UKC

I don’t get this.. the old rules said 6 people max unless from 2 households, then up to 30, with appropriate precautions. This basically means no parties. The new rules say only 6 people period. What on Earth makes anyone think the legal status of parties of the type we hear police shutting down changes today?  They were just as illegal yesterday.. I despair at people, I really do. 

Yeah thanks to this I've a funeral and wake next week that's just totally ruined , because dick heads can't behave themselves ,  and want to prove that they don't care for others .

Well done dick heads .  I get you don't care for others.   Must be very proud.  

Just a heads up, funerals are exempt and can still be up to 30 people. 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-meeting-wit...

Section 2, ninth bullet.

Doesn't help with the wake though.....

Yes,  still not great for family and relatives though .  drawing short straws for who can say goodbye.

Yeah its the wake that's the issue really .  

It was sorted , now we are waiting for the venue to let us know what we can do.

Unless it's a completely separate event from the funeral (eg on a different day), I would say the wake is part of it?

I delayed a family funeral in April until we can have a proper memorial party, heaven knows when. Was not very popular among the older generation, especially those who needed support and something to help them move on. We got through it.

OK, let's put another point of view. My daughter is 23 and life isn't being very fair at the moment - as if Brexit wasn't enough (she's doing French and German at Uni) Covid meant her year abroad - a crucial part of her degree - was curtailed in March, her intensive course in France was cancelled, and now she's going back to Uni and a chaotic situation where no one seems to know what's happening. So  she will have spent £35K+ (actually I don't like to ask) on a 'lifetime experience' that has turned in to a stressful chore which she could have done at night school.

And for what? The very few friends (from her large circle) that have caught it have brushed it off. The tiny number of fatalities we are aware of were very frail and elderly who were towards the end of their lives in very poor health. It's not even clear that the 'rules' are anything other than arbitrary guidelines, arbitrarily imposed... Why were face masks not needed 6 months ago but are now crucial? If hand washing is so important why doesn't our local co-ops  have sanitiser, why isn't that being enforced? Why are there no public information campaigns about the importance of using and discarding handkerchiefs? 

She and her friends aren't selfish, but these should be some of the best years of their lives - they worked bl**dy hard for them (my daughter, like many of her friends, got more 'A's and 'A*'s than I can keep track of); they will be paying for this for years to come; and they're being slagged off for trying to recover something from a summer because a government is pulling levers just to demonstrate that it can. 

You can go to the pub with mates from 5 other households, but two two-children families cannot meet in their garden, oh except they can in Scotland/Wales. One example of how illogical and ridiculous the laws have become.

The government has just made it clear it feels no responsibility to follow laws themselves. 

I'm not listening any more (I know whats responsible and what isnt).

You don't understand the trade off between risk and economy ? Meeting and spending money at a pub which should have undergone a proper risk assessment and have proper procedures is just not equivalent to ad hoc house gatherings. Even if they have comparable infection transmission statistics,  they are not equivalent economically.

The flaw is, as anyone who has ever worked in a pub could spot, is peoples ability to follow rules rapidly disappear after a few beers. Might be able to protect the staff but the customers?

Depends on the pub or bar..Locally to us there have been some which are well managed and have adjusted really well. Others are playing fast and loose with the guidelines/new  regulations.

The only ones that I visit on a Fri/Sat are those that are now well managed.

Do you understand the trade-off between risk and the damaging effect on the mental wellbeing and social development of children if they are again effectively put in forced isolation? Have they not been put through enough already?

You should see how much we spend on vol-a-vents and prawn cocktail for our house gatherings. Waitrose depends on us.

The current restrictions should slow the rise of cases which is central to keeping schools open.  You have previously argued strongly for making schools the priority for reopening, and I agree.  If we don’t slow the doubling time of the infection we could hit with a “lockdown-lite” in about 21 days.  Having to ban large group meetings is a key part of keeping the schools open - as you wanted.

Children can still meet and interact in schools, and children from up to five household can still meet and interact outside of school - with one parent present in close proximity as part of their group and the other parents meeting separately some distance away.   This is rather daft when you consider it’s connecting households about the same as if they all met together, but given how far many people will go to twist a more nuanced rule I have sympathy for the government.

