Mike Buckley 🌹
@mdbuckley
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Director @UKEUCommission | Commentator + journalist | Former @UKLabour adviser and aid worker 🇺🇦
Sheffield, England
Joined August 2008
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Last Seen Profiles
What kind of a man goes to visit his *elderly parents* when sick with an illness that disproportionately targets the old?
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Brutal cartoon in The Times of all places.
Governments in control of events don’t let stuff like this happen.
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I’ve never understood the ‘it’s all the Remainers fault’ line. Literally none of this was our idea.
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Ireland spent €770,000 on their test and trace system - and it works. Our Govt spent £12bn - and it’s a disaster.
We’re being taken for fools.
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The gulf between Johnson and Whitty at these press conferences grows and grows. Today Johnson said 'Omicron is mild, hospitalisations are less likely', Whitty said 'Omicron is not mild, we're heading towards the hospitalisation peak seen last January.' /1
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It’s quite something when the PM and his advisor can unite
@JuliaHB1
@montie
@piersmorgan
@Keir_Starmer
, the entire opposition, many of their own backbenchers, almost all the media *and* most of the public in utter disgust at their incompetence and failure.
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Daily deaths at 314, +95 from the same day last week. And Johnson decides today is the day to announce he's ending all Covid restrictions a month early, in yet another desperate attempt to save his own skin. /1
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Why on Earth is the government telling fishermen that they’ll be able to catch 7 times more fish after Brexit? There won’t be any more fish.
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So this week Johnson has:
✅Melted down hundreds of thousands of 31 Oct 50p coins
✅Given up £7bn windfall from European Investment Bank
✅Spent £2bn on needless No Deal preparations
✅Spent £100 million on 31 October Get Ready ads
✅Failed to leave EU
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So we’ve reached the part of Brexit where government advisors tell UK companies to lay off British staff, open EU operations and employ EU based staff to circumvent Brexit barriers. Genuinely no one thought this through.
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Grant Shapps this morning on
@BBCr4today
said the 'UK is testing more people than any country other than China & Italy'. It isn't true. We're not testing anywhere near the numbers of other countries. Even NHS staff can't get tested. If they're going to lie what chance do we have.
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Listening to Frost speech in Lisbon which is supposed to be about Northern Ireland but in reality it seems to be a belated justification for why Brexit is going so badly. /1
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The Govt is refusing to allow Matt Hancock to attend the EU Pandemic meeting - which we’re still entitled to, and could choose to remain a member of - because they’re desperate to create distance. Politics above lives.
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Calls for Whitty and Vallance to set out the science - if any - behind the removal of restrictions are absolutely right. /1
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I know we’re all angry about the parties.
Can we also be angry about the ‘lowest restrictions in Europe’ in the nation that coincidentally has the highest deaths in Europe, and about the 5 day isolation which puts about 1/3 of people back into society while infectious.
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What Corbyn wants is not the point.
What Corbyn will *do* is very much the point, which is hold a 2nd referendum with Remain on the ballot. This is the only way we get to stay in the EU.
It’s easy for the Lib Dems to take pot shots. It’s impossible for them to stop Brexit.
Jeremy Corbyn cannot bring himself to say he wants the UK to stay in the EU,despite being asked multiple times, for one simple reason: he is a Brexiter.His "credible Leave option" does not even include Single Market membership.A vote for Corbyn is NOT a vote to
#StopBrexit
#Marr
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Must watch - British people get told how much healthcare costs in the US.
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The biggest problem with ‘learning to live with the virus’ is the growing number of people dying with the virus, all because our Govt refuses to act.
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A good chunk of our governing party - including we're told a third of the Cabinet - have devoted themselves to fighting the safety measures instead of the virus. That's a real problem.
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Looks like Brexit could mean that the UK gets any
#COVID19
vaccine later than other countries, & for more money, due to us being out of the EU’s joint procurement of medical countermeasures. I'm not sure this divergence thing is all it's cracked up to be.
