The Covid Inquiry
- Thread starter brogdale
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elbows
Well-Known Member
Thanks elbows for your reporting on this. Much appreciated
No problem, just keep in mind that there is vast sprawling testimony and other evidence I dont get time to see. I cover a larger chunk of stuff in the other inquiry thread in the pandemic subforum, in more tedious detail, but starting this week I'm having to reduce the amount I quote from transcripts.
I only sporadically get a chance to have a detailed look at which bits the media bother to cover and which bits they overlook. Since the witnesses are getting higher up from this week onwards, and the media tend to like the most political or sensational aspects, they will probably be paying more attention again at the moment. I will probably like to some of their stories later.
elbows
Well-Known Member
Some of the BBCs reporting of todays evidence:
And plenty of other bits and bobs, many of which were shown in the screenshots I posted earlier.
What their coverage isnt doing a great job of is really getting into all the failures of the machine and individuals to spot what stage of the pandemic were were at through Feb-March 2020, or to then raise the alarm. And how late they realised they better change from the original shit 'mitigate' plan to a suppression & proper lockdown plan sooner. The media are more interested in the soap opera aspects.
Theres endless detail about those themes but I would suggest that one of the underlying factors was that actually this countries traditional cold calculations just involved letting people die, and a lot of operational considerations in a bad pandemic were therefore just about how to deal with scaling up death processing services. If it had only been a question of death I still suspect we might have stuck to the original plan, and it was only when other factors such as public and media attitudes towards hospitals being overwhelmed got factored in that the establishment machine realised it would have to come up with a different plan that required more intervention.
Also note that dodgy use of triage can be used to suppress the burden on the NHS and turn a lot of admissions straight into deaths instead, potentially enabling a country like ours to believe it can stick to its original plan instead of being forced to switch to plan B as ultimately happened here. The dodgy triage stuff is certainly part of traditional thinking and pandemic planning, and was something the likes of Jeremy Hunt expressed alarm about when he gave evidence in module 1. The extent to which the inquiry will truly explore these possibilities and take the ramifications to their full conclusion during this inquiry remains to be seen. Likely the themes will keep coming up but will not be explored to my full satisfaction, but that sort of thing is why I was interested in pandemics in the first place, they can become a severe demonstration of shit establishment priorities. It will be more comfortable for the inquiry to instead describe all sorts of things as being a collection of unfortunate mistakes and failures rather than properly factoring in the extent to which it was actually a question of shit priorities and cold calculations, coupled with resource limitations and a can't do mentality.
And plenty of other bits and bobs, many of which were shown in the screenshots I posted earlier.
Simon Case: Top official thought Johnson couldn't lead on Covid
Simon Case said the former PM changed direction "every day", in evidence heard by the Covid inquiry.
www.bbc.co.uk
What their coverage isnt doing a great job of is really getting into all the failures of the machine and individuals to spot what stage of the pandemic were were at through Feb-March 2020, or to then raise the alarm. And how late they realised they better change from the original shit 'mitigate' plan to a suppression & proper lockdown plan sooner. The media are more interested in the soap opera aspects.
Theres endless detail about those themes but I would suggest that one of the underlying factors was that actually this countries traditional cold calculations just involved letting people die, and a lot of operational considerations in a bad pandemic were therefore just about how to deal with scaling up death processing services. If it had only been a question of death I still suspect we might have stuck to the original plan, and it was only when other factors such as public and media attitudes towards hospitals being overwhelmed got factored in that the establishment machine realised it would have to come up with a different plan that required more intervention.
Also note that dodgy use of triage can be used to suppress the burden on the NHS and turn a lot of admissions straight into deaths instead, potentially enabling a country like ours to believe it can stick to its original plan instead of being forced to switch to plan B as ultimately happened here. The dodgy triage stuff is certainly part of traditional thinking and pandemic planning, and was something the likes of Jeremy Hunt expressed alarm about when he gave evidence in module 1. The extent to which the inquiry will truly explore these possibilities and take the ramifications to their full conclusion during this inquiry remains to be seen. Likely the themes will keep coming up but will not be explored to my full satisfaction, but that sort of thing is why I was interested in pandemics in the first place, they can become a severe demonstration of shit establishment priorities. It will be more comfortable for the inquiry to instead describe all sorts of things as being a collection of unfortunate mistakes and failures rather than properly factoring in the extent to which it was actually a question of shit priorities and cold calculations, coupled with resource limitations and a can't do mentality.