I’m far from convinced about pubs and WMCs given what’s happened near us in Houghton and reports elsewhere.  

As with Feb/March, we have an opportunity to avoid seriously damaging measures such as lockdown. 

Frankly this argument is pathetic Rob. Whilst I sympathise with your daughter, we are all under the kosh in ways we never imagined. What about the 75yo terminal cancer patient  who can’t spend the last 6 months the way they want to but for the sake of their (Elderly) friends stays at home anyway? (Not a hypothetical example btw)

I work bloody hard for my holidays but there’s a global pandemic, so I don’t have as much fun. A lot of people are getting very sick or dying. It’s a different level. Do you think the 18-25s of 1914 or 1939 took that kind of attitude to their country?
 

don’t take this response personally please, I feel strongly about this issue and in my mind the attitude you describe IS selfish

Yes I agree totally but that doesn’t make parties ok..

Risk assessments and procedures like these?

https://amp.theguardian.com/business/2020/sep/14/wetherspoons-staff-tested-...

I understand your frustration but you’re a smart chap, please don’t let yourself be drawn in to this thinking - it’s almost certain that you don’t know many affected people because we eventually took such robust measures.   I agree with many of your comments and all of your “Why” questions.  Right now we’re under pretty mild restrictions; metaphorically speaking I’m making hay whilst the sun shines and hoping my negative take gets shown to be totally wrong over the next few months.

The answer to “for what” is right around us - the NHS is intact, we only have 60,000 dead, many (but not all) of whom were pretty elderly, we have only mild restrictions at present, we have less than 800,000 people going in to flu season with long term consequences of their infections, schools have all returned, universities managed to compete their year of teaching and learning, the economy is bouncing back, we have a much better theoretical and public understanding of risk control measures which continues to get better and more parts of society continue to adopt them.  All in all it’s looking promising but a wave of resentment and disregard of the risk control measures could burn that all down by January.  So the curtailed year for young people has benefits - not directly to their heath but to the society and economy they live in.

The whole point is that stopping big parties like you've heard of the police doing previously is not enough. To slow the spread its also necessary to stop smaller gatherings. 

Ps. To the questions on wakes/funerals, the guidance would not have had you organise a wake anyway. Its definitely not considered part of the funeral. I'm afraid it's tough times. We had to arrange a funeral a couple of months ago - it was a small affair with maybe 15 people at the funeral and a close-family only wake on the beach afterwards (there might have been 7-8 of us but no more.) This is still much better than the funeral of another distant relative in April, which was completely cancelled because no one could travel. 

What I meant was I don’t get peoples attitude that the rules are changing so let’s party before they do.  I totally get why the rules are changing.. 

For young kids your suggestion of how to let them meet friends is impossible unless the parents know lots of other kids' parents.

I'm increasingly pessimistic about the school situation. Our son tested positive out of nowhere a month ago and we had to self isolate for 2 weeks. Now one of the staff at his nursery has tested positive so his whole group has to isolate for another two weeks. He had only been back for one week. So we will have been stuck at home with him unable to go out for 4 weeks out of 5. It's shit.

Furthermore it seems like the virus is probably rife in the nursery if most young kids are as asymptomatic as the world would have us believe. His own symptoms did not really follow the pattern the guidance would suggest, it was mostly just a runny nose.

I agree we need to keep schools open but I increasingly expect we are going to see a huge number of infections amongst kids and their parents even if the test programme is insufficient to capture it. 

This fellas party cost him £10k (fixed penalty notice).

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/covid-fine-house-party-nottingh...

Think we will see a lot of these.

Indeed, and you wouldn’t want five of them to one adult if they’re young - but it’s the biggest counter point I could think of to Richard Horn’s false assertion that “[children] are again effectively put in forced isolation”.  It’s far from it with schools and social lives - no birthday parties but meetings with children from 1 to 4 other households are possible.  There’s no reason what so ever they can’t meet another family at least.

