Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Covid-19

Left or Right In a situation where so far 249,000 people have lost their lives it seems a shame to use the situation to leverage ones own flavour of politics.

As a contrarian, I disagree completely

Where does legitimate scrutiny end and political leverage start?

Does that mean you feel the Government should not be exposed to question and criticism by the Labour Party regarding their handling of the crisis? And if not by Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, then presumably by nobody?

How about the media? Would for example the refusal of the government to be interviewed by Piers Morgan on Good Morning Britain represent leveraging their own flavour of politics, or a result of Piers Morgan leveraging his own?

Not too sure how you get from "it seems a shame to use the situation to leverage ones own flavour of politics." to "Does that mean you feel the Government should not be exposed to question and criticism by the Labour Party regarding their handling of the crisis"

But In this situation it is not something I'm prepared to debate.

(Oh and Ball and Player again Tim)

Ok. Let's hypothetically take domestic politics out of the equation. The Uk"s response to the virus has been woeful. Just imagine if the building nest door to you was on fire and in danger of burning down. Would you sit idly by and hope that it wouldn't spread to your building? Would you maybe get a garden hose and just in case a few sparks fell your way? Would you have a plan to deal with and mitigate the risks from a fire spreading to your building (or perhaps starting in your building)? Would you have kept that plan updated and made sure that the firefighting equipment that you might need was kept in good order and that any water supply you needed was adequate and properly maintained? Once it was clear that the building was alight and in danger of spreading to you building would you take expert advice on what measures to take next?

I watched a rather revealing documentary last night on how South Korea has been dealing with the epidemic and it was frankly embarrassing for the UK. And I'm sure there are those who will trot out the nationalist stereotypes about Koreans being more deferential to authority - watch the documentary on catch-up if you can. We have deep problems in our society that makes us extremely vulnerable to disasters like this. And that is where the politics starts.

Exactly. And if we can't engage, question and critique policies, politics and ideologies now, then when can we?

Not seen the Korean programme but a radio programme some weeks ago suggested that because of previous Covid type (Birdflu) outbreaks in that part of the world, they and possibly other far eastern countries were geared up and ready with plans to implement the immediate actions necessary when the next one emerges.

Suppose in hindsight, this pandemic was predictable and probably inevitable and governments in the rest of the world should have been much better prepared.

Look at how much countries spend on defence.

David - yes, there has been a conservative-led UK Govt for a long time, but I'm not convinced like you it will stay that way well into the future.

Yes, there is utter lunacy at the extreme left of the Labour party as you state in an earlier post - but a key tenet that unites all of Labour is a belief that essential services that benefit and unite the whole of society (health, social care, education, basic utilities, transportation infrastructure etc) should be owned, controlled and regulated by society as a whole.

So when the Covid crisis leads the electorate to conclude that society should maybe take back control of some of these things, is it more likely that Boris Johnson can shift the Tory Party towards a social infrastructure agenda, or that Kier Starmer can get rid of the looney element in his party?

I wouldn't bet on Boris (and I don't dislike him). I think the path out of Covid and the changes it will ask of society will wrong-foot a lot of politicians...

(Ps - I ask my question as a neutral - there is not a UK political party which reflects my views)

That was why I asked the question of Brian. It appears at the moment that any critique of the government's handling of the crisis is deflected by claims that 'this is no time for politics'. We now have a situation where the government is refusing to participate with anyone that might scrutinise them (eg Piers Morgan on GMB), and where they are unable to do so in Prime Minister's Questions (where Keir Starmer is proving to be a very effective scrutineer), they are seeking to discredit him by circulating doctored videos of Starmer making it seem as if he was defending the failure of the Rochdale debacle. I note that the 3 main Tory MPS involved (Nadine Dorries, Lucy Allan, and Maria Caulfield) have now deleted their tweets, but no apology has been forthcoming as yet.