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In all the North Shropshire coverage so far there's been basically zero mention of the fact that yes many rural voters voted Brexit but that since then the Govt has shafted farming and agriculture with its Australia and New Zealand trade deals. /1
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How is AstraZenica is getting off so lightly. They promised the UK and EU the Earth, couldn’t come up with the goods, told different stories to each side then sauntered off into the distance whistling. And here we are.
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Astounding we are not more angry about this. We don’t have to put up with high case numbers, hospitalisations and deaths. It’s Govt choice - they’re choosing to let us die by the hundred, day after day after day.
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It’s all in the headline eh. ‘Sadiq Khan acts to save 3.5m from dirty air and ill health’ would’ve done just as well.
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British messaging on Covid rates can be mind bending. A BBC interviewee today said 'we're ahead of the EU in our Delta wave', perhaps suggesting it's like a race and we're in the lead. What he meant was that we've just let more people die since the summer. Hardly an accolade.
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One unexpected result of the US departure from Afghanistan is the spotlight it has shone on Britain’s isolation in the world. The special relationship has been shown for the sham it has long been. Our wilful abandonment of Europe now becomes apparent. And we find ourselves alone.
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If this is proved to be true Cummings shouldn’t just lose his job, he should face a public enquiry & the law, as should anyone who assisted him. It was obvious to anyone aware of WHO guidance that the UK was making a huge mistake; if this is true we know it was deliberate choice.
So we were right. The lethal ‘herd immunity without vaccine’ strategy came from Dominic Cummings “protect the economy and if that means some pensioners die, too bad”.
There’s an audit trail now. I hope lawyers are watching. Herd Immunity without a vaccine is unheard of.
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‘A land of hope and glory does not allow a woman to die in poverty with her child at her side.’
We should all be angry about the death of Mercy Baguma, dead at the hands of a system designed to be hostile.
Well said
@MatthewdAncona
.
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Johnson reportedly 'raging' about young people not getting vaccinated in large enough numbers but he's spent 18 months telling young people Covid doesn't affect them, and refuses to vaccinate teens for the same reason and because he claims falsely that vaccines aren't safe. /1
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If
@UKLabour
enables a Tory Brexit we’re finished as a political force.
All polling on this shows a huge drop in our support.
We would own the social and economic damage of Brexit along with the Tories.
The alternative is to oppose the Tories, win votes and end the Brexit damage.
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Long live the world’s greatest peace project. 🇪🇺
Singing of Auld Lang Syne starts in the European Parliament as the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement is approved by MEPs
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Speaking to EU colleagues this morning clear that the Australian trade deal has reaffirmed EU intent to ensure full application of the NI Protocol. The arrival of large quantities of Aussie beef and lamb in GB means they need to be sure it doesn't get into the Single Market.
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The ‘watermelon smiles’ column from Johnson is quite a read. Besides the naked racism, he thought then that the NHS was one of the worst health systems in Europe, that it should be part private funded and that we should pay to see GPs. He’s also, unsurprisingly, misogynist. Vile.
the original Boris Johnson ‘piccaninnies’ column is here - he’s previously claimed the quote was taken out of context…. so here it is:
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Great job
@Channel4News
This is how to deal with a politician, or anyone else, telling blatant lies on your programme.
Call out the lie and ask them to move along.
👍👍
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Another Labour gain from the Tories in the south. These elections are far more interesting than they’ve been made out to be.
Chipping Norton (Oxfordshire) council result:
Lab: 42.6% (+8.5)
Con: 40.9% (-4.3)
Grn: 10.9% (+8.2)
LDem: 5.6% (-10.6)
Lab GAIN from Con
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At what point do the English population tire of Johnson’s failure to control the pandemic. It can be done - as demonstrated by the rest of the UK. It’s Govt failure on a massive scale.
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In contrast to Starmer's reported comments in the
@guardian
interview, Labour clearly do have ambitions to improve the Brexit deal. They're laying 9 amendments today on issues including SIS II, economic impact, employment and environmental standards and Erasmus.
Thread 👇👇 /1
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Starmer's tactic is comparing NHS waiting times now to when Labour left office in 2010 is a good one. The difference is stark. Sunak has no answer.