I share your pessimism on schools but am not (yet) having the rough time that you are.  My issue with pubs is that schools are one network mapping between household bubbles, and pubs a different one, and the rate of spread is going to increase beyond linearly with the number of different network topologies households plug in to; for that reason I think eliminating other topologies will help contain and isolate cases within the schools.  Didn’t get my way on the pubs and am not holding my breath for a change - but if the current trend of a rise masked by testing failures and delayed by reporting lag continues, it can’t be long, perhaps 3 weeks, before more closures return.

i believe 30 at a wake is allowed.  Will find a source....

EDIT:  looks like I'm wrong, from .gov exemption list.....

funerals - up to 30 people. This does not include wakes, other than for religious ceremonial purposes

other religious and belief-based life cycle ceremonies - up to 30 people, in a public place. This only covers the ceremonies, and does not include celebrations of these events

Interesting to note you are allowed 30 at a wedding reception

To address your daughter's issue, I very much sympathise as I did the same (a long time ago) and it was a watershed in my life, turning me from a kid out of school into a young adult speaking two languages pretty fluently and thinking of the UK as a foreign country

Can she and you think of some creative solutions which might allow her to go ahead anyway, in some form? By far the most important part of a stay abroad is not the education; it's the immersive process of being in that country, understanding the culture and being part of it. The most successful of my cohort got jobs / boyfriends / girlfriends, while the others went to class.

I think 35k is the least of her worries. It is a lot of money though

Fair enough, I agree with that

To a certain extent, yes.  This is a very small proportion of Wetherspoon staff and it was found and acted on.  No one pretends the risks of bringing people together is zero.

The obvious fallacy in the case of pubs are the cases where staff and customers simply ignore the procedures.  But that behaviour isn't confined to pubs.

I thought that there was significant evidence that a) the huge majority of infected children suffered no ill effects and b) that even infected, symptomatic children were not very contagious.

This internet is rubbish, you can find 'evidence' for anything. As a rule of thumb though I will remain sceptical about anything the Govt or the various NHS quangos have say.

As you say the rules are daft. They might just have more success ripping up the rule book and saying "be sensible", the problem with the rules is that those not pre-disposed to being sensible wont follow the law anyway.

The disparity between the English laws and the Scottish/Wales laws looks distinctly like pandering to the silver haired Tory vote who have been happily upping the rhetoric recently that the resurgence is the fault of young people.

Agree re: pubs. There are at least four near me that are on the outskirts of Sheffield and away from prying eyes/enforcement. Packed (*) with no attempt at any distancing by punters. Can't be easy for the staff maybe be wanting to say something but aware of causing a fuss and losing a job. Most of the staff are very young. 

* I've not been in but cycle/run by them. 

Just a thought: Children’s anxiety levels reduced during the pandemic (think it was Bristol Uni research about teenagers).  

Sorry for your loss.  

Calling it pathetic is a bit harsh I think, and I am probably particularly sensitive because one of my projects is digitising slides that I had long forgotten - and I'd forgotten just what a great time I had at university when I was my daughter's age.

HOWEVER you are assuming that what we are being told to do is actually effective - well it may be but there is a degree of scepticism out there, especially among the young,  which I think is justified. You called me pathetic; I think uncritically believing in government guidelines is naive.

I'm not sure your comparison to WW II is appropriate, that was a long time ago, the enemy - and what to do about him - was much more clearly defined and, for the most part the 18s -5 year olds who participated and survived (the huge majority) had a better time than they would have done living through a depression.  

I think it was being effective until various people started taking more risks of spreading it.  I've been looking at the detected case counts, presented by the date the sample was taken.  I smoothed the data with a 21-point 2nd order Savitsky Golay filter to even out the random and weekend fluctuations, then I did an exponential fit to a ±7 day window for each day and used the fit parameters to estimate the doubling time of the virus - how many days it would take for cases to double.  

The plot is below; grey is individual data points, black is from the exponential fits, and red is the doubling time.   By mid-August it was tending towards infinity - that is case levels were static, R=1.  Things were working.  From there, a few more small tweaks would have got R<1 and cases slowly falling towards elimination.

I don't think there's been any sort of effort to communicate from government to those at very low immediate health risk just how important it is to their futures that we keep a lid on this, and how important their actions are to achieving that.

