Coronavirus Death Thread

[Spikey M]

Who has benefited?

I spent about half an hour on the phone to a completely broken man last week. He bought out his old employer at the back end of 2019, and has been unable to trade pretty much ever since. He pumped every penny he had into the business, but it's now completely insolvent. He has no money, the stress has ruined his marriage and he awaits the bailiffs.

That is not an unusual situation either. I have had many conversations like that over the last year.

THAT is where my tax money should be going.

[randomlegend]

Who has benefited?


Idk, the thousands of people who would be dead?

Find an ITU nurse and talk to them about their experiences. Perhaps that would open your eyes a bit.

I don't need/want/deserve a payrise for the last year and am not asking for one. But the poor nurses who found themselves looking after an entire ward of 36 respiratory patients on their own absolutely do.

[SvN]

I like how RL took the moral high ground and refused to engage, and then pretended he hadn't posted that 20 minutes later and carried on :D

[Ian]

It's long since become clear he can't help himself.

[Lewis]

You can't set pay and conditions off a blip year like this. They'll all be back to standing around chatting and guzzling biscuits whilst pensioners die of thirst before long, and then any pandemic uplift will look a bit irresponsible.

[Dquincy]

I agree with Spikey and RL.

[Spikey M]

1) We're right back to the role of the NHS.

2)My man sacrificed everything he ever worked for, for your benefit.

[randomlegend]

I like how RL took the moral high ground and refused to engage, and then pretended he hadn't posted that 20 minutes later and carried on :D

I wasn't trying to take the "moral high ground" really, I just think that's the truth of it.

And yeah I know I'm a child and I can't help it.

[randomlegend]

1) We're right back to the role of the NHS.

Just because that's the role of the NHS doesn't mean you shouldn't recognise extraordinary work within it.


2)My man sacrificed everything he ever worked for, for your benefit.

For my benefit? How?

[Spikey M]

I wasn't trying to take the "moral high ground" really, I just think that's the truth of it.

And yeah I know I'm a child and I can't help it.

Obviously, and I'm saying what I consider to be the truth of it. We have clearly had very different years that have seen us interacting with people suffering in very different ways.

And because of that, we're probably both right and probably never going to agree.

[Don]

Nursing and all that fluffy shit is a vocation and one that's received reasonable pay increases in recent years and has them at a respectable level so it's really not that deep. If they wanted to make it rain I'd suggest they ought to have thought a bit more before undertaking the significant training because they are most certainly in the wrong field.

[niko_cee]

Should soldiers get paid more if there's a war on? Do they do danger money?

[Spikey M]

For my benefit? How?

So the NHS didn't get overwhelmed. But as said, we'll never agree, best to leave it there.

[randomlegend]

The idea that because you chose to go into nursing/teaching/whatever means you should just accept literally ANYTHING that is thrown at you in those fields no matter how unforeseen or difficult is ridiculous.

[Jimmy Floyd]

The private sector is a results business in terms of pay and the public sector (generally) isn't, that's the difference and why the two come to blows with each other, especially when you get thicko union reps in the media like the teachers currently have.

[randomlegend]

So the NHS didn't get overwhelmed. But as said, we'll never agree, best to leave it there.

Errr, lol? You weren't doing that for us.

It would suck for us if we'd reached the point people literally died because we didn't have capacity to treat them, but it would suck for them more.

[Spikey M]

That's some top leaving it right there.

[Magic]

I think the best bit is most of us stayed at home to make their workload even lighter than usual. Pathetic.

[Lewis]

Should soldiers get paid more if there's a war on? Do they do danger money?

You get extra for being deployed and what have you, but not extra again if you report strong opposition or have to work overtime. Now that the old final salary pension scheme is a thing of the past the real money in the military is in losing your arms and legs or getting serious brain damage. Don't let the sob stories you read about the cost of handrails and walk-in baths fool you.

[Foe]

I’ve a nurse on Snapchat who occasionally sends me messages of her cleavage in scrubs.

Top profession and they should be rewarded handsomely.

[Dquincy]

https://twitter.com/hughlaurie/status/1367554922330411011?s=20

Edit: well I've nailed that.

[7om]

Some infuriating calls to Jeremy Vine on radio 2 just now. The Unison woman demanded that this 1% rise not only go to nurses. But we need to include the porters, cleaners, admin staff as well. When Vine mentioned the people who have lost businesses she gave it the old, “well we need the nurses for our NHS to run”. That’s true, but how does Big Dave, whose business has gone under, now pay his mortgage?

The next caller then said this low pay rise will directly affect patient care. Because nurses will retire early, leaving less nurses in hospitals and thus patients will suffer. Can that be true? It sounds like extreme mental gymnastics to express outrage.

[Don]

Sounds a possibility. Market economics innit, all those skilled and dedicated nurses are going to flood the financial industry, take all the jobs and leave all the Bertrams and Horatios on the dole and without a health service.

[Spikey M]

I just can't fathom the priorities of the argument. It's purely emotional. Nurses have had a shit year, give them some money. Cool. Sounds great. But the country and swathes of its people are kinda sorta Bankrupt and we might want to make that right first.

[Yevrah]

If you accept 1% is a bit small, you then have to ask, what is fair? 4%, 5%?

Apparently not.


The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) called this "pitiful", arguing that its members should get 12.5% instead.

[7om]

Jesus fucking Christ. I don’t anything about politics or economics but how are we supposed to afford that? Why even suggest it when it’s so outrageous?

[Pepe]

I also want to get paid more.

[Yevrah]

I assume it's an opening gambit and in reality they'd be happy with less, but it's such a ridiculous opening gambit it really only leaves lolling the whole thing off as the response.

[Pepe]

They should give a raise to the nurses by docking the pay of all the teachers that refuse to go into the classroom.

[Yevrah]

I also doubt public will be on their side for very long if they continue to go down that road. Sure some people have had it worse than others, but nearly everyone has suffered in some way throughout this. Millions of people have lost a year of their life protecting people from a virus that statistically offered little threat to them, for example. What price do you put on that?

[Pepe]

But yeah workload has never correlated to pay.

[Don]

These people have had to watch countless fatties die. I hereby argue a pay cut of 2.5% should be enforced.

[Yevrah]

But yeah workload has never correlated to pay.

One of the most frustrating things I encounter in my career is people who hold the mistaken belief that bonuses should be linked to hard work. It's nonsense of the highest order.

