Another senior figure in the so-called government should soon be resigning, after driving 264 to stay with his parents, against the stay at home order in effect at the time, and while showing covid symptoms shortly after Boris Johnson was admitted to hospital and thus should have been self-isolating. A resignation that will cause great rejoicing.
I'm no defender of Cummings but I don't see what else he and his wife could have done. She was ill, he was getting more unwell, the whole of the UK was being told to keep to themselves and they had a 4 year old that needed to be looked after. Where they went there was someone to look after the child and a separate place for him and his wife to be isolated.
What else to do? Take themselves off to hospital and call in Social Services? Emergency placements are hard enough to find at the best of times, never mind when the country is in the midst of a pandemic and you're trying to find somewhere for a child who might be infected with coronavirus.
Did he break the rules? Yes, of course. But in this instance there wasn't an alternative. Definitely not a resignation issue.
My friends and I used to have a rule of thumb for minimal standards of parenting. This was "How would it sound at the inquest?" If, on reflection, it would sound like bad parenting at the inquest, then we didn't do it.
By that rule of thumb, if they'd had to say at the inquest into why their child died in a fireball on the motorway "We knew we were both ill, and neither of us was really fit to to drive, but we drove 264 miles anyway" it would have been classified as Really Bad Parenting.
If they were well enough to drive 264 miles, they were probably also well enough to lie on a sofa, while their child watched mindless cartoons on the T.V.
I like the Dominic Cummings lock down tour t-shirt (Twitter link). Lots on Twitter last night about the journalist who broke the original story timing her revelations to allow all the refutations of the first trip before releasing the information of the second trip.
All those single parents in small flats with 2 or 3 kids who found themselves so ill that they could barely get out of bed (be that a really bad cold brought back from playgroup by their little disease vectors or covid-19) yet still managed to somehow fall out of bed to get their children dressed, fed, plonked in front of the TV for the day are clearly very bad parents. Because a couple with one child, in a large house were being such good parents by driving all the way to Durham to be close to parents.
It also suggests that the rules are discretionary. Apart from childcare, suppose someone is suffering mental health issues, as I'm sure plenty of people are. Why should they not decide to go on holiday, as they desperately need a change?
I think illness, fear of illness and desperation can make the most intelligent people behave irrationally.
Desperation? They were not very sick. Even with bad flu you can hardly move from bedroom to bathroom, never mind drive the length of the country. They didn’t care about the fine so they were happy to take the consequences.
I bet they are not quite So happy now that the consequences = dragging him out of the shadows into the glaring spotlight.
Welcome to the real world Cummings. ‘Herd immunity’ is suddenly less attractive as a policy eh?
My worry is a second wave, bigger than the first, which is entirely possible. How will the government’s ‘stay at home’ message be credible when they are all rallying round a person who totally ignores the guidelines.
The real consequences of this one couple’s actions could be catastrophic. If the govt had acted swiftly and sacked him, things would have looked very different this morning.
That's the point. It's a wrecking ball through govt requests to follow the rules. I don't feel like it, because of child care, old parents, mental health, blah blah. Why should I?
I think illness, fear of illness and desperation can make the most intelligent people behave irrationally.
Even if "fear of illness" (given that Dominic wasn't actually ill) can lead to irrational actions, does that excuse him for those actions and mean that he doesn't need to face the consequences?
Excess consumption of alcohol can lead people to act irrationally. Would it therefore make it OK for someone who's just downed half a bottle of whisky to drive 250 miles to say hello to mummy?
If I were the Cummings I think I'd be thinking about my life choices. It must be dismaying to discover that you have no friends / family / colleagues in London who like you enough to help out if you were ill, and the nearest people who are prepared to help in an emergency are your parents 264 miles away. I think I'd be pretty sad to think that I was a Dominic no-mates and everyone within a 250 mile radius had a "I wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire" attitude.
And, even then it was his parents he turned to. Doing something to help your children even when it's inconvenient is part of the job description of being a parent ... though, for most of us that also includes looking after toddlers when we're a bit under the weather, which doesn't appear to be what Cummings wanted to do.
