€™s even a team of psychologists running a part government funded Behaviour Analysis Unit who may well have been running the show…to see how compliant we would be. A social experiment.

    However, there are the normal conservatives who , like the public, are being shut down from having an opinion. Likewise, other scientists and medics are discredited.

    Itā€™s time for this to stop! The social experiment worked initially, but as more and more people see through the scam – and the destruction it has left in its wake, economically and health wise – it must STOP.

    Life must be allowed to return to normal and not this dystopian ā€˜new notā€™ that was part of the experiment.

    Are there enough, and strong enough, politicians to persuade Boris?

    Itā€™s almost gone too far to stop but not quite…..

    I can still hear The Speakerā€™s speech at the G7 meeting suggesting that now itā€™s been shown people are prepared to make sacrifices for the greater good, it should be harnessed to tackle climate change…. my blood froze.

    1. The Great Reset
      October 25, 2020

      I can still hear The Speakerā€™s speech at the G7 meeting suggesting that now itā€™s been shown people are prepared to make sacrifices for the greater good

      ….
      That is the conspiracy, he didn’t dream that up.

  58. Lifelogic
    October 25, 2020

    Over 80’s denied treatment intensive care treatment by the NHS it seems – this even when they had ICU beds free and just based on age it seems. In the Sunday Times today. Perhaps this rather explains we the UK has have about 70,000 Covid Deaths (looking at the excess death figure) wheras the 20% larger Germany has, it seems, only had about 10,000.

    Rather than clapping the NHS what is surely needed is to find out why the Germans heath system was about 7 times better as preventing Covid Deaths than the UK’s.

    We pay a fortune in taxes and still get dire public services. Many even do far more harm than good.

    Of course infecting stroke patients with Covid at NHS hospitals then dumping them untested into nursing homes cannot have helped much. As happened to an elderly patience, distant relative of mine. He was finally readmited to hospital and died a day later of Covid (only then was he even tested).

    1. steve
      October 25, 2020

      Lifelogic

      “Rather than clapping the NHS what is surely needed is to find out why the Germans heath system was about 7 times better as preventing Covid Deaths than the UKā€™s.”

      Because Germans on the whole don’t have as much comorbidity because they don’t have high levels of obesity etc, and according to the BMA covid 19 is a syndemic, not a pandemic.

      See the Lancet 26 Sep 2020. Then come back and tell us what you think of SAGE.

      1. Fred H
        October 26, 2020

        bratwurst and beer – thats the solution.

  59. No Longer Anonymous
    October 25, 2020

    It response to SM’s sad news.

  60. cornishstu
    October 25, 2020

    An interesting article on the American Institute for Economic Research ‘The Year of Disguises ‘, on viral transmission/ spread, somewhat relevant to the conversation

  61. steve
    October 25, 2020

    What’s up JR, don’t you advocate fair play and justice?

  62. Mel Drew
    October 25, 2020

    Between the 70s and 90s or parts there off I detested the Tory party and the ilk of John Redwood and his colleagues because of the damage done to Great Britainā€™s society, industry and public services. However, having read Johns column, at last I can see a politician maybe singing from the same common sense/public-health hymn sheet as me. I am a retired environmental health officer with a good knowledge of public health and the importance of adequate ventilation in relation to airborne spread of disease. I wonder if John has noticed that most buses and trains have now got their windows closed because of the cold weather or maybe have none at all. I would ask John to look at the Ministry of Transport advice on ventilation in their Covid 19 guidance because he will find the biggest load of vague and confusing tripe I have ever seen as it frequently uses meaningless ā€œBlairiteā€ words such as ā€œadequateā€ . Standards for ventilation have been recommended by CIBSE – https://www.cibse.org/knowledge/knowledge-items/detail?id=a0q20000006oamlAAA and there is no reason why as a matter of urgency they should be a mandatory requirement, backed up of course with public subsidy.

  63. hefner
    October 25, 2020

    The latest conspiracy theory appears to be that our PM is waiting for the results of the US elections to decide how and when the UK is to finalise its dealings with the EU.

    The other interesting bit I collected these past few days is about a recently launched daily newsletter called Fortune & Freedom with a guy called Nigel F. Nobody would want to selfishly keep such a piece of news for oneself.

    1. steve
      October 25, 2020

      hefner

      “The latest conspiracy theory appears to be that our PM is waiting for the results of the US elections to decide how and when the UK is to finalise its dealings with the EU.”

      ….and that’s all it is, a conspiracy theory.

      If Boris Johnson is to compromise with the ungrateful EU, that decision would have been taken ages ago and kept secret.

      1. Jacob
        October 25, 2020

        Don’t see where the conspiracy can be.. it’s clear to all that no.10 would rather a Trump victory and in that way they think they could thumb the nose at Barnier and suck up to Trump for a special deal. But it would be a big mistake because of the irrational behaviour of Trump and the indiffetence of Biden to UK.. in a way we can say the US does not give two figs for Uk or trade deals

      2. Lynn Atkinson
        October 25, 2020

        I do not bel8eve there will be a compromise. Also Trump will win.

      3. rose
        October 25, 2020

        The BBC reported that this theory comes from the EU.

  64. Martin C
    October 25, 2020

    Could this proposal also include the cost of heat exchangers?

  65. Anonymous
    October 25, 2020

    Here we go again.