[niko_cee]

I assume it's an opening gambit and in reality they'd be happy with less, but it's such a ridiculous opening gambit it really only leaves lolling the whole thing off as the response.

I presume their case would be no real terms increase in pay for 10 years (and actually a 7% drop or somesuch in that time period).

Nurse and doctor pay is always a lolworthy thing though. Didn't the last round of significant 'pay increases' (whenever they were, I seem to recall it happening at some point) come at the cost to those bursaries to help young people train to be nurses?

[Yevrah]

I also doubt public will be on their side for very long if they continue to go down that road. Sure some people have had it worse than others, but nearly everyone has suffered in some way throughout this. Millions of people have lost a year of their life protecting people from a virus that statistically offered little threat to them, for example. What price do you put on that?

In fact, let's test it. What would the good people of TTH have to be paid to have another year like the last?

[Don]

I literally was paid a 5 figure sum in terms of savings. I'm not sure I'd agree to anything below about triple that if you're asking me to go again for a second consecutive year.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I'd want 50 grand tax free to do it all again. Then again people go to work in Saudi Arabia (basically the same thing) and are paid that many times over to do so, so perhaps I'm underselling myself.

[-james-]

I can't wait for lockdown to be lifted so that I can get back to spending five rather than seven evenings a week staring at screens indoors.

[randomlegend]

I just can't fathom the priorities of the argument. It's purely emotional. Nurses have had a shit year, give them some money. Cool. Sounds great. But the country and swathes of its people are kinda sorta Bankrupt and we might want to make that right first.

So if your business did well out of the pandemic, that's the private sector you get to make lots of money, but if your business failed because of the pandemic isn't that just the other side of the coin? It's just a "blip year" after all.

I don't really think that but I don't see how you can argue one without accepting the other.

[randomlegend]

In fact, let's test it. What would the good people of TTH have to be paid to have another year like the last?

I'd do it again for what I'm paid, it was aight.

Edit: oops quoted wrong post, fixed.

[Jimmy Floyd]

How many businesses have done 'well' out of the pandemic? Must be almost none.

[Spikey M]

So if your business did well out of the pandemic, that's the private sector you get to make lots of money, but if your business failed because of the pandemic isn't that just the other side of the coin? It's just a "blip year" after all.

I don't really think that but I don't see how you can argue one without accepting the other.

Supporting struggling people / companies whilst others do well is not a new idea.

[randomlegend]

Amazon.

[niko_cee]

Games Workshop, Supermarkets.

Although haven't most who have said they'll repay/not take the government support widely on offer?

[Dquincy]

Supermarkets
Food suppliers/manufacturers
PPE companies
Hot tub companies (ask Yev)
...There are more but I cannie be arsed.

[Spikey M]

Delivery companies and steaming services have both had amazing years. They really should be the focus of whatever taxation they want to use to get us out of this.

[Dquincy]

http://news.sky.com/story/nursing-union-sets-up-16335m-strike-fund-after-news-of-1-nhs-pay-rise-12236607

The word 'strike' has been mused re the nursing pay rise. Now that would set the cat amongst the pigeons.

[Ian]

Delivery companies and steaming services have both had amazing years. They really should be the focus of whatever taxation they want to use to get us out of this.

Also anybody who knows Matt Hancock.

[Spikey M]

Also anybody who knows Matt Hancock.

Them too.

Are we yet to discover the engineers behind his incredible shrinking understairs toilet?

[Lewis]

The supermarkets have done more for the ninety-nine per cent of people who haven't needed nurses over the year, so why not tax them and give the real key workers their due?

[randomlegend]

Supporting struggling people / companies whilst others do well is not a new idea.

I didn't say it was, but your argument for not paying nurses more is that they don't generate a profit. Well neither did these people, but you want to help them.

[Spikey M]

I didn't say it was, but your argument for not paying nurses more is that they don't generate a profit. Well neither did these people, but you want to help them.

My argument is that there is no money to. If a company generates profit it is good practice to pay your employees more money. If they don't turn a profit, then it isn't.

That's completely removed from the idea that we should help those that are struggling in society. Or, it should be, but when people are prioritising a pay rise for people who have had a bad year over stopping people going bankrupt through no fault of their own, I guess it isn't.

[Lewis]

If any given year was a comparatively quiet one for hospitals would it be fair to reduce pay?

[randomlegend]

If any given year was a comparatively quiet one for hospitals would it be fair to reduce pay?

Irrelevant argument given it will never happen.

[Spikey M]

Matt Hancock has been busy. He'll deserve the 10% raise coming his way.

[Lewis]

Irrelevant argument given it will never happen.

Excluding the vaccine stuff, for which you were earning well above your usual rate, have you done more or less work than you normally would have done this year?

[Lewis]

1367845628324249604

Have Unison had permission from the official clap woman for this?

[Mellberg]

I presume their case would be no real terms increase in pay for 10 years (and actually a 7% drop or somesuch in that time period).

Nurse and doctor pay is always a lolworthy thing though. Didn't the last round of significant 'pay increases' (whenever they were, I seem to recall it happening at some point) come at the cost to those bursaries to help young people train to be nurses?

This first paragraph is the key. Public sector pay was hammered during the wasted years of austerity. They've had an increase over the last couple of years, but nothing to catch up compared to pay freezes during years when inflation was as high as 3%. It's projected as 0.6% for 2021, and I have no idea if that 1% raise is plus inflation or not. Either way, they're well behind what they were earning a decade ago, whilst the wealth gap increases regardless of a pandemic.

It would be a good time to push them back toward the mean, after they've just had a year in which they'll feel like they've failed at their jobs, with many on the brink mentally, but instead their government are giving them the two fingers. Top work, cunts.

[Shindig]

Is this one of those situations where they were pressured into announcing a rise from unions? Any rise would've wound them up. Announcing nothing would've been better for the time being. I've noticed any nurse asking for support of the strike on social media gets shouted to death by the many, many people who are either on furlough, out of work or anybody that's had to lay people off in the last year.

[Lewis]

The public sector as a whole has probably reverted to something like the mean over the decade. The pension is still really good (if not outrageous like the old scheme), you get discounts in sex shops, and you can't put a price on being virtually unsackable. They should have wider pay bands (and actually use them) to reflect that not every grade job is the same, but generally speaking none of us can moan. Me especially. I've had half the year off.

[randomlegend]

Excluding the vaccine stuff, for which you were earning well above your usual rate, have you done more or less work than you normally would have done this year?