I was thinking exactly the same thing @North East Quine.
Where is Mr Johnson? Is he keeping a low profile on this one till he sees if the situation is rescuable, or is he doing a Sir Robin act and bravely running away from it all, Cummings, Covid 19, Brexit the whole lot?
I was thinking exactly the same thing @North East Quine.
Where is Mr Johnson? Is he keeping a low profile on this one till he sees if the situation is rescuable, or is he doing a Sir Robin act and bravely running away from it all, Cummings, Covid 19, Brexit the whole lot?
Perhaps he is hiding in the fridge until everyone goes away.
I wish I'd known back in March, when we got the symptoms, that it was ok to drive over to your parents' house and get them to look after your sprog. Instead we did the socially responsible thing and muddled through at home, with a bit of help from the neighbours.
My parents live in Cumbria, which is among the regions with the highest number of fatalities. I can only assume this is due to all the people who hurried off to their second homes in the Lake District to sit out the lockdown.
I expect The Invisible Man the Prime Minister is spending some quality time in one of his homes, with one of his families.
He may be getting ready to 'stand behind' Demonic The Great, which means he's sharpening the dagger, and making sure he knows exactly at which point in Demonic's back he needs to insert it...
O - it seems that Cummings Has Entered Number 10, which presumably means that the PM is there, too...no doubt we will be treated to a typical Johnsonian Wafflefest later.
Meanwhile, a Sky News correspondent speculates that the reason for Labour's reticence over the whole Cummings debacle is that Sir Keir is heeding Napoleon Bonaparte's very sage ( ) advice not to interrupt one's enemy whilst he is making a mistake.
If everyone in Cummings' situation had acted as he had - with the country subsequently being criss-crossed by how many thousands upon thousands of similarly placed parents and guardians driving their infection from one part of the UK to the other etc - would the Prime Minister and his sheep-like sycophants have defended ALL those people? No.
You and I are to be conscientious, selfless, self-denying, observing to the letter the 'guidance' of staying at home if sick, keeping family members in the same household, similarly isolated for a further fortnight etc etc. If symptoms worsened, we would THEN be expected to phone NHS 111 and follow their advice. Anyone think Cummings did any of this? Did the voice at the end of the line say: 'Well, obviously you're so clearly too unwell to care for your child you should put it in a car, and drive half a day across the UK to your vulnerable elderly parents and have a little break while you're there. Before coming all the way back home again'.
Frankly, I don't care that he won't resign over this. He hasn't resigned over any of the other crap he's pulled. He knows he's invincible. He belongs to the posh millionaire's Teflon Club. What I will mind is that Johnson will still be supported and adored by his minions. Nothing this administration does, it seems, will ever change the minds of Tory supporters. Of course, it is hard to see the light, when one is so far up the backside of a corrupt political regime.
OTOH, at least some of the tories are voicing disapproval of Cummings. Not enough of them, but a few...
Whether this is because they care about the vast majority of good Lerts who are keeping to the rules, or whether they think they might lose votes over the affair (and the government's general incompetence, as well), I wouldn't like to say...
Were this affair to be part of the plot of a novel, of course, Cummings would be guided gently (but firmly) into a side room at Number 10, where a bottle of whisky, and a loaded revolver, would be waiting.
He would then be followed, after the single shot had rung out, by the next person in line...I wonder who that could be? This is, BTW, a novel with a Happy Ending.
If everyone in Cummings' situation had acted as he had - with the country subsequently being criss-crossed by how many thousands upon thousands of similarly placed parents and guardians driving their infection from one part of the UK to the other etc - would the Prime Minister and his sheep-like sycophants have defended ALL those people? No.