I don't think the skepticism is a justifiable cause to neglect following the rules - sure some of them may be less helpful but we don't really know, we can't do controlled studies, and we only get one shot at controlling this - so it needs a leap of faith, and I think as of a month ago just as it was coming together, too many people lost the faith.  Which is tragic, especially for their futures.

I feel the university cohort should be bright enough to understand that if we all do it properly for a while, like really properly, then we do it for a shorter time! Now, I get that they are at the mercy of other people who are not playing by the rules, but by doing their best to not exacerbate the situation and maybe trying to convince others in their generation, they stand a chance of their time at uni improving. If they ignore the rules and party etc, there is a real chance of full lockdown again and things get worse for them again.

I refuse to feel sorry for young people who can live a pretty normal life now when our residents STILL can't even go to asda for their shopping or leave the premises for any reason. This is mental health residents who would HUGELY benefit from doing something, but still can't do anything at all because people wanted the freedom to go on holiday and to the pubs! We were getting really close to community infections being low enough to allow some time out and now that's all scuppered again. 

For the record, I called the argument pathetic, not you. I don’t even know you..

I'm curious to know how the police/marshals/other citizens are going to differentiate between 2, 3 or 4 different groups of 6 who happen to be in the same place at the same time. Are these groups of 6 to keep 2 metres away from the next group? or is there a greater distance involved here. 

What if I happen to be in 1 group of 6 and know people in another group of 6 walking down the road, do I ignore them or say hello and interact 2 metres apart?

I'm afraid the "selfish youngsters" or whatever else you wish to call them will find a way to socialise and there is very little you or I can do to prevent it.

What we need to do is encourage them to stop visiting their grandparents, that will have the greatest positive effect over the next 6 months. 

I can tell you as a cop we have all but given up. The public don't know the rules and neither do we, its bloody impossible to keep up. If you can't write on the back of a fag packet its too complicated. They change the rules every day and they don't make much sense.

Unless you're out shooting grouse - then apparently a group of 30 is fine. This must be the least-secretive cronyism ever executed by a government? 

Any organised sport can.  3 aside football, anyone ?  The crap part is that shooting can be classed as organised sport.

Last time they told people to be sensible they had massive parties and flocked to the beach. 
 

The reason we have new rules is because people have already been told to be sensible, and it’s not working. 
 

Regards weddings and funerals. How many weddings and funerals does the average person have, how many people regularly go to the pub (clue pubs are dying), and compare that with how many people just pop round to each other’s houses for a chat, or to pick something up. 

Turns out I should actually read news stories not skim twitter "hot-takes". Agree with you though... shooting shouldn't be classified as a sport (or in fact even be a thing, but that's another debate for another time). 

It took me 20 minutes this morning to figure out whether I could stay at a fellow surgeon's house tonight (just outside Solihull). It's just outside the local lockdown area so no issues. However as it's a work meeting could I have gone there for a meeting? Could I then have stayed over in a self contained flat attached to the house (given I'm there anyway)?

And it goes on. We are trying to organise a village pub quiz in the village hall. There would have been 30 attendees: this was alright but not now. The establishment is licensed; everyone in the village knows each other.  As it's teams of 5 can we go ahead as 6 distanced tables? If not can we go to the pub and do it there? I think we can still do it outside but can we be joined by one person who lives in a local lockdown area (the partner of a local)?

I'm sure there are answers but I can see why people are starting to ignore the rules.

Few points: I think the rules are easy enough to understand, and they need to change regularly I’m response to developing situations.   The vast majority of people follow them, but they are people like me and you who crack on sensibly and don’t try and find a workaround. Biggest problem is though: they will have little impact - 5 or 6 weeks of local lockdown measures in Greater Manchester have not stopped rates escalating.

It’s all about probabilities and statistics. 
 

How many people are engaging in shooting as a sport every day? If you are shooting you will definitely be outside and social distancing. 
 

These restrictions are clearly aimed at mums having coffee mornings in each other’s houses and that type of gathering. I’m aware that is quite an odd example and I’m sure there are others that fit in our own surrounds. A couple of mates around in the evening to play xBox or whatever. 
 