I personally have done less, but my circumstances are pretty unique and I'm not asking for a payrise.

[randomlegend]

Actually tbh when you take into account for covering all the people who were redeployed away from paeds, there's probably not a lot in it.

[Lewis]

Taking money out of nurses' pockets.

[Magic]

1367845628324249604

Have Unison had permission from the official clap woman for this?

:D

I just love this country.

[Kikó]

You don't love Scotland?

[Mellberg]

The public sector as a whole has probably reverted to something like the mean over the decade. The pension is still really good (if not outrageous like the old scheme), you get discounts in sex shops, and you can't put a price on being virtually unsackable. They should have wider pay bands (and actually use them) to reflect that not every grade job is the same, but generally speaking none of us can moan. Me especially. I've had half the year off.

Old pensions were definitely outrageous, and obviously were all brought in line just in time for our generation to be further bled dry (housing, lower wages relative to expenditure/inflation etc). Wages in general are too low imo. I'm fortunate and earn good money, but am a working class lad and see a lot of people who can afford to pay there bills and not a lot else. A single nurse on 25k would be in this bracket. Go to work, watch a load of people die, go home and cry into the Pot Noodle whilst ignoring the landlord. There's enough to go round and people in such positions in which they sacrifice so much should be able to buy a decent house and a decent car, go the pub on the weekend and holiday to somewhere south of Dover, but they can't afford life's simple pleasures and it's not on. It's why a load of them quit or off themselves.

They need to be dragged up to an acceptable rate and then given inflation every year.

[Lewis]

Isn't it everything but wages the issue there? A lot of actual stuff has never been cheaper (or at least better value), but then you get bummed on taxes and housing.

[Mellberg]

Maybe. Pensions don't matter til you're nearly dead, so less so them, and I have no real problems with tax and think it's structured relatively sensibly, bar the breaks at the top.

My issues are deeper rooted than that and more difficult to solve. One of wages or housing needs to give in a big way to provide a lot of working class people what they deserve from life (a bit of fucking happiness).

[Spikey M]

There is a definite problem with wages in this country, but there is a far deeper problem with our relationship with debt and complete inability to manage money / priorities.

I deal with it every day and the issue is pretty much split down the middle. People don't have enough money to make ends meet, but they still have Sky TV, XBox memberships and David Lloyd memberships. They're paying their rent and food shopping on credit cards and dressing their kids via their Store Cards.

Then come the Debt Relief Orders / IVA's.

The whole system is a debt trap. It's completely unsustainable.

[Lewis]

You would have to say housing, since widespread wage increases would just make that more expensive under the current arrangements. Alternatively, what about three per cent mortgages?

[Mellberg]

With reduced rates and spread out over 50 years, maybe. 18-years-old, small deposit, pay it your entire working career at about £250/300 a month. Maybe cut council tax as well, actually. Make actually living under a roof more affordable.

[Shindig]

There is a definite problem with wages in this country, but there is a far deeper problem with our relationship with debt and complete inability to manage money / priorities.


Yep. Some people just cannot hit reverse. Even worse are ones waiting for something or someone to bail them out. "If I just do this or this happens, I'll be fine, etc."

[Lewis]

With reduced rates and spread out over 50 years, maybe. 18-years-old, small deposit, pay it your entire working career at about £250/300 a month. Maybe cut council tax as well, actually. Make actually living under a roof more affordable.

At that point it would have to all be subsidised to the point of ownership being a worthless proposition, and then you're back to the council house/rental purgatory that people lived in back in the day.

[Mellberg]

I don't think it's a resolution and don't think it would work. But that's where the bar is for a single person on 20k to live comfortably alone, which they should be able to if they're working 40 hours a week or whatever. Otherwise it's not a living wage and the whole system is bollocks.

But if we can't bring property prices down, then wages need to come up. Because the money is certainly out there for that to happen, just in the wrong places and where, to be frank, it isn't required to better society whatsoever.

[phonics]

In Switzerland, mortgages are done over 100 years so technically you never own the place but it keeps payments affordable.

[Dquincy]

Shadow chancellor agrees that nurses should receive a 12% pay rise. Shock horror...

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-56288548

President Jair Bolsonaro has told Brazilians to "stop whining" about Covid-19, as he criticised measures to curb the virus despite a surge in cases and deaths.

His comments came a day after Brazil saw a record rise in deaths over a 24-hour period.

Brazil is facing its worst phase of the pandemic yet, leaving its health system in crisis.

"Stop whining. How long are you going to keep crying about it?" Mr Bolsonaro said at an event. "How much longer will you stay at home and close everything? No one can stand it anymore. We regret the deaths, again, but we need a solution."

lol, a glimpse at Magic ruling a country.

[Spikey M]

The whole world should be Madagascaring them. Mental.

[Magic]

I'd well sacrifice the likes of How so me and Taz could frequent club saunas.

[Shindig]

As your therapist, I must congratulate you on this big step to conquering your social anxiety.

[Magic]

And Shinners.

[Shindig]

Not really a sauna bloke but I'll be damned if I'm spending two weeks off work sitting at home.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-56278809

Heh.

[Spikey M]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56301981

"NHS pay: 'Undervalued' nurses may quit over 1% rise - union"

I couldn't afford to quit my job just because I was upset about a 1% rise, so I can only assume they're not that hard up.

[mo]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56301981

"NHS pay: 'Undervalued' nurses may quit over 1% rise - union"

I couldn't afford to quit my job just because I was upset about a 1% rise, so I can only assume they're not that hard up.

Well no, they won't be when they get a gig stacking shelves in Aldi.

[Alex]

This canonisation of healthcare professionals that occurred during all this was always going to be a double-edged sword, wasn't it? The nation (or at least the media) decided to collectively elevate them all to the status of angels walking amongst us. Imagine then trading off on that to try and emotionally blackmail the country into a massive pay-rise while the economy struggles and a great many people around you have lost everything? Fucking grow up.

People are grateful, but fucking hell. "Stay home, protect the NHS!". Yes, we did that. For quite a long time. And it hasn't collapsed, which is great. The economic downside of which is we can't really afford a lot right now. It's a shame that same spirit of "let's all pull together" doesn't extent to maybe "pulling together" through to ensuing financial hardship and delaying your demands for a fucking 12.5% pay-rise until such a time when we have begun to recover.

