With the Cummings Commons Committee starting at 0930 – the former advisor Tweets a pic of pre-lockdown Number 10 strategy white board
The first premise was no vaccine in 2020
Now we have the build-up to the Cummings appearance before Commons Health and Science Committee
Local lockdowns by stealth – it is all looking rather chaotic
A big problem with bringing in new lockdowns is that so many people are now vaccinated and don’t feel the same risk or believe that they could be spreaders. The major fact needs to be repeated that in terms of hospitalisations the pandemic has just about been stopped. I live in one of the affected areas and my reading is that it is going to be very difficult to impose and maintain travel bans on a voluntary basis. Many people…
If controlling hospital admissions is the objective then the pandemic is almost over
The lead story in the Telegraph this morning is under the heading “Exclusive: Vaccination won’t mean an end to self-isolating”. This is in sharp contrast to the strategy being followed by the Biden administration in the US where those who are fully vaccinated don’t need to self-isolate if they have come into contact with someone who has had Covid unless they are showing symptoms. This is based on guidance from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Contrast that…
Choosing Jo Cox’s sister might just be enough to save Labour’s bacon in Batley and Spen
So far we haven’t got a date for the Batley by-election but everything is getting ready for the starting gun to be fired. After Labour’s debacle in Hartlepool, the assumption on the betting markets is that the Tories will find it easy to overhaul be 3.5k majority that Labour had at GE2019. Currently, the Tories are rated as a 66% chance. What could make a difference here is the choice of the Labour candidate, Kim Leadbeater, who is the sister…
Can Dom’s Commons committee appearance on Wednesday possibly live up to its billing?
Or will it end up a bit of a damp squib? Over the weekend there has been an increasing build up to the appearance on Wednesday morning by Dominic Cummings before the Commons select committees on Health and Science. This has been reinforced by a series of Tweets from the former advisor to Boris Johnson and all the indications are that he is going to try to “spill the beans” in some form about the government’s handling of the pandemic….
In just three weeks there’ve been CON leads ranging between 1% and 18% in the published national polls
At least we know the pollsters aren’t “herding” Above is the Wikipedia table of the latest voting intention polls and as can be seen there is a huge variation between the polls. In fact the gap when looking at them from the CON lead perspective is as great as anything I have seen since establishing PB in March 2004. What is not included in the list is the regular monitor from Ipsos-MORI – the one firm that still carries much…
The most depressing polling response I can recall
I’ve never been more disheartened by a response to a poll than this poll. I think the GOP are becoming aware of the fact that they’ve only won the popular vote once in the last eight presidential elections. I try to use the word fascism sparingly but this is where the party of Lincoln is headed, but like many despots the GOP want to suppress their political opponents from challenging them. A confident party would want to focus on popular…