You and I are to be conscientious, selfless, self-denying, observing to the letter the 'guidance' of staying at home if sick, keeping family members in the same household, similarly isolated for a further fortnight etc etc. If symptoms worsened, we would THEN be expected to phone NHS 111 and follow their advice. Anyone think Cummings did any of this? Did the voice at the end of the line say: 'Well, obviously you're so clearly too unwell to care for your child you should put it in a car, and drive half a day across the UK to your vulnerable elderly parents and have a little break while you're there. Before coming all the way back home again'.
Frankly, I don't care that he won't resign over this. He hasn't resigned over any of the other crap he's pulled. He knows he's invincible. He belongs to the posh millionaire's Teflon Club. What I will mind is that Johnson will still be supported and adored by his minions. Nothing this administration does, it seems, will ever change the minds of Tory supporters. Of course, it is hard to see the light, when one is so far up the backside of a corrupt political regime.
I think illness, fear of illness and desperation can make the most intelligent people behave irrationally.
Really? A family I know well, mum, dad and 3 sons of 2, 4 and 6 years old - dad, went down with it, then mum 3 days later, both really poorly. NHS 111 confirmed Covid diagnosis and said to all self isolate for 14 days. What did they do? What they were told was the right thing of course! I wonder if they would if the same happened now, well, I know the answer would be yes, because they are moral, thoughtful people, not selfish, self entitled brats!
Meanwhile, a Sky News correspondent speculates that the reason for Labour's reticence over the whole Cummings debacle is that Sir Keir is heeding Napoleon Bonaparte's very sage ( ) advice not to interrupt one's enemy whilst he is making a mistake.
Napoleon may very well have said it, but didn't Sun Tzu say it first?
You know my biggest fear about catching Covid-19? It's not ending up in the ICU. It's what the hell I would do with Captain Pyjamas. He's 2, rather than 4, so even less capable of keeping himself entertained, and the thought of keeping him confined in the apartment for a fortnight without going outside terrifies me.
But even so, it wouldn't occur to me to travel a couple of hundred miles to an old person's house to seek help. I would phone my friends and ask them to deliver groceries. I would throw myself on the mercy of the neighbours. I can't imagine doing anything so irresponsible as what Dominic Cummings has done.
I wonder if they actually believed in the lockdown, so many ministers are supporting Cummings, and his own version, that is, I do what suits me. Even the health minister has supported him, after condemning Ferguson.
I wonder if they actually believed in the lockdown, so many ministers are supporting Cummings, and his own version, that is, I do what suits me. Even the health minister has supported him, after condemning Ferguson.
I understand the ministers were "encourage" to offer their support. I don't think it proves anything about their personal inclinations so much as them recognising that they serve at Johnson's whim, as shaped by Cummings.
And the attorney general has supported Cummings. Good grief. 'I know there are these regulations, but I have special circumstances, which oblige me to swerve them.'
I wonder if they actually believed in the lockdown, so many ministers are supporting Cummings, and his own version, that is, I do what suits me. Even the health minister has supported him, after condemning Ferguson.
I understand the ministers were "encourage" to offer their support. I don't think it proves anything about their personal inclinations so much as them recognising that they serve at Johnson's whim, as shaped by Cummings.
Yes. This. They'll have all Benn whipped into line regardless of their own personal views on the matter.
A Conservative councillor once said to me, 'It's not as if we have a big whip ...'
To which I replied, 'No, but you've got a whopping big Cat o'Nine Tails and an enormous spiked cudgel instead ...'
My wife hasn't seen her mother since early March, and missed her 95th birthday. Her ma also lost her best friend to covid, and has been on her own the whole time. And then some android pipsqueak dances around the rules. If he isn't sacked, the rage will increase from people following the rules.
I am counting no chickens but it's just possible they've jumped the shark on this one.
There's a lot of anger from people who followed the rules and made big sacrifices (because regardless of the government's idiocy, they understood it was necessary). The ministerial defences seem to be particularly effective at enraging people.
There's a lot of chatter on social media, there is noise from prominent Torys and Tory supporters.
I count no chickens because most of us on this thread already knew that this government is as amoral as it is incompetent as it is arrogant. But this particular episode seems to be cutting through to those who hadn't seen that before.