I'll tell you who's not up in arms about "only" being offered a 1% pay-rise at the moment. The people who don't have jobs at all anymore on the back of this entire situation. They have more pressing concerns, like "how will I make my next mortgage payment" and "can I still provide for my family". Trivial shit like that. :rolleyes:

[Kikó]

Classic Tories splitting the nation and putting them against the blessed nurses so they can nationalise our NHS. 4D chess again.

[Lewis]

They won a landslide in 2019 with a mandate to sell it to Donald Trump, so hopefully they can still do a deal with his successor.

[Shindig]

Positivity rate of 0.6% That might as well be zero.

[Boydy]

1368139481174470658


Britain's billionaires had amassed a combined fortune of £156.6billion at the end of July, according to the annual Billionaires Insights Report from UBS. This is up 34.7 per cent from £116.6billion the previous year.

www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-8812261/amp/How-rich-just-got-richer-UK-billionaires-wealth-soars-35.html


Just putting this here for any of this "we can't afford it" nonsense.

[Jimmy Floyd]

You can afford anything if you want to (see furlough). They don't want to. Their critics from a certain space would say it's because they're heartless fatcats etc etc lefty cliché. Personally I think it's about 15% that and 85% pragmatism because a shit ton of private sector workers are about to be laid off when furlough finally ends and they don't want to create a visible divide between that and generous public sector pay rises.

[Lewis]

The 2020 billionaire gains are largely down to all the borrowing/money printing shitting the system to pieces.

[randomlegend]

People are grateful, but fucking hell. "Stay home, protect the NHS!". Yes, we did that. For quite a long time.

I find it hilarious the general attitude seems to be that people think they were staying at home for the benefit of NHS workers, rather than for the people who would have died.

[Magic]

What about all the people that are about to die from all the other stuff?

[randomlegend]

You're going to have to be a bit more specific than that.

[Magic]

Says the healthcare professional. :harold:

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

You've clearly got him on the ropes, Magic...

[Alex]

I find it hilarious the general attitude seems to be that people think they were doing staying at home for the benefit of NHS workers, rather than for the people who would have died.

Of course we were doing it for the people that otherwise would have died. Do you think the entire country is the under the impression that we brought the economy grinding to halt purely to wrap you lot up in cottonwool and lighten the NHS's workload? The general public are not all fucking idiots, regardless of your obvious distain for them, which seems to be seeping out of you increasingly with every passing week. But I do deal with the general public a lot in my job too, so I can sympathise with you to some extent on that. It comes and goes.

Although the lack of bodies piling up in the hallways does indirectly benefit you to some extent too, doesn't it? That may not have been the main intent but it doesn't stop it being true.

The reason behind why we did it doesn't really have any impact on my overall point either, anyway. It all happened in the spirit of pulling together to get through the current situation. We did it, it's done, we're skint and still very much in a shit situation. Ergo no 12.5% pay-rise. So they'll have to just pull together with us through that bit of it too. Or pack it in and go try their luck in the current job market. That is the general point I was making.

[Magic]

Except those fucking cunts who were furloughed. They should be docked the amount they were paid.

[randomlegend]

Of course we were doing it for the people that otherwise would have died. Do you think the entire country is the under the impression that we brought the economy grinding to halt purely to wrap you lot up in cottonwool and lighten the NHS's workload?



I hadn't even considered it the remotest possibility until both you and Spikey seemed to express exactly that opinion in this thread.

I don't have disdain for the "general public", whoever they may be.

[Shindig]

Quotation marks. Nice. That'll endear you to the common man.

[Spikey M]

I hadn't even considered it the remotest possibility until both you and Spikey seemed to express exactly that opinion in this thread.

I don't have disdain for the "general public", whoever they may be.

I refer you to Niko's second paragraph and can't actually believe it needed to be said.

[Lewis]

Lockdown is about preventing the NHS literally falling apart over winter. It's already stretched to breaking point every year, it will only take a few extra patients to properly implode.

Also, to the "I won't need a ventilator so I don't care" crowd, do you think they'll keep a few spare in case you fall and hit your head and need ITU treatment, or get in a major car accident, or any of the other things which might end up with you needing one? Because they won't, they'll all be taken up by covid patients.

Lighten the Workload. Protect the NHS. Scam the Public.

[randomlegend]

I refer you to Niko's second paragraph and can't actually believe it needed to be said.

Of course it's better psychologically for healthcare staff if there aren't bodies piling up in the corridors. I never said any different. It's the insinuation that when people were staying at home they were primarily doing it for NHS workers and we should be grateful that I took issue with. On an individual workload level people were at capacity anyway.

[Magic]

Why would they pile up? Plenty of undertakers and land left...or is that OVERWHELMED as well.

[7om]

There seems to be two issues here, regarding the nurses pay. One is that they’ve had an effective 9% pay cut over the last ten years. Number two, they want recognition for the spectacularly hard year they’ve had.

Point one is clearly shit and I don’t know enough about government spending to know why it’s happened. How do they stack up against other public sector workers?

Point two is wank. Yes it’s been shit but you don’t get extra money for doing a harder job for a temporary period. As someone who will (hopefully) be a doctor in three years, you don’t go into the healthcare industry in this country to make money. If I want to make it big I’ll fuck off to America again.

[Lewis]

lol three years in advance at Randrew creeping round 7om in the health thread trying to drum up interest in his shit second opinions.

[randomlegend]

Even if nurses got a 12.5% pay rise, there wouldn't be a single a soul going into it to "make money".

[Shindig]

Actually, people getting peeved over any rise is a bit petulant. Lost your job in the pandemic? The NHS can't help that. Shit happens.

[Spikey M]

Actually, people getting peeved over any rise is a bit petulant. Lost your job in the pandemic? The NHS can't help that. Shit happens.

Shit does indeed happen and it's the shit that's happened that's left numerous people out of work, will leave countless more out of work in the near future and is going to lead to mass homelessness and bankruptcy without governmental intervention. If you look at that situation and come down on the side of "nah, give the nurses 12.5% mate", then tune in to Jeremy Vine on Monday. You have found your people.

[Dquincy]

Of course it's better psychologically for healthcare staff if there aren't bodies piling up in the corridors. I never said any different. It's the insinuation that when people were staying at home they were primarily doing it for NHS workers and we should be grateful that I took issue with. On an individual workload level people were at capacity anyway.
"Bodies piling up in the corridor"

Really? :saywhat:

[Lewis]

Even the cleaners are lazy.

[randomlegend]

"Bodies piling up in the corridor"

Really? :saywhat:

I was responding to Alex who used those words.