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elbows
Well-Known Member
That came out slightly wrong - I have watched almost every minute of testimony from modules 1 and 2 so far, although thats probably not sustainable. But it hasnt been possible to summarise all of it, and the other thread gets very tedious even when I do my best to cherrypick. Its the other written evidence I havent had time to wade through hardly at all.
elbows
Well-Known Member
I've been posting more stuff from todays transcript over in the pandemic forum, from this post onwards over there: UK Inquiry Module 2: Decision-making & political governance
It includes plenty of interesting detail about a key March meeting when the original plan died and it turns out we were faced with the spectacle of Cummings and Gove being the ones calling for quicker action, including a London Lockdown that never happened.
I feel the need to copy one of my posts to this thread too, one that deals with the fundamental numbers game that actually mattered to government (hospitalisations not deaths), and when that bit of government finally woke up to the true scale of things:
NHS England bed demand modelling from 9th March 2020:
covid19.public-inquiry.uk
When I wanked on endlessly about things being a numbers game at the time, this sort of thing is why, and why eventually even the government machine came to terms with these numbers and the extent to which, even if they had not fucked up the timing of when they thought the peak would arrive (and fuck that up badly they did), the original mitigation approach still left rather insane levels of expected demand and a staggeringly huge gap between demand and supply:
This is what the measures (mitigation not suppression) they still spent the rest of that week trying to hint at and sell to the public and journalists in their press conferences (until this plan died on the 13th and we found that out over the subsequent few days) were expected to achieve at best:
This is also why I continue to be extremely rude to know-nothing pandemic fuckwits who never understood the scale of this pandemic we faced without lockdowns etc.
Its also why I continue to be rude about a short-lived 'keep calm and carry on' piece of shit that Nick Triggle wrote for the BBC in the early hours of Friday 13th March.
It includes plenty of interesting detail about a key March meeting when the original plan died and it turns out we were faced with the spectacle of Cummings and Gove being the ones calling for quicker action, including a London Lockdown that never happened.
I feel the need to copy one of my posts to this thread too, one that deals with the fundamental numbers game that actually mattered to government (hospitalisations not deaths), and when that bit of government finally woke up to the true scale of things:
NHS England bed demand modelling from 9th March 2020:
INQ000146571_0001 - Extract of COBR Brief titled 'NHS Bed Demand for Covid-19: RWCS modelling', dated 09/03/2020. UK Covid-19 Inquiry Archives
Extract of COBR Brief titled 'NHS Bed Demand for Covid-19: RWCS modelling', dated 09/03/2020.
covid19.public-inquiry.uk
When I wanked on endlessly about things being a numbers game at the time, this sort of thing is why, and why eventually even the government machine came to terms with these numbers and the extent to which, even if they had not fucked up the timing of when they thought the peak would arrive (and fuck that up badly they did), the original mitigation approach still left rather insane levels of expected demand and a staggeringly huge gap between demand and supply:
This is what the measures (mitigation not suppression) they still spent the rest of that week trying to hint at and sell to the public and journalists in their press conferences (until this plan died on the 13th and we found that out over the subsequent few days) were expected to achieve at best:
This is also why I continue to be extremely rude to know-nothing pandemic fuckwits who never understood the scale of this pandemic we faced without lockdowns etc.
Its also why I continue to be rude about a short-lived 'keep calm and carry on' piece of shit that Nick Triggle wrote for the BBC in the early hours of Friday 13th March.