If this all unravels as I now think it might the defences by Raab and Patel and Rees-Mogg will just look worse and worse.
Basically, Boris is saying, make up your own rules, according to your instincts. What a pathetic display. I'm sure people had instincts to be with their dying relatives, but they couldn't and didn't. What a fucking disgrace.
I'm surprised how angry I am about this. People have made real sacrifices and Boris is effectively saying "more fool you for taking our instructions seriously"
What would the death rate be like now if everybody had had Cummings loose grasp of the rules?
Conservative shipmates, if you're still listening and reading, this is your last chance to take back your party from the British Trumpists to whom you and your loved ones don't matter a jot. Write to your MPs and stand up for the millions of people who've had their sacrifices thrown back in their face by Johnson and his spoilt selfish mate.
The only realistically serious fear Cummings (and don't we wish his mother had douched away his father's?) and other half should have had, being in a low risk group, was passing it on to vulnerable people, like (random example) grandparents in a higher risk age group. Which is why they didn't... oh, wait, sorry.
Comments
It’s not like London to Luton.
That wasn’t a quick nip over the county border or something.
I rest my case.
My friends and I used to have a rule of thumb for minimal standards of parenting. This was "How would it sound at the inquest?" If, on reflection, it would sound like bad parenting at the inquest, then we didn't do it.
By that rule of thumb, if they'd had to say at the inquest into why their child died in a fireball on the motorway "We knew we were both ill, and neither of us was really fit to to drive, but we drove 264 miles anyway" it would have been classified as Really Bad Parenting.
If they were well enough to drive 264 miles, they were probably also well enough to lie on a sofa, while their child watched mindless cartoons on the T.V.
I'm not sure Cummings has that level of self-awareness.
no sign of him using it ...
All those single parents in small flats with 2 or 3 kids who found themselves so ill that they could barely get out of bed (be that a really bad cold brought back from playgroup by their little disease vectors or covid-19) yet still managed to somehow fall out of bed to get their children dressed, fed, plonked in front of the TV for the day are clearly very bad parents. Because a couple with one child, in a large house were being such good parents by driving all the way to Durham to be close to parents.
Desperation? They were not very sick. Even with bad flu you can hardly move from bedroom to bathroom, never mind drive the length of the country. They didn’t care about the fine so they were happy to take the consequences.
I bet they are not quite So happy now that the consequences = dragging him out of the shadows into the glaring spotlight.
Welcome to the real world Cummings. ‘Herd immunity’ is suddenly less attractive as a policy eh?
My worry is a second wave, bigger than the first, which is entirely possible. How will the government’s ‘stay at home’ message be credible when they are all rallying round a person who totally ignores the guidelines.
The real consequences of this one couple’s actions could be catastrophic. If the govt had acted swiftly and sacked him, things would have looked very different this morning.
Excess consumption of alcohol can lead people to act irrationally. Would it therefore make it OK for someone who's just downed half a bottle of whisky to drive 250 miles to say hello to mummy?
Will sensible Tories speak up?
It's not illness, it's a sense of entitlement and "the rules don't apply to me".
Where is Mr Johnson? Is he keeping a low profile on this one till he sees if the situation is rescuable, or is he doing a Sir Robin act and bravely running away from it all, Cummings, Covid 19, Brexit the whole lot?
Perhaps he is hiding in the fridge until everyone goes away.
I wish I'd known back in March, when we got the symptoms, that it was ok to drive over to your parents' house and get them to look after your sprog. Instead we did the socially responsible thing and muddled through at home, with a bit of help from the neighbours.
My parents live in Cumbria, which is among the regions with the highest number of fatalities. I can only assume this is due to all the people who hurried off to their second homes in the Lake District to sit out the lockdown.
He may be getting ready to 'stand behind' Demonic The Great, which means he's sharpening the dagger, and making sure he knows exactly at which point in Demonic's back he needs to insert it...