[Don]

Apparently the Tories have snuck through a 13% pay rise for HMRC workers. The fucking audacity.

[Spikey M]

When I worked for the MOJ they offered us a 9% rise spread over 3 years, but we would have to sign a new contract changing us from 37 hours per week to 40 hours per week and would change from Monday - Friday to rolling shift pattern with Saturdays included.

Lol.

[Don]

The HMRC increase is funded by similar contract changes and savings and isn't costing the public purse anything. Stand down. Open the saunas.

[Shindig]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-56281064


Sonja Chenier, 47, from Colchester, has had three hospital admissions in the past 15 years and takes multiple medications daily for her asthma.

15 years is a bit of stretch, Sonja. The multiple medications would be better if the article told me what they were. I'm guessing one's a brown preventative inhaler and they regularly use their blue one.


Peter Smith, a 37-year-old from Bristol, said his GP dismissed the NHS guidance as "irrelevant".

He had four hospital stays because of his asthma when he was younger - twice after an emergency ambulance was called - and says respiratory illnesses like flu are a trigger for him now.

[randomlegend]

3 hospital admissions in 15 years is extremely significant for someone with asthma tbh.

[Magic]

BuT aStHmAtIcS aReNt AfFeCtEd

[randomlegend]

The data shows people with MILD asthma are at no increased risk of severe disease if they get covid than baseline.

That's why only people with moderate/severe asthma are in a priority group for vaccination (i.e. those with previous hospital admissions or requirement for courses if oral steroids).

Which is entirely consistent with what I've said all along.

[mo]

In other news, I might look more presentable if the barbers were open.

1368472018283339776

[Shindig]

With the two in the article, their most recent hospital admissions mustn't have been recent enough. They do lay out the guidelines pretty clearly and asthma's a moving bar. I'm nowhere near as bad as I was as a kid and nothing seems to trigger it aside from clearing the hoover out. I'd have been more sympathetic if the article was more specific about the hospital stints. 3 in 15 years might've meant their last one as 5 years ago. Clearly their GP's see their condition as managed.

[randomlegend]

A hospital admission as an adult with asthma is significant regardless IMO.

I've just looked at the guidance and it says any hospital admission ever as far as I can see, which seems completely reasonable to me.

[Shindig]

BBC: ZERO COVID DEATHS

Government website: "Owing to processing issues for deaths in England, the numbers of deaths throughout the UK will be updated later. In the meantime, the number of newly reported deaths for 7 March 2021 may incorrectly show as zero."

Fucking useless. Fact check before posting that shit, you eejits. Especially when you've just reported Wales' numbers as 18. :D

[Jimmy Floyd]

It'll be 100-ish today.

Covid is all over red rover, schools opening will have no effect now. Just got to sit around for another two months or whatever waiting for our public health overlords to let us out.

[Spikey M]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56312621

Team Zero-Covid have moved on to fresh pastures.

[randomlegend]

I think that one is a very genuine concern.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Zero Covid had an absolute jamboree yesterday, I loved it. Scroll down this twitter thread at your own risk. Oddly their list of speakers seemed to coincide basically in perfect harmony with those habitually occupying the extreme left of British politics, but I'm sure that's just a coincidence and their motivations are entirely to do with scientific rigour.

https://twitter.com/ZeroCovidNow1/status/1368162316005507082

Still, good to see a few old favourites out and about.


"The risk is that cases will rise once more, a couple of weeks after schools reopen on Monday", @HackneyAbbott says. "Instead of tackling the pandemic, the Tories are using it to launch more attacks on workers with austerity."

Deepti's still going strong with her unique brand of dishonest poison:


"A vaccine-only strategy, the government strategy, leaves us open to great risks", says @dgurdasani1. "Sections of the population will not be vaccinated, protection is not complete, and variants provide new risks. #ZeroCovid is an elimination strategy, and is achievable"

I wonder if you keep saying 'It's achievable' enough times, will that make it more achievable? Who knows. Still, even she was outgunned in the dangerous bullshit category this time:


'Our members are very clear we will do everything we can, with students and unions, to halt in-person teaching until it's safe, up to and including industrial action", says @zenscara

That's the spirit. But wait, here come Independent Sage.


Our next speaker is @chrischirp from @IndependentSage who highlights the fact that lockdown benefits better paid. "Poorer workers are still forced to go to work. And get more infections, and more likely to need intensive care".

YOU ARE LITERALLY ADVOCATING MORE OF THIS FOR MONTHS AND MONTHS.

It's probably the worst 'movement' imaginable.

[randomlegend]

You know what I would find refreshing? If people (politicians really) were willing to say "you know what, we don't and can't actually know what the absolute right thing to do is, but is is what we think and are going with". People on any part of the spectrum who claim to be 100% sure they are in the right are idiots IMO.

I firmly believe that whatever we do we could be looking back in ten years and thinking how wrong we were, but we are in unchartered waters and that's just the way it is.

But I guess people would paint any politician with the authenticity to do that as 'weak' and they would lose all support.

[Yevrah]

We've got a working vaccine, so unless we're saying we've enjoyed far too many unnecessary freedoms over the last x decades, opening up is 100% the right thing to be doing.

[Spikey M]

You know what I would find refreshing? If people (politicians really) were willing to say "you know what, we don't and can't actually know what the absolute right thing to do is, but is is what we think and are going with". People on any part of the spectrum who claim to be 100% sure they are in the right are idiots IMO.

I firmly believe that whatever we do we could be looking back in ten years and thinking how wrong we were, but we are in unchartered waters and that's just the way it is.

But I guess people would paint any politician with the authenticity to do that as 'weak' and they would lose all support.

There's no arguing that really. It is a fact that a new variant COULD pop up up render everything we've done until now pointless. It comes down to risk tolerance, I guess. Some of us fall on the side of taking that risk, some of use fall on the side of, well, not leaving the house until the world is free of this.

I guess the solution has to be in the middle somewhere, because the Brazilian approach is pretty worrying.

[Shindig]

Yep. And by the time we're fully open, two thirds of the country will at least have one shot in the arm. This is it, largely because there's no more silver bullets to wait for.

[randomlegend]

There's no arguing that really. It is a fact that a new variant COULD pop up up render everything we've done until now pointless. It comes down to risk tolerance, I guess.


Exactly, and that's absolutely fine and right. I wish people were willing to...?admit that rather than pretending they are absolutely confident that what they are advocating for is best.

[Lewis]

Mate, we're not masking up again to give you another winter off.