More people socialise at home more regularly than people go to restaurants or down the pub. 
 

If you’re at a restaurant you’re still only supposed to be two households. I’m not sure that part is clear to everyone. 

No it isnt. Its about letting their mates and paymasters indulge their hobbies.

not necessarily. A shooting butt is a tad cramped if you want a loader and then there is the transport arrangements.

FWIW I  intend to fully comply with guidelines in so far as I can understand them, and I won't discourage others from doing so, though living in Wales doesn't simplify things...

I suspect that the frighteningly high initial death rate (and I admitted at the time, as an at-risk person of 66 I was pretty anxious myself) was caused by a number of factors, everything from inappropriate treatment protocols, stressing elderly patients by moving them about, and returning them to their homes while highly infectious, exposing vulnerable patients to high viral loads, - and of course, the artefact of bringing forward deaths by just a few weeks in severely ill patients, so suddenly they were classed as dying of Covid when they would otherwise have been classified as dying of old age, dementia or whatever. I'm not sure we are going to see a return to those figure, or anything like. 

I am sceptical about how efficacious the measures we are being asked to take are, or how well there will be adhered to, but we're  going to see, aren't we?

All I can say is that I've lived through a number of these pandemic threats, (AIDs; CJD; SARs) and the ability of the entire PH and medical establishment to get the scale of the risk wrong, or implement wholly unnecessary precautions should not be underestimated.

I think the inconsistency is the worse thing. On the same government Scottish website this morning it says that you shouldn't meet groups of more then 6 in two house holds etc but it also says that having a house party of more then 15 from 15 different house holds is an offence. So which one is it? What's guidance, whats the law no one knows man, least of all us Police. 

Most people make their own decisions, I'm not going in a pub unless I'm working, avoiding my granny because I can't socially distance at work. The law is becoming futile. All this talk of a curfew is mental.

Your graph pretty much says it all.  We had it under control with the lockdown and we kept it under control for a while after the lockdown before we pushed the reopening too far.  Now it is screwed and unless they start doing something pretty radical we are going to replay what happened last winter.

My gut feel is opening the schools and telling people who work in offices to get back to work in the office are not compatible with R < 1.    Pubs and parties aren't good but schools are orders of magnitude more hours of people in close proximity.

We should stop rushing to get back to 'normality' and plan on the assumption this is going to go on for six months to a year until there's a vaccine and we need to adapt.   We should be looking at the short term need to adapt to Covid as an opportunity to accelerate the rate at which we do things which need to be done anyway to adapt to climate change.

Do you want to catch Covid or not. Mixing with a large group of people who probably have families at school etc may not really be a good idea.You do not need to have rules to figure this out.

I see ultimate frisbee is on the exemption list as well...excellent news.

Not any more. They've dropped that bit.

Yes it is. It’s about trying to limit the amount of damage to the economy while trying to limit the amount of damage to public health. 

How many people are engaged in shooting? How many people would be at a football match? Which of those activities exposes more people to greater risk? 

(can't be bothered)

I am pointing out that you have to manage the risk yourself and make up your own mind irrespective of the rules.

I am away on Thursday night so my wife has invited 4 friends round for a drink. Thats within the rules.But those 4 friend all have 3/4 children at school ( our  2 are no longer at home). One of them is an NHS consultant and works on Covid wards.

And to add a bit of colour where we live is one of the new hotspots but no additional restrictions....yet.

I point out it may be fine to have her mates round as its within the rules, whether its a good idea or not is a bit subjective.

Its the same dilemma as yours.Nothing down in writing, but deep down you know what is right/wrong to do.

Yes of course which is why the tories wanted a specific meeting to allow these groups of friends to meet up before deciding not even to bother.

Note how it uses the firearms licence to apply looser rules than it does for other informal meetings.

What are you talking about? I am completely lost. Is it only Tories that go shooting? I must have missed that. There’s a list of specific ORGANISED sports that are allowed more than 6 in a group and other sports are allowed more than 6 if their governing body has produced their own guidance. 
 

