please log in to view this image Notice the sign says "should be used' not like most other countries where it would say must be used. The result is the following. please log in to view this image
The French minister of health, Jean-Michel Blanquer, has said today that in the one week that some schools have been open, there have been 70 cases of the virus detected. A small number, but significant as so many children are doing online learning from home. A number of the schools that did reopen have now been shut again. Has the virus come into the schools via children or staff? Are the children or staff likely to spread it? That is unknown at the moment, so the message is clear, it is not safe to assume that schools are a place of safety.
They had an education minister on this morning parroting the it is safe message... whilst a GP was saying otherwise....
This will bite back Boris and co big time..... any unneccesary death..... is.... a form of state murder... we are not in a war when we are senidngp eople over the top to take a hit for the victory of all....
same old... same old... likes to make the divisive digs on their own terms.. . but bleat when it goes against them... This is so much bigger than party politics... . I seee very little sign of oppostion parties choosing to make political capital out of all this... .
Most of the UK public are sensible enough to realise the government is in a difficult situation. As far as I know there is not another election for almost 5 years, not sure how the government will be bitten? There has been criticism of most government's handling of the pandemic, some of it with inaccurate notions.
"From today, all individuals should self-isolate if they develop a new continuous cough or fever or anosmia. Anosmia is the loss or a change in your normal sense of smell. It can also affect your sense of taste as the two are closely linked. We have been closely monitoring the emerging data and evidence on Covid-19 and after thorough consideration, we are now confident enough to recommend this new measure. The individual’s household should also self-isolate for 14 days as per the current guidelines and the individual should stay at home for 7 days, or longer if they still have symptoms other than cough or loss of sense of smell or taste." Sorry but this is two months late. We were told here that loss of taste or smell was a symptom in the middle of March. There have been countless scientific reports saying that because of not including such symptoms in the UK advice there are thousands of people not isolating who should and can be unaware that they are passing it on.
Same in Australia and New Zealand. It really beggars belief that it has taken them this long to cotton on to it. This from the Guardian story about it is rather alarming - Prof Tim Spector from King’s College London, who has been collecting data on people who downloaded its symptom app, said 50,000 to 70,000 people in the UK with Covid-19 were wrongly not being told to self-isolate. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...ts-advised-for-people-who-lose-taste-or-smell
And more disturbing news - recovering Covid-19 patients are having strokes. https://theconversation.com/coronav...n acute stroke while recovering from COVID-19
Although this ruling is not specifically about the coronavirus it does have implications for future funding to repair some of the financial damage to EU members countries. I am interested in asking Cologne what the German people in general think about this issue. It looks very important to both Germany and the EU. It is a good article, hope you can access it. EU risks losing Germany if it picks a fight to the death, or the euro if it doesn't
Due to the shut down INTU who own a number of the largest shopping centres in England, including the one in Watford, are saying that they are in danger of defaulting on repayments of the interest on the massive debt they are carrying forward. £4.6 billion of debt shows how so much of the UK economy is built on borrowing. They are asking for no payments until December 2021. All of this is bad news for Watford Borough Council who have a 7% stake in the shopping centre.
Germany is aware of the fact that it needs the rest of the EU as much as they need Germany. It is obvious that some kind of financial package will be forthcoming - the only difference of opinion is the form this will take. Germany favours a type of Marshall Plan solution whereas others want Euro bonds which would force all European countries to share a collective debt. Germany knows it has to pay in some form or other - but the costs of umbrella payments to Southern European countries have been a fraction of the solidarity payments into the former GDR.
One company financially overstretching themselves does not extrapolate across the UK economy by any means. I know these shopping centres take years to plan and build but it was easy to see many years ago that the high street was fast losing trade to the internet. Business borrowing rates are at an all time low, it is an excellent time to take on debt for the right investment. Not a good time to have investments in commercial property, rents will plummet.
What is the general opinion of the average German, are they willing to accept the idea of eurobonds even if allowed by the German courts. The struggling countries are not interested in loans with strings attached, they basically want the richer countries to bail them out.
I do not know the general opinion of the average German SH ! It is not a subject which crops up on a regular basis in my conversations with them. However - they have been paying a solidarity tax for the former GDR ever since the reunification and I have heard few people grumbling about it, they have also paid billions to Israel in belated reparations without too much bother. There is the other aspect of the fact that many Germans still remember how Germany was helped after 1945 through the Marshall plan and so, my general feeling is, that they may be more open to this than the government of Angela Merkel.
Funny but ny son works in retail as a uk sales manager of a range of high Street brands.. He sees it rather differently.. Maybe a couple of years to recover and the high Street will never be the same again..
I know that the German, Dutch and Austrian governments have refused to contemplate the idea of Eurobonds / coronabonds. Last week the German constitutional court ruled that the ECB and the European Court of Justice had overstepped their legitimate competence. Basically it said that their decisions had no validity in Germany when they spent German funds without adequate authority. This put the Verfassungsgericht court above the German government, ECB and the ECJ. The ruling has been challenged by Brussels which has vowed infringement proceedings against Germany. The implication of this disagreement will harden the views of those richer Northern EU members to refuse any mutuality actions to help the poorer EU members apart from conditional loans which are likely to be refused. This will also affect the Brexit negotiations about ECJ as the final arbitrator. The UK has refused this and can now quote the German court pointing out that even EU members do not recognise the ECJ above domestic law.
It is not a good time to invest in the high street, the pandemic has simply accelerated trade towards online shopping. The high street will never be the same again.