[randomlegend]

Bronch season will come whenever we open up properly, winter or otherwise. Bring it on.

[Raoul Duke]

Brunch season, moar liek

[Dquincy]

It'll be 100-ish today.

Covid is all over red rover, schools opening will have no effect now. Just got to sit around for another two months or whatever waiting for our public health overlords to let us out.

The confidence in this post. I just hope it rings true in a few months time.

[Baz]

My colleagues stag do has been booked for 25th-28th June in a massive house in Belper and a night out planned in Nottingham. Even if the restrictions are only lifted for a week, I’m going in hard. :drool:

[7om]

All we need now is some nice weather this summer. I can’t wait.

[Shindig]

Aye. I can't wait to bugger off out the house and or country.

[Dquincy]

http://news.sky.com/story/organiser-of-nhs-pay-protest-in-manchester-given-16310000-fine-by-police-12239043

Oganiser of NHS pay protest in manchester given £10,000 fine by police.

:harold:

[Shindig]

de-arrested doesn't sound like a word that should exist.

[randomlegend]

de-arrested doesn't sound like a word that should exist.

Winningest is a word that seems to have popped up in the last year or so which absolutely needs to fuck off.

[Spikey M]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56311723

This shit needs to fuck off.

Understandable for GCSE students, but there's no way my daughter is going in. We have an amazing summer planned and she's missed out on enough.

[Baz]

Winningest is a word that seems to have popped up in the last year or so which absolutely needs to fuck off.Not for the legendary few who completed G1 Jockey 3 on the PS2, where the ultimate and almost unattainable aim was to become the “Winningest Jockey.” :cool: Meaning it’s been a mainstay in my vocabulary since 2004.

[Yevrah]

Isn't a lot of what she's missed out on school?

[Shindig]

There's a part of me that wonders how little schooling you can get away with. The last two years of secondary school was all about gearing you for GCSE's.

[Baz]

Isn't a lot of what she's missed out on school?

They all have though. It’s not like a select few are behind. They’ve all missed the same, and can all catch up together, in regular school time.

[Don]

I see a possible flaw in that logic.

[Dquincy]

Isn't a lot of what she's missed out on school?

Not that important if she's in the first couple of years of primary school, which is basically organised play.

[Spikey M]

Isn't a lot of what she's missed out on school?

She's in reception. We can do finger paintings at home (and have done for a year now)

[Magic]

Isn't she a big young to be doing that.

[7om]

:D

Christ almighty.

[Jimmy Floyd]

The places Britons think *should* require a vaccine passport:

Care homes - 72%
Gyms - 56%
Pubs and bars - 56%
Cinemas - 55%
Restaurants - 53%
Beauty salons - 50%

Beauty salons (the only one in the list which requires person-to-person contact) being at the bottom of that list confirms all my Facebook Mum theories. Bring back the patriarchy.

[Yevrah]

Bit odd that I'd need a passport to see my Gran when they're not making the workers get vaccinated in the first place...

[Jimmy Floyd]

If there's one thing I've learned from this pandemic it's that in the eyes of the state, GDP > love.

[Ian]

It took a pandemic to make you realise that?

[Jimmy Floyd]

They don't usually legislate on it.

[Spikey M]

Debatable. The benefit system often punishes being in a relationship (a couple get less than 2 single people) and seems to want children punted out onto the streets the day they turn 18. Disability / Carers benefits are another laugh.

Making people choose between those they love and having more money seems to be the key priority of the benefits system, now that I think of it.

[Jimmy Floyd]

2 single people would have more fixed costs, wouldn't they? As they can't share a bedroom etc.

We do have a weird aversion to the concept of the extended family though. Probably yet another attempt to drive up housing demand.

[Spikey M]

Quite possibly, but it goes far deeper than that. For example, a 'mixed age couple' are completely fucked when it comes to claiming pension credits until the younger of the two reaches pension age. So basically, Ted needs to kick Brenda to the curb if he wants to eat this month.

The whole system is full of bollocks like that.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Isn't measuring anything like that by 'household' rather than by individual pretty Victorian? Saves them money though I guess so there you are.

[Jimmy Floyd]

0 deaths in Wales reported today, and you still can't buy socks in Tesco there.

[Magic]

Them, like Scotland, have went for the hardline 'make the Tories look stupid' approach which, hilariously, is backfiring with their independence ambitions. :drool:

[Spikey M]

They do appear to have overlooked the mildly obvious "taking away more freedoms than the Tories would have is not a good look" angle.

[randomlegend]

She's in reception. We can do finger paintings at home (and have done for a year now)

There's a lot of developmental stuff from interacting with peers etc. which is important too.

[randomlegend]

Bit odd that I'd need a passport to see my Gran when they're not making the workers get vaccinated in the first place...

I know I've already said it, but I really don't understand all the furore around whether or not care/healthcare workers can be mandated to be vaccinated given they already are mandated to have other vaccines.

[Spikey M]

There's a lot of developmental stuff from interacting with peers etc. which is important too.

She's only actually been off since December. Other than that she's been going in on the KeyWorker card. We've kept her off since then because we kept getting text messages saying she had to isolate.

Regardless of that though, she has from now until July in school and then will be busy over the summer having fun and seeing family and friends. An extra three weeks at school offers nothing compared to that.

[Yevrah]

I know I've already said it, but I really don't understand all the furore around whether or not care/healthcare workers can be mandated to be vaccinated given they already are mandated to have other vaccines.

I don't either. There are loads of jobs that are subject to conditions which aren't universally present, so I've no idea how this isn't being seen in the same light as those.

I don't think we should be forcing the general public to have the vaccine, but if you work in an environment where the people you look after a sitting ducks for catching and dying from it (probably even to some degree after they themselves have been vaccinated), then you should absolutely be made to have it or look for alternative employment.

[Shindig]

I think the only reason the jabs wouldn't have been mandated out of how new the jab (and the virus, for that matter) is. There's also the possibility some people working in healthcare had a prior infection and thought they can leave the vaccine for a few months.

As for the residents, the majority of them have taken the offer up so there's a potential safety net on that end.

[Raoul Duke]

Our man Hugo De Jonge (Health Minister) reckons everyone will have had "a" vaccine at least by July 1st. They're going to have to extract a digit if they want to get up to that pace though.

[Queenslander]

George Clooney and Julia Roberts have jumped the line to film a movie in South East Queensland. Im sure them both spending quarantine in the Gold Coast Hinterland will go down well.

