Apparently it is no longer allowed.
Many forum contributors keep telling me this, and they get very upset when I contest their ruling.

How the government works

The king wanted to go fishing, and he asked the royal weather forecaster the forecast for the next few hours. The palace meteorologist assured him that there was no chance of rain.

So the king and the queen went fishing. On the way he met a man with a fishing pole riding on a donkey, and he asked the man if the fish were biting.

The fisherman said, "Your Majesty, you should return to the palace! In just a short time I expect a huge rain storm."

The king replied: "I hold the palace meteorologist in high regard. He is an educated and experienced professional. Besides, I pay him very high wages. He gave me a very different forecast. I trust him."

So the king continued on his way.

However, in a short time a torrential rain fell from the sky. The King and Queen were totally soaked. Furious, the king returned to the palace and gave the order to fire the meteorologist.

Then he summoned the fisherman and offered him the prestigious position of royal forecaster.

The fisherman said, "Your Majesty, I do not know anything about forecasting. I obtain my information from my donkey. If I see my donkey's ears drooping, it means with certainty that it will rain."

So the king hired the donkey.

And so began the practice of hiring dumb asses to work in influential positions of government. The practice is unbroken to this day.

Scott Correct there is Light at the end of the Tunnel for Labour ,Starmer done a decent job

with his Clear out ..... Long overdue ...

Seems to me we are in much the same boat as most of the rest of Western Europe.

How Labour supporters - and it is always Labour supporters - on here see our situation as being handled way worse than others with much the same death tolls is hard to explain other than partisan party politics.

What would be different if Corbyn or Starmer were dealing with this ?

You would have had the same bunch of scientists telling them the same things that needed to be done and the same things that were not needed. And unless Corbyn or Starmer had decided to overrule them we would have had the same results.

Are the mail and telegraph posting on here

I suppertime most deaths are been linked to this virus last week a former neighbour of mine died he was 81 and had been ill for sometime he was been cared for by his youngest son he never left the house and the son had also been self isolating due to the nature of his dad's health. He died of pneumonia after taking I'll at home yet his death as been put down to the virus this as raised questions by his son as to how on earth could his dad have contacted the virus in the first place?

"Seems to me we are in much the same boat as most of the rest of Western Europe."

Yes we are in the same boat as Spain & Italy but we didn't have to be, we had more time to act

Are suggesting that vital supplies could be easly and plenty fully obtained after the crisis in Italy and Spain?

I think the government should've followed the rest or Europe and lockdowned a week earlier.  It seemed obvious at the time, but the mistake was really ICL's more so than the government.  As we have a leader who doesn't like controlling the public, and the national advice from his experts more closely aligned to that mantra and a leader who also advocated BREXIT, then you are inclined to follow UK advice, rather than European surely.  There's every chance Corbyn or Starmer would've have followed Europe's experts rather than the UK's as their mantra is more control and closer alignment with Europe

Whilst I think Labour could easily have lockdowned a week earlier, I think the level of competence in their cabinet is much weaker than the Tories.  Albeit now Starmer is in charge and their front bench is much stronger, if Labour had won the election, we'd have the most incompetent heads of state in modern times leading the response.

And the key role in the response is that of the Chancellor and the Treasury.  It's not just about the next 3 months, it's about the next 20 years.

I don't need to be qualified in medicine to know this is just not good enough

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I have not been using inflammatory language either like calling Boris a killer or that he should be arrested or hoping he bought it when he was in intensive care.  Some have on here, not me.

I joined this form in 2008, never came here until corona arrived, never read anything on chitchat let alone post here.

He announced it at a press briefing, the decision will not have been his alone, they love committees in the worlds of science and medicine.
I'd imagine that it was a recommendation made by SAGE.

Hancock must be gone and Bojo's coat is on a very shoogly peg.

And of course ackiebigot defends the tory bampots who have made the situation far far worse than it should have been.
WORST IN EUROPE...absolutely disgraceful.

We will have the highest death total in Europe from this virus.

we might already be the worst as our figures don't include care home deaths which can be numbered in the thousands ...