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elbows
Well-Known Member
I dont think the inquiry are going to look at pandemic propaganda from the state broadcaster or others, but since I just mentioned the Triggle piece, I may as well take the opportunity to post it again. So this came out early on Friday 13th March 2020, days after those internal NHS bed estimations were known inside government, but at a time when there was still a camp within government who hoped to win a 'herd immunity' debate and not have to modify the original plan too much. We'll hear more about that herd immunity debate on other days, its only been briefly touched upon and hinted at in evidence so far.
I think it was too crude and shit a piece for even the BBC, so at some point in the hours after publication, they got cold feet removed it from a news story on their website that was embedded in, and replaced it with a different sales pitch from a different BBC bloke. Which I will also post below so you can spot certain differences, but that the original desperate attempt to sell us the original shit plan was still in effect even as it was dying behind the scenes.
I think it was too crude and shit a piece for even the BBC, so at some point in the hours after publication, they got cold feet removed it from a news story on their website that was embedded in, and replaced it with a different sales pitch from a different BBC bloke. Which I will also post below so you can spot certain differences, but that the original desperate attempt to sell us the original shit plan was still in effect even as it was dying behind the scenes.
farmerbarleymow
I'm Petee's spirit animal
You're our official Inquiry monitor. Thanks for keeping track of what is going on.
elbows
Well-Known Member
Cheers,
Its a shame I cant do it properly without being incredibly long-winded over on the other dedicated thread about this inquiry module ( UK Inquiry Module 2: Decision-making & political governance )
And even if I manage to keep this up for the rest of this module, I'll not be able to repeat this feat for subsequent modules.
A lot of what Im sticking on this thread rather than the other one covers the more sensational, personality based stuff that the media are going to do some kind of job of covering on weeks like this one (eg today featured plenty of bombshells and tomorrow features Cummings giving evidence).
What the media appear to be much less interested in doing is telling the other story, the story of cold establishment calculations rather than tory, Johnson etc fuckups. They havent even managed to properly cover all the broader establishment fuckups that made the first wave worse, blame can be cast far and wide for that one in contrast to the highly tory, Johnson, Sunak etc disgraceful second wave.
Of course as an establishment inquiry there will be limits as to how far they go in certain areas too, time will tell. They may put a charitable spin on certain things when they reach their conclusions, eg they may prefer to avoid the sort of central theme that an old article like this one highlights: When it comes to national emergencies, Britain has a tradition of cold calculation | David Edgerton
I just had cause to mention that article over on the other thread, when discussing some of todays testimony that touched on the theme of excessive attention to excess death management : #156
(which includes the witness quote "I think there was too much focus on excess death management and not enough focus on preventing those deaths in the first place" )
elbows
Well-Known Member
More press reporting of little snippets of Mondays rather packed evidence session:
www.independent.co.uk
www.independent.co.uk
Boris flip-flopping’ made it ‘impossible’ to tackle Covid, advisers’ messages reveal
Cabinet secretary warned that Johnson ‘cannot lead’ during crisis – as ex-No 10 aide admits he ‘disappeared’ WhatsApp messages
www.independent.co.uk
Boris Johnson’s pandemic response was ‘Trump-level mad and dangerous’ - live
Comes as former principal private secretary confirms report found ‘significant degree of misogyny’ in government
www.independent.co.uk
scalyboy
They’re taking the piss now
Not 100% sure, but I think the Chief Whip at the time was Mark Spencer, famous for his defence of the benefits system which:
"according to Labour MP Lisa Nandy, left a job seeker with learning disabilities unable to afford food or electricity because he was four minutes late for a job centre appointment."
Spencer told Nandy: "It is important that those seeking employment learn the discipline of timekeeping, which is an important part of securing and keeping a job".
By Christ, we knew these people were psychopaths, but here it is in their own words:
"Boris Johnson agreed with 'let old people get Covid' message, inquiry hears"
From Sir Patrick Vallance's diaries at the time: Boris Johnson is "obsessed with older people accepting their fate and letting the young get on with life and the economy going”.
Another diary entry says: “He says his party ‘thinks the whole thing is pathetic and Covid is just nature’s way of dealing with old people – and I am not entirely sure I disagree with them.”