[Spikey M]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-56323453

:drool:

[Shindig]

"The announcement [about lockdown ending] has piled on quite a lot of pressure, especially for me being in the LGBT community," he says.

You didn't have to drop that in there, Olli(e).


He thinks there's a pressure within the community to come out of the pandemic looking physically good.

"It brings up issues of 'do I look good enough?' or 'will my friends want to see me?' and whether I've achieved enough during lockdown.

Neurotic.

[Spikey M]

I don't think an article has ever made me feel like more of a sneering old man. Full to the brim with triggers.

"Oli is worried about going back to busy social spaces like nightclubs"

Well, have I got a solution for you.

But, they're atleast trying to help Magic;

"Focus your energy in being interested in the other person, showing empathy and kindness towards them rather than being stuck inside your own anxious mind"

[Don]

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/15779/production/_117492978_photo-2021-02-23-17-31-52.jpg

Surprised the bird didn't mention the difficulties of being BLM.

[Magic]

"Focus your energy in being interested in the other person, showing empathy and kindness towards them rather than being stuck inside your own anxious mind"

There's the irony of lockdown.

[Spikey M]

I love stuff like that. They may as well have just written "don't be anxious". Err, cheers lads.

[Lofty]

'Chris Whitty warns of potential new surge'

That could have been the daily headline for the last 12 months.

[Spikey M]

There will be a surge. Hospital rates will pick up a little bit. Maybe even deaths a tad, but a third of all adults are now vaccinated and by and large it's the most vulnerable ones. It won't really matter.

[Ian]

Olli and Taz need to get back to the clubs.

[Yevrah]

I'm with Whitty, we absolutely must guard against a surge of fun, in all its forms. We've spent too long in lockdown to ruin that by ending it now.

[Magic]

Desperate to stay relevant. Desperate.

[Lewis]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EdtQEH2mF0

:cab:

[Yevrah]

The knots in which people are tying themselves in to criticise the government over their current approach, when there is no justifiable criticism to made, are absolutely fantastic.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Zero covid is about politics, just like the Steve Baker end of things is also about politics. Not even a global pandemic is safe from being just another battleground in the culture war.

I think Whitty has been pretty good throughout. His communication is really good, better than any politician (especially that one). Him and JVT can have a beer each at the end. Vallance can swerve.

[Spikey M]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EdtQEH2mF0

:cab:

You could see the lights go off half way through that as she realised she was making absolutely no sense.

[7om]

I've seen a few different lol videos of Dawn Butler now and every time she comes across as completely thick as shit.

[Jimmy Floyd]

We did 1.5 million tests yesterday (with the school kids coming back). Less than 6,000 positive.

Open the fucking clubs.

[Magic]

1.5million sad, desperate, weak minded and extremely paranoid people wishing they could continue to lock us down.

[Kikó]

You need to see a doctor.

[7om]

1.5million sad, desperate, weak minded and extremely paranoid people wishing they could continue to lock us down.

Are you mental? Some people get tested because they have to.

[Ian]

The first sentence of your post was a rhetorical question, right?

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

You need to see a doctor.

He's beyond help.

[Spikey M]

Maybe he means a plastic surgeon.

[Lofty]

Some geezer at my wife's work has to isolate because he was going to power wash his front drive on sunday and knocked on his next door neighbours to suggest they move their car out of the way, only for the daft bitch to open the door to him and proclaim 'I have covid!'. Laddo has to burn 10 days holiday now :D

[Spikey M]

He has to use holiday to isolate? That's mental.

Not as mental as just keeping quiet about it considering the tiny risk, but, yeah.

[Lofty]

Yeah a lot of places have been doing it. Once some fella at her spot had a suspected heart attack and had to go to hospital in an ambulance, they docked him half a day.

Welcome to the world of work, Jeremy.

[Lewis]

I wouldn't isolate in that situation.

[Don]

MJ gets mocked by the normie brigade for suggesting people are overreacting yet that comes out 6 posts down and I bet there's a good few going "Hmmm seems a little cautious but yeah, fair. Gemma, what's for tea tonight? So excited for our 2 remaining episodes of Line of Duty before the new season is out. I love you."

Get the fuck out of here, you cretins.

[Spikey M]

Even the official rules don't say he should be isolating.

[Alan Shearer The 2nd]

Some geezer at my wife's work has to isolate because he was going to power wash his front drive on sunday and knocked on his next door neighbours to suggest they move their car out of the way, only for the daft bitch to open the door to him and proclaim 'I have covid!'. Laddo has to burn 10 days holiday now :D

Fuck that.

If he was that concerned he'd just step back from the door surely?

[niko_cee]

She told him through the medium of loud singing whilst the rest of the family were on the woodwind in accompaniment.

Assuming you have the same weird anti-singing/anti-woodwind rules we do.

[7om]

MJ gets mocked by the normie brigade for suggesting people are overreacting yet that comes out 6 posts down and I bet there's a good few going "Hmmm seems a little cautious but yeah, fair. Gemma, what's for tea tonight? So excited for our 2 remaining episodes of Line of Duty before the new season is out. I love you."

Get the fuck out of here, you cretins.

You and him need to get a firm grip on yourselves. People get tested, get over it.

[Spikey M]

#SackChrisWhitty trending on Twitter. :drool:

Rightfully so too. "There'll be a lockdown in August is we go any faster". August? Fucking how? They'll be vaccinating the teenagers by then.

[Shindig]

On site testing's starting at my office. More reason to stay at home.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I can see why we're unlocking indoor settings slowly and cautiously and waiting for a high jab level in order to do so, but why I had to tell a dad that he legally wasn't allowed to use the cricket nets with his two sons earlier today I have absolutely no idea.

[Shindig]

What if he gave you a verbal contract that his kids were elite athletes and he was coaching them?

That'd be my answer for everything. Every. Thing.

[Magic]

On site testing's starting at my office. More reason to stay at home.

Asymptomatic? Human rights violation.

[Shindig]

It's picked up four cases in our other site so it's probably worth the 15 minutes of inconvenience. Especially when 2 hours of my day is now doing abso-fucking-bugger-all.

[Don]

Another harrowing episode of the UCL Hospital series on BBC News at 10 tonight (time-stamped 17:45-21:25 on iplayer for those who missed it and need a wake-up call as to just how serious this all is). A nurse saying "you won't find any nurses or doctors booking holidays or pub gardens for April as they're so worried this will happen again."

I was getting complacent so it was very timely.