The key point here being there is a Covid Officer in place and someone is organising the event. Someone is responsible for ensuring people are socially distancing or I guess in the case of grouse-butts and landrovers - wearing masks. 

That doesnt surprise me.

eh what the f*ck are you on about now?

Incorrect, unsurprisingly. The requirement is that it is run by a "club, business or charity; and/or involve someone who has received an official license to use equipment relevant to the activity."

With shooting being given a pass with the "official license" simply meaning a firearms licence.

Now you could try arguing thats pure chance but then you would need to explain why the tories felt the need to set up a meeting about it before cancelling.

Well if ultimate frisbee sneaked through as an exemption I am impressed by their lobbying.

Did they have any meetings planned to get an exemption through with a special additional qualification added?

Nope wasnt clear at all, can you provide an up to date link? Wife is planning a weekend in Oxford next Saturday with a couple of friends from different households, going out for dinner etc. They took it as their group is less than 6 they are ok.

Thats simple, they can stay alert and shoot the virus if they see it 

They are fine. The rules changer recently. No longer needs to be 2 households.

Are you actually involved in a club organising activities? Have you any idea what has to be done if you are organising an event for more than 6 people? Risk assessments, civid secure environment, collecting records etc... Your answer suggests not. 
 

You ask what I’m on about and then mention Tories in your last sentence. You’re not being very consistent. 
 

It’s all about probabilities and statistics and balancing risk of spread of the disease with collapse of the economy. You really need to get your head around that before spouting nonsense. 

Seems that’s been altered since middle of last week. 

You don't need a firearms licence, or even a shotgun certificate, to participate in a shoot.

Why are you talking about something utterly irrelevant? Do you not understand the and/or?That said considering your next point I guess its a bit hopeful.

Aplogies I thought you would be able to comprehend the difference of the tory government defending shooting specifically vs all shooters are tories. One being supported by the evidence and the other bollocks you created to try and muddy the waters.

Yes, yes of course it is.  Because without shooting the economy will be doomed.

Yes but someone needs to have it (on the common form of shoots anyway) and, if you read the rules that have been set thats the convenient opt out clause used.

Please explain what’s you meant by this comment. 
 

There’s no ‘convenient opt out clause’. Really there isn’t. 
 

I am actively involved in organising a running club. I am fully aware of what we have to provide if we are meeting in groups larger than 6. 
 

What is your experience of organising sport in this current situation? You don’t seem to have a basic understanding of the Covid Secure Environment stipulations.  
 

You seem to think that shooting has been given some kind of free pass. 

Well done. Shame its absolutely and utterly irrelevant to the point isnt it?

Note the and/or between the reference to clubs and the reference to individuals with official licence for equipment. With the one sole reference in any of the examples being, drumroll, a firearms licence.

So no point appealing to authority about clubs when it is irrelevant.

That’s because, drum roll, clubs already have to have licensed coaches leading sessions, as part of their rules under normal conditions. 

If shoots have different constitutional setups (I don’t know how an organised shoot is run), then the organisation, if there is one, has to appoint a ‘leader’ for each shoot.
 

What normally happens at a shoot? Does everyone have a licence, no one, is there a leader running the shoot, is it a free for all. How do they prevent more than 6 people turning up? How do they make it Covid Secure if they want more than 6 to attend.

All sport is the same and so my point is totally relevant. All they have done is bought shooting in line with every other organised sport. 

So you dont know the subject and you continue to confuse organised sport with something which isnt.

F*ck it I give up. You seem desperate to ignore that the primary part of the story was that there was a specific meeting planned on how to exempt shooting which was replaced by "correspondence" and that shooting then had a clause added specifically to help it out and means it doesnt have to be organised to the same level.

F*ck it I give up. You seem desperate to ignore that there was a specific meeting planned on how to exempt shooting which was replaced by "correspondence" and that shooting then had a clause added specifically to help it out and means it has to be organised to the same level.
 

You seem to ignore that you are being manipulated by the press into believing this is a bad thing. 
 

Can you tell me what sports you organise?

Can you tell me how shooting was previously organised? (Shooting is a sport, it’s even in the olympics.)