Meanwhile, a Sky News correspondent speculates that the reason for Labour's reticence over the whole Cummings debacle is that Sir Keir is heeding Napoleon Bonaparte's very sage (
You and I are to be conscientious, selfless, self-denying, observing to the letter the 'guidance' of staying at home if sick, keeping family members in the same household, similarly isolated for a further fortnight etc etc. If symptoms worsened, we would THEN be expected to phone NHS 111 and follow their advice. Anyone think Cummings did any of this? Did the voice at the end of the line say: 'Well, obviously you're so clearly too unwell to care for your child you should put it in a car, and drive half a day across the UK to your vulnerable elderly parents and have a little break while you're there. Before coming all the way back home again'.
Frankly, I don't care that he won't resign over this. He hasn't resigned over any of the other crap he's pulled. He knows he's invincible. He belongs to the posh millionaire's Teflon Club. What I will mind is that Johnson will still be supported and adored by his minions. Nothing this administration does, it seems, will ever change the minds of Tory supporters. Of course, it is hard to see the light, when one is so far up the backside of a corrupt political regime.
Whether this is because they care about the vast majority of good Lerts who are keeping to the rules, or whether they think they might lose votes over the affair (and the government's general incompetence, as well), I wouldn't like to say...
Were this affair to be part of the plot of a novel, of course, Cummings would be guided gently (but firmly) into a side room at Number 10, where a bottle of whisky, and a loaded revolver, would be waiting.
He would then be followed, after the single shot had rung out, by the next person in line...I wonder who that could be? This is, BTW, a novel with a Happy Ending.
Absolutely this!!!
O wait. This thread is about the PM. Add him to that remark, if you like.
Really? A family I know well, mum, dad and 3 sons of 2, 4 and 6 years old - dad, went down with it, then mum 3 days later, both really poorly. NHS 111 confirmed Covid diagnosis and said to all self isolate for 14 days. What did they do? What they were told was the right thing of course! I wonder if they would if the same happened now, well, I know the answer would be yes, because they are moral, thoughtful people, not selfish, self entitled brats!
Napoleon may very well have said it, but didn't Sun Tzu say it first?
But even so, it wouldn't occur to me to travel a couple of hundred miles to an old person's house to seek help. I would phone my friends and ask them to deliver groceries. I would throw myself on the mercy of the neighbours. I can't imagine doing anything so irresponsible as what Dominic Cummings has done.
I understand the ministers were "encourage" to offer their support. I don't think it proves anything about their personal inclinations so much as them recognising that they serve at Johnson's whim, as shaped by Cummings.
To the Tower with the lot of 'em...
Except that even more people would get sick, and die.
Not that the Gang of Gobshites would care.
Good luck imposing any restrictions on everyone else going forward, I suppose.
Our Glorious Leader Himself, in his own person, will lead the coronavirus briefing at 5pm today.
Any bets on whether he'll announce that Cummings is Goings?
Yes. This. They'll have all Benn whipped into line regardless of their own personal views on the matter.
A Conservative councillor once said to me, 'It's not as if we have a big whip ...'
To which I replied, 'No, but you've got a whopping big Cat o'Nine Tails and an enormous spiked cudgel instead ...'
There's a lot of anger from people who followed the rules and made big sacrifices (because regardless of the government's idiocy, they understood it was necessary). The ministerial defences seem to be particularly effective at enraging people.
There's a lot of chatter on social media, there is noise from prominent Torys and Tory supporters.
I count no chickens because most of us on this thread already knew that this government is as amoral as it is incompetent as it is arrogant. But this particular episode seems to be cutting through to those who hadn't seen that before.
If this all unravels as I now think it might the defences by Raab and Patel and Rees-Mogg will just look worse and worse.
Have they jumped the shark?
Maybe, just maybe.
AFZ
But I have to admit that I am watching today and it is hilarious!
Johnson's squirming and ridiculous justifications...
OK, so I have a black sense of humour but satire is one of the best weapons there is against arrogant abuses of power.
AFZ
What would the death rate be like now if everybody had had Cummings loose grasp of the rules?