#PMQs
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Len McCluskey maintains his one man crusade to ensure perpetual Tory government. What a guy.
Unite source: "We are fed up with being taken for granted. Unite’s support is not guaranteed and we had to send a message. Let’s hope Keir listens."
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The problem of children needing to isolate due to a highly dangerous virus spreading through schools is not to end isolation but to restrict transmission.
The fact *we're not even talking about* restricting transmission fails children, teachers and their households. /1
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Astounding.
@AmberRuddHR
admits that Johnson’s deal will cause huge damage to the economy, and that she’d prefer regulatory alignment included, but says she’ll vote for it anyway.
It’s not a compromise. It’s a walkover by the hard right.
Wake up Amber.
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Watching Starmer on catch up, he says that Labour will inherit the Brexit deal in 2024 and needs to accept it. It isn’t credible to say ‘vote Labour - we won’t change stuff’. The public - the country - need better.
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Imagine what we could have done with £200bn.
Brexit is set to have cost the UK more than £200 billion in lost economic growth by the end of this year — a figure that almost eclipses the total amount the UK has paid toward the European Union budget over the past 47 years of its ENTIRE MEMEBERSHIP
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Near unbelievable that lockdown decisions are *still* being presented as lives vs economy when it's been abundantly clear for well over a year that the best way to protect / free the economy is to reduce infections as far as possible, which also saves lives. /1
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If The Times is to be believed Cummings’ number one goal is avoiding a Brexit extension. This one man has done huge damage to our country - and he is set to continue.
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The real solution to the NI Protocol that no one will talk about (yet)? The UK rejoining the Customs Union. Give the idea a bit of time though. We'll get there.
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So we're now living in a strange world where Jenny Harries, now head of the UK Health Security Agency, says Omicron is “probably the most significant threat” since the start of the pandemic, and Amanda Pritchard, chief executive of NHS England, says it could lead to as many /1
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Awkward moment for Priti Patel as her pet project has actual consequences.
Actually, Madam Secretary, as you may know, the cooperation with France was enshrined in the EU rules. You’ll have to negotiate a new treaty with your neighbor.
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How others see us.
"When I grew up, UK diplomacy was, for me, a symbol of credibility," says
@ManfredWeber
, leader of the *conservative* European Parliament grouping. "Today when we see the way Johnson behaves, the message is 'I don't care, I don't care even about my signature'."
Hard to hear. ~AA
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So we've reached the point of Brexit where the Government tells schools to stock up on long life milk.
How the rest of the world must marvel at our pristine sovereignty and weep with jealousy.
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He says Brexit has allowed a bonfire of regulations - in reality it's the biggest imposition of regulations on business, and the biggest loss of freedoms for business and individuals in living memory. /2
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I should be used to it but I'm still shocked by the people whose response to a potentially dangerous new variant is 'let's not do anything it'll be fine'. Meanwhile WHO and our own scientists are sounding the alarm and recommending masks, distancing etc. We've been here before.
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‘Wales to keep home working, Covid pass and mandatory masks until 2022’
Not everywhere in Britain is badly governed, which is something.
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Looks like turning Kent into a car park doesn’t help you win votes. Shocker. There’s a lesson here for Labour if it’s willing to take it.
Folkestone East (Kent) council result:
Lab: 38.2% (+12.5)
Con: 32.7% (-3.0)
Oth: 18.7% (+17.3)
LDem: 10.4% (-6.3)
No UKIP (-20.4) as prev.
Lab GAIN from Con
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Jo Swinson’s refusal to work with Corbyn to stop No Deal is very poor politics. She says Corbyn won’t get the numbers - he’d be more likely to do so if she signed up. There’s little point being anti Brexit if you’re going to reject a real, available means of stopping it.