    Yet another bunch of hijackers about to get access to UK benefits and housing.

    1. Iago
      October 25, 2020

      Strange, the tanker from Nigeria appears to be empty.

      1. beresford
        October 25, 2020

        The tanker owner’s lawyers say that it was known for some time that there were ‘stowaways’ on board. So why did they wait until they reached British waters to raise the alarm? Return the migrants to Nigeria and sequestrate the tanker as being a tool of criminals.

  66. Mel Drew
    October 25, 2020

    Steve et al. There are recommended CIBSE standards and HEPA filters which could help in providing Corona virus free air but where are the latter, have they been correctly sited and fitted AND are they being properly maintained at the correct intervals? – see my previous posting. Inspection is largely self enforced but of course there is always the profit motive to cut corners. From my experience as an environmental health officer, routine HSE and local authority H&S inspection has been greatly reduced
    Dear Leslie Ventilation with the correct minimum of fresh, HEPA filtered or otherwise disinfected air is better and I think a lot cheaper than the billions already spent on lockdowns, furloughs etc. Which would be better to prevent at least some cross-infection -a properly ventilated public building/vehicle or one with ventilation based on the fug stirring principle? Come on you brighter MPs – there are lots of things to be done to reduce the infection rate – get your advice from well trained practitioners rather than academic professors. Some of the methods will help to provide real work, develop skills but not cost hundreds of billions of Ā£s. Start thinking outs ide of the academic box!

  67. steve
    October 25, 2020

    OOH !

    The Lancet, 26 Sep 2020 :
    COVID-19 is not a pandemic. It is a syndemic.

    Question is who do you believe; SAGE or the BMA ?

    I’m starting to think we’ve been stuffed.

    1. Margaret brandreth-j
      October 25, 2020

      Until you see a pregnant 28 year old fighting for her life in ITU or the local GP who has just died with the covid infection , th you must ask yourself.. .. are we really being duped?

      1. Anonymous
        October 25, 2020

        Until you see a pregnant 28 year old fighting for he via overall context. life in ITU or the local GP who has just died with the covid infectio

        ….
        Almost no one under 40 dies of it according to ONS stats.
        individual examples must be filtered

      2. No Longer Anonymous
        October 25, 2020

        Or someone committing suicide out of despair as I have !

        Or a friend who has died of a heart attack pending a consultation !!!!

        No economy = No NHS

        What are you not getting about that ???

  68. Brian Tomkinson
    October 25, 2020

    ā€œItā€™s Easier to Fool People Than It Is to Convince Them That They Have Been Fooled.ā€ ā€“ Mark Twain

    1. Martin in Cardiff
      October 26, 2020

      Yes, we’re having that problem with about seventeen million just now.

  69. The Prangwizard
    October 25, 2020

    Seems to me the figures are going to start going down now. It won’t be because of the restrictions brought in. If so why?

    1. DaveK
      October 26, 2020

      Dr Yeadon explains this to Delingpole, but in a nutshell it is the natural decay curve of a virus. Initially it follows a Gompertz function and then reduces as it runs out of susceptible people or encounters more of the immune. This second blip is created by locking down susceptible people then subsequently re-opening and in no way matches the initial exposure curves.

    2. Martin in Cardiff
      October 26, 2020

      How will you prove your extraordinary claim that it was not because of the measures?

      Come on?

  70. Anonymous
    October 25, 2020

    There is plenty of research saying that if a restaurant, hotel, meeting room has a system for extracting stale air promptly and replacing it with clean air it can offer a safer environment

    ….
    There is no scientific research on how viruses spread as they are too small to monitor.

    https://www.aier.org/article/the-year-of-disguises/

    1. Anonymous
      October 25, 2020

      air promptly and replacing it with clean air it can offer a safer environment

      from dust etc, not viruses.

  71. forthurst
    October 25, 2020

    Is this not a matter for HSE which is sponsored by Work and Pensions? HSE is run by yet another female Arts graduate career civil servant.

    Any decisions on how to reduce the incidence of Covid-19 exposure in public indoor spaces should be based on science ie experimental results. It is known that when an infected person coughs or talks aloud, they spray infective material into their immediate environment. However, the persistance of that material suspended in the air is inversely proportional to its size. with the smaller droplets or aerosols (<5 microns) remaining suspended in the air and diffusing into a larger cloud enveloping the heads of people in the vicinity whilst the larger droplets assiduously obey Newton's law of gravity.

    The objective of any mitigation should be to remove the aerosols as quicly as possible without causing larger droplets to be diffused into smaller droplets. Not only should the rate of air change be considered but also the direction in which it is extracted and whether the air itself should be humidified or even electrically charged in order to cause the aerosols to coalesce with moisture in the air and precipitate as 'rain'.

  72. rose
    October 25, 2020

    Please don’t let’s have very young footballers setting the budget, however fashionable they are.

    Good signs of an uprising in Wales against authoritarian socialism and the Assembly. HMG should take heart.

    1. Martin in Cardiff
      October 26, 2020

      Well, some foul-mouthed individual has been charged with criminal damage etc. for ripping the covers off restricted items in a supermarket if that’s what you mean.

      Some “uprising”.

      1. rose
        October 26, 2020

        Not what I meant.

  73. glen cullen
    October 26, 2020

    Plan B is in fact Plan A
    Philip Hammond (remainer) made a Peer today

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