This lot should be in Broadmoor, not the Houses of Parliament
BusLanes
Pedestrian
Not 100% sure, but I think the Chief Whip at the time was Mark Spencer, famous for his defence of the benefits system which:
"according to Labour MP Lisa Nandy, left a job seeker with learning disabilities unable to afford food or electricity because he was four minutes late for a job centre appointment."
Spencer told Nandy: "It is important that those seeking employment learn the discipline of timekeeping, which is an important part of securing and keeping a job".
By Christ, we knew these people were psychopaths, but here it is in their own words:
"Boris Johnson agreed with 'let old people get Covid' message, inquiry hears"
From Sir Patrick Vallance's diaries at the time: Boris Johnson is "obsessed with older people accepting their fate and letting the young get on with life and the economy going”.
Another diary entry says: “He says his party ‘thinks the whole thing is pathetic and Covid is just nature’s way of dealing with old people – and I am not entirely sure I disagree with them.”
This lot should be in Broadmoor, not the Houses of Parliament
elbows
Well-Known Member
So the Cummings stuff before the lunch break was mostly on his favourite topic of government dysfunction with an emphasis on various parts of the senior civil service, and the scripted just for show nature of cabinet. Including how much real power the cabinet secretary has compared to everyone else, and the 'pop-ins' who waited till the likes of Cummings were not present and then popped in to see Johnson to try to get him to change his mind about decisions they didnt like.
elbows
Well-Known Member
Pretty tedious stuff, most of which has been well described in other sessions already.
As I've been complaining about in the other thread, the lead counsel has a faulty narrative in this module where he keeps suggesting that there was a doctrinal debate about mitigation vs suppression in February. When actually a large part of the problem was that there was no such debate, there was only the shit mitigation plan, right up until that plan died in mid March 2020 (and that debate only started a little earlier within SAGE than it did in the heart of government, eg some SAGE modelling group people started mentioning it from early March but got shot down for a while by colleagues). Other witnesses have already explained this to the lead counsel on multiple occasions, and now Cummings has had to do the same.
We've now made it to about mid-Feb 2020, the notorious half term, "they werent banging alarm bells, far from it, they were going skiing".
As I've been complaining about in the other thread, the lead counsel has a faulty narrative in this module where he keeps suggesting that there was a doctrinal debate about mitigation vs suppression in February. When actually a large part of the problem was that there was no such debate, there was only the shit mitigation plan, right up until that plan died in mid March 2020 (and that debate only started a little earlier within SAGE than it did in the heart of government, eg some SAGE modelling group people started mentioning it from early March but got shot down for a while by colleagues). Other witnesses have already explained this to the lead counsel on multiple occasions, and now Cummings has had to do the same.
We've now made it to about mid-Feb 2020, the notorious half term, "they werent banging alarm bells, far from it, they were going skiing".
steveo87
22/11/2022 - got a maths joke.
It would be interesting to find out how incriminating those deleted WhatsApps really were...
Ming
I shot a man in Reno...
I think that guy who said he couldn't attend due to illness has the right idea. No one's going down for this so why face a few hours of onerous questioning? Just call in sick.
Fucking scum bags. People died. I'll probably go on a list for saying this but they need a good kicking. It's the only language they understand.
Fucking scum bags. People died. I'll probably go on a list for saying this but they need a good kicking. It's the only language they understand.
elbows
Well-Known Member
If the inquiry hadnt got various whatsapps and Vallances private diary, the inquiry would have ben hideously dry, so thank fuck we did get this stuff.
There are many other amazing aspects too, surprising on one hand and yet thoroughly unsurprising on the other. Few have the time, but if you study the timing of what was going on inside the machine and compare it to what everyone on the outside was saying, eg what everyone was saying on this forum at the same time, its quite the spectacle.
elbows
Well-Known Member
He is absent from his main job for medical reasons for a limited period. He will be back, and then he will also give evidence to this inquiry (so long as he doesnt end up seriously ill or dead).
elbows
Well-Known Member
I watch it direct via the inquiry youtube feed, none of that tv bs there.
the beeb is interrupting every few minutes to apologise
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