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Most comment on this will focus on the EU-UK battle of words. But think too of Northern Ireland - as ever stuck in the middle of this - and its still fragile peace process. The lack of concern for the GFA and peace in NI from Johnson's Govt is a dereliction of duty. /23
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He says Brexit is about safeguarding British democracy - but at the same time his Govt is pushing through an Elections Bill which is a direct attack on British democracy - voter ID, restricting third party campaigning and more. /3
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Finally he's on the Northern Ireland Protocol. He says the EU tried to use NI to force the UK to reverse Brexit - which is a flagrant lie. The EU was careful not to interfere in the Brexit process the whole way through. They still are. /5
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Listening to this it seems ever more likely that Johnson and Frost may - as surmised by others - have decided that given NI isn't suffering the shortages faced in GB that it may be too much proof that Brexit is the cause of GB shortages and trials. /10
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Johnson says that it's a choice between Plan B and lockdown, which has its own harms. He ignores - again - the vaccines plus strategy adopted in many other nations and recommended by WHO. Ventilation in schools, working test and trace, support to stay at home if infected ... /5
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Kate Hoey spent years making this happen. The people of Northern Ireland spoke up for themselves when they voted clearly for Remain, a vote she and her ilk ignored. Now we have the consequences.
"No one is speaking up for Northern Ireland."
Baroness Kate Hoey says the Northern Ireland Protocol "has to be looked at" as it is causing "huge delays" to deliveries travelling to Northern Ireland from the rest of the UK.
Latest politics news:
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It’s kind of depressing that the media are more incensed by the boozy parties than the 175,000 deaths, the constant failure to listen to experts, the callous disregard for the grief of others. /1
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He says he 'just wants friendly relations and free trade' yet he refuses to implement the agreements he not only signed, he negotiated, just months ago. /4
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Johnson’s ‘freedom day’ is the exact opposite for many. Anyone who wants to avoid COVID infection, the risk of Long COVID, the risk of passing infection on to loved ones or strangers, will have no choice but to withdraw from public spaces as cases skyrocket.
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Labour need to do far more than tell the Govt to ‘get a grip’ or sort out ‘dither and delay’.
Brexit outcomes aren’t primarily a problem of execution but design - the problem is Brexit itself, made worse by their choice of its hardest form. /1
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He says the Protocol means that NI needs to run EU law 'without consent' which may be true BUT crucially that was his choice in 2019. No one forced him to negotiate the WA - he did so willingly and at the time he and Johnson celebrated it as an act of strategic genius. /6
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Other nations will trust Britain again but it will be after Johnson, and as with the US after Trump that trust will be cautious. There’ll always be the thought ‘they did it once, they could do it again’.
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or even more hospitalisations as last winter, yet the Govt have 'no plans' to introduce measures beyond the clearly inadequate ones they've brought in so far. Which means more cases, more hospitalisations, more deaths and more Long Covid. /2
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The UK Parliament had a single day to scrutinise the deal. The European Parliament will have about 3 months. Now JRM closes the Brexit select committee. They know the deal is a dud - they just don’t want us to know it.
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This is absolutely a consequence of Johnson's failing leadership and his inability to bring his party with him. It's also the result of letting infections run in the tens of thousands per day since July. /3
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Essentially he's saying 'we signed it hoping the EU would actually just let us off, but they didn't so now we don't like it'. Which isn't exactly grown up politics. /19
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'I'm starting to wonder if Boris Johnson has been furloughed. I don't trust him at all. You hardly ever see him. What the Govt says doesn't have any logic to it, whether they follow the alert system anymore, whether they follow scientists.'
Brutal voter interview on
@BBCr4today
.
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‘People who had recovered from COVID exhibited significant cognitive deficits’
Allowing this virus to spread unimpeded, particularly among the young, is barbaric. We urgently need a rethink and change of strategy before more harm is done.
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Frost seems to think there's a way for the Belfast Agreement to exist and be implemented *without* the Protocol *and* with the UK outside the EU and Single Market. Only there isn't - we went through all this in excrutiating detail from 2016 - 2019. /12
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This is just sad - for performers, for lost audiences in Europe, for British soft power - whatever that means now.
@BorisJohnson
@michaelgove
et al have caused so much harm, for no gain other than their own short term electoral advantage.