[Magic]

It's not like they could afford it anyway with their 1% pay rise. :harold:

[Spikey M]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-56355861

With their President openly indifferent to their 2000 deaths per day and a quarter of a million already dead, why are Brazil being so open about their figures?

[Baz]

Test and Trace most wasteful and inept public spending programme of all time, says former Treasury chief :harold:

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/newslondon/test-and-trace-e2-80-98most-wasteful-and-inept-public-spending-programme-of-all-time-e2-80-99-says-former-treasury-chief/ar-BB1erz0u

[SvN]

Mr Bolsonaro has downplayed the threat from the virus. Earlier this week he told people to "stop whining".

Fucking hell :D

[Don]

Brazil :cool: they do it right because their culture recognises the important things in life and aren't full of soft shites happy to piss away their lives sitting on their fat arse.

[7om]

Absolutely. As long as we can party on copacabana beach then fuck everything else.

[Yevrah]

Brazil is interesting as despite having seemingly done almost nothing to stop this they still only have a death rate from it of 118 per 100,000, ours is 188.

Now their death rate might be understated and even if it isn't it might be incomparable to ours due to numerous different factors, but if it isn't understated and it is comparable, we've basically wasted a year of our lives for nothing.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Is there a full death rate chart (in the terms expressed above) anywhere?

[Spikey M]

They live an out-doorsy lifestyle which is a massive win with Covid. I genuinely thing 'climate' is one of the main factors in the spread of this. But at 2000 deaths a day, and taking no action to stop it, they will breeze past us soon enough.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Deaths per million (on worldometer) has the following ranking among non-micronations:

1 Czech Republic (I refuse to say 'Czechia')
2 Belgium
3 Slovenia
4 UK
5 Hungary
6 Italy
7 Bosnia
8 Portugal
9 USA
10 Bulgaria

Now if I were to run my amateur eye across this, the correlation I would make would be consumption of fatty foods (Italy the exception).

[Don]

Can we run it alongside their global Soft Shites index scores?

[Jimmy Floyd]

If you provide the data I will be able to beam a graph onto the wall of your local sauna in time for when they open.

[Spikey M]

There's no way a soft shite chart will work with that many Eastern Europeans.

[Boydy]

Would Portugal not be similar dietary-wise to Italy?

[Jimmy Floyd]

My instinct is they eat loads of fried crap in comparison to Italy, but Kiko can confirm.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

They love a good pastel de nata.

[Lewis]

That sausage/steak/cheese/egg butty they have as one of their national dishes is like something a proper country would have. Meanwhile, the Spanish are tormenting rats and eating rice from bins.

[Spikey M]

Spanish food is the worst national food. FACT.

Italian food in the most Overrated. FACT.

[Lewis]

Where did I read that what we call Italian food is more like Italian-American food, and they actually live on moody fish and generally a lot less of the cheese, sauce, meat that we all like in our 'Italian' food?

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Proper Spanish food is one of the only food things Spain has going for it.

[Spikey M]

Proper Spanish food is disappointing fish and the worst parts of a pig left to go off for a bit. Get out of here, herb.

[Sir Andy Mahowry]

Proper Spanish food is disappointing fish and the worst parts of a pig left to go off for a bit. Get out of here, herb.

I did have beef tongue and pig ears last time I went...

[SvN]

I was taken to an expensive restaurant in Valencia by a client, and it was basically loads of plates of shit pork and fish. Had to pretend it was amazing.

[Kikó]

My instinct is they eat loads of fried crap in comparison to Italy, but Kiko can confirm.

They love their pastries but so do Italians.

Lot of fresh fish and carbs (rice, potato, bread combos). Probably less healthy but more beach sports which balance it out.

[Kikó]

Spanish food is the worst national food. FACT.

Italian food in the most Overrated. FACT.

Wrong.

British food is the worst.

[Spikey M]

Pie and Chips is better than anything any other country has come up with alone.

With the exception of Curry.

[-james-]

Mediterranean food > *

[Jimmy Floyd]

Everything around the Med is great, it all goes back to the Phoenicians and trade routes and spices etc. They also just have far more native good stuff to work with, olive oil and citrus fruits and so on.

Northern Europe doesn't even start to compete. I'd say we do a reasonable job with the available resources. Germany has its moments. And if you think any cuisine is more overrated than the home of the word 'cuisine' then you are deluding yourself.

[Spikey M]

Mediterranean food > *

Turkish, yes. Greek is its poorer but tolerable cousin. The rest has been addressed.

[-james-]

Mediterranean food > *

And within that it probably goes Spanish > Israeli/Lebanese > Italian > Greek > Turkish.

What the Spanish get right more than anything else is food culture. Small meals infrequently is vastly superior to one massive meal.

[-james-]

Everything around the Med is great, it all goes back to the Phoenicians and trade routes and spices etc. They also just have far more native good stuff to work with, olive oil and citrus fruits and so on.

Northern Europe doesn't even start to compete. I'd say we do a reasonable job with the available resources. Germany has its moments. And if you think any cuisine is more overrated than the home of the word 'cuisine' then you are deluding yourself.

Yeah this is it. Just lob a bunch of veg and olive oil on a plate and you're set. You can't do that up here.

[Spikey M]

And within that it probably goes Spanish > Israeli/Lebanese > Italian > Greek > Turkish.



Lol

Turkish > Greek > Lebanese > Italian > Mahows arsehole > Spanish

[niko_cee]

Can only conclude Spikey's version of Spanish food (for the purposes of this comparison) is breakfasto inglesio.

[-james-]

I was thinking about this (https://imgur.com/mTQfDbY) meal the other day, eaten standing up outside at about 2 in the afternoon in Cadiz after a morning at the beach. What could be better?

[Spikey M]

Can only conclude Spikey's version of Spanish food (for the purposes of this comparison) is breakfasto inglesio.

Nope. I don't eat English food abroad. That's Lewis. If he ever left the country.

[Ian]

"Listen, right, I'll tell you how bad Spanish food is. When I went to the Red Lion in Marbella..."

[Lewis]

Man's bigging up Spanish 'food culture' reminiscing about sandwich filling.

[Lewis]

Eating corned beef out the tin with a spoon. One thing I will say for Army cuisine...

[Spikey M]

The best thing I ever had in Spain was Gambas Pil Pil, which is prawns in oil with spices, served with bread. Tough to get wrong.

[Kikó]

Sorry I've had a think, German food is the worst. Pure stodge on a plate.