I must admit to being quite surprised at the criticism of the Gov during this pandemic. Im not a fan of the current Gov either, and if you know me, almost an enemy of the concept of State, or the current global expressions of it. States lie and manipulate and legitimise disinformation without a crisis.
Anyway, this is a novel and seriously anomalous challenge not faced before in around 100years. Im quite sure if there were another Tunguska event somewhere more populace, there would be similar criticism of whichever Gov were forced to deal with it. Covid is a shit storm in every expression. Yes I understand ministerial duty, but I also understand the forces of nature. One is made by midgets, the other, by the universe.
I am the other end of the spectrum. I am surprised there are not riots on the streets.
60-80 thousand people dead
One of hardest hit countries in terms of recession
PPE scandal
Profiteering from COVID
Huge levels of incompetence
Battles with school meals
Battles with local mayors
School exams
Carehomes
It’s been one fuck up after the next.
Sure it’s one of the biggest challenges any government has ever faced. But at almost every turn they have performed poorly. By many metrics the performance of this government has been among the worst in the world.
Yep I agree, at times they have plainly spieled us. We must remember though, the peoples greatest fear is oppression by the Gov, the Gov greatest fear is panic leading to overthrow. They were lying to keep panic down; those daily updates in the first wave, looking back, are now like a horror show.
Inescapably this is high novelty from the universe.
Is the death rate wholly dependent on perceived incompetence, UK is one of the most densely populated areas in the world.
As to the recession, I think this is conjoined with Brexit.
All the others, your bang on about.
If this government were a private company and faced a yearly review with KPI indicators used they would be torn a new arsehole over how they’ve performed
There is complexity to the decision, but they’ve also failed on the basics. Starting with recognising it was a bloody pandemic in the first place.
If after everything that’s happened, the slow start, the pissing about with herd immunity, the failure to close borders, the PPE fiascos, the track and trace fiascos, Dominic Cummings, the confusing advice, the hokey-Kokey lockdowns, the abandonment of vulnerable people, the testing failures, the exams fiascos, the Christmas fiasco, the shovelling of public money to their incapable friends and colleagues, and last but not least the tens of thousands of deaths that could have been prevented, people still are willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, then our democracy is lost.
I have absolutely no defence to the profiteering - that pales into our mutual anti-capitalist sentiments, but as to the proliferation of the virus, to what extent do we factor in the inadvertence of youth to adhere to social distancing guidelines.
The difficulty for all governments is that where the expert advice isn’t followed and the experts’ worst forecasts for not doing so come to pass they’re going to get slammed and forced into u-turns or changes of course which are often then cases of too little too late. However, when the government doesn’t follow the expert advice and the forecasts of doom do not come to pass, no credit is given for the government balancing the risks well. Instead they’re lucky.
They really are damned if they do, damned if they don’t but that’s the price of being in charge. That’s not to say that the government hasn’t fucked up along the way, on multiple occasions across many issues, just that they’re nearly always judged with the benefit of hindsight and can’t be expected to get every call right when responding to something as profoundly unprecedented as Covid-19.