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‘By definition the variants we are most worried about are the ones that infect vaccinated people. So making vaccinated people exempt from quarantine doesn’t make any sense if variants are what we are most worried about.’
Well said
@chrischirp
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Another day, another £1bn loss of daily trading for the City of London courtesy of
@BorisJohnson
and
@RishiSunak
's Brexit deal.
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use and provision of high quality masks, vaccination of children, etc would all keep cases - and hence hospitalisations and deaths - down while allowing us to continue living our lives. Instead we have minimal and inadequate restrictions with the inevitable results we see today/6
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Even the Telegraph seems to be admitting that Brexit is a disaster - even if that means they’re now desperately casting around for a scapegoat.
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The rest of us pointed out the downsides, and that Johnson had said not long before that he would never countenance a border in the Irish Sea, but he and Frost did it, chose it, knew exactly what it meant. /7
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It’s another own goal, another attempt to look like they’re reducing no regulation when they’re creating it. British businesses will have to abide by GDPR anyway if they’re going to trade with the EU. They’ll now need to do double the work. Red tape courtesy of hard Brexit.
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Frost now complains that NI being de facto in the Single Market means that the EU can make laws which apply in NI without NI consent. True - but again this was Johnson and Frost's choice. /9
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@AlokSharma_RDG
It was developed in Germany and manufactured in Belgium. I'm not sure that counts as 'UK led charge'.
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It might be quicker if Sue Gray worked out which days there wasn’t a party in Downing St attended by Boris Johnson in 2020.
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The message of the locals, at least for
@UKLabour
, is not to get Brexit through - but to stop it.
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We landed at the Protocol because Johnson, Frost and the ERG refused to accept May's backstop. Attempting to suggest now that there is a magical 3rd way that is not the backstop or Protocol is ludicrous. For obvious reasons. /13
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Depressing if unsurprising that
@theresecoffey
has abandoned the health inequalities white paper, sending the clear signal that she and her Govt don't care about inequality that gives the rich 19 more years of life than the poor.
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Which of course would mean that Frost and Johnson are running scared, and that they're more terrified of the political impact of shortages (which aren't going away until Brexit is at least in part unwound) than they're letting on. /11
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Frost refers to the Belfast Agreement - which the EU have shown far more commitment to than Johnson and Frost throughout. To her credit May did see its value and importance, Frost and Johnson never have. /8
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There’s something quite chilling about a Govt announcement which is essentially ‘more of you will die, but we’re going to carry on with our plan anyway’.
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All of which rather depressingly points to the likelihood that Frost and Johnson don't want a negotiated solution, and instead want ongoing arguments and a deepening loss of respect, trust and communication between the UK and EU. /22
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"Brussels has warned that it will sever a data-sharing agreement with the UK if London’s attempts to rewrite its internet laws are found to pose a threat to EU citizens’ privacy."
Sure looks as if we had more control on the inside...
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They agree on boosters but neither gave the unwelcome news that booster effectiveness starts to wane after 10 weeks (and likely goes down from there, we don't have data to know yet). Still absolutely worth getting but it's no guarantee of avoiding infection or illness. /2
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This is so wrongheaded. Had Labour not backed a 2nd ref we'd have done substantially worse last December, losing more voters to the Lib Dems, Greens and Plaid. We'd be below 200 seats now. Had we backed Remain we'd have done far better. Facts matter.
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At some point the Govt is going to have to stop pretending that it didn't know what it was signing up to in 2019.
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Meanwhile millions remain in work, there are no significant protection measures in schools (as throughout the pandemic), children remain unvaccinated, as do around 6 million adults. But you can still meet however many people you want, and you don't need a vaccine passport to /4
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Good - but damage has already been done
The Prime Minister & Chancellor Rishi Sunak have U-turned amid public fury just two and a half hours after claiming they would be able to avoid self-isolation by taking part in a daily pilot
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The conclusion is that Frost (and Johnson) are no closer to accepting the reality of what it means for the UK to leave the EU and Single Market while at the same time having NI as one part of the UK which has a land border with the EU/SM. /14
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