Concerns over new Covid variants continue to hamper the narrative regarding Britain’s unlock. Nicola Sturgeon has warned that restrictions on international travel should not be lifted too soon because of the “big risk” of importing Covid variants into the UK. Scotland’s First Minister also told Sophy Ridge on Sky News that the British Government’s “traffic light” system for international travel is not fit for purpose because “we don’t know where the next dangerous variant will come from“.
The Daily Record has the story.
Nicola Sturgeon has warned Scotland faces a “big risk” of importing new variants of the coronavirus if restrictions on international travel are lifted too soon.
The First Minister admitted lifting travel abroad “too quickly” last year which allowed the virus to re-seed amongst the population, which then lead to a second national lockdown.
Speaking on the Sophy Ridge on Sunday show, the SNP leader said Scots face living longer with international travel restrictions due to the risk of importing new strains of Covid.
She added: “The big risk that we face, not just in Scotland but in the UK, is the importation of new variants of the virus.
“Variants that might be faster spreading, that might be more severe, and crucially variants that might undermine the efficacy of the vaccines.
“We have to be very careful about that which is why I think one of the restrictions we’re all going to have to live with for longer is a restriction on international travel.
“We must not allow the progress we are making domestically to be undermined by a too lax position on international travel.”
… Asked about the fast-spreading Indian variant, Sturgeon said: … “It is a variant of interest as oppose to a variant of concern.”
Worth reading in full.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Informative graph, but Pakistan and Bangladesh notably absent – camouflaged by British citizenship and/or difficult to track stats for non-citizens?
They are on the chart. Both names overlaying each other, mixed in with Nigeria and Slovakia.
Okay thanks, gotcha.
They are overwritten bottom left, just above Latvia and Slovakia.
The question is, what are our authorities going to do with this table? Ignore it, I suppose.
Just look at US crime statistics by race.
Bit of a change of tack from Farage here;
“But it is our intention, ultimately, that if you’ve come illegally, you should not be able to stay.”
”Nigel Farage has announced a change in Reform UK’s policy on illegal immigration, now seeming to support, at least in principle, the mass deportation of ALL illegal immigrants in Britain.
“I know the problem is huge, because there are an estimated 1.2 million people here illegally. And going beyond the last 100,000 is not going to be an easy job. It’s going to be one hell of a battle, and we know that the state, the apparatus of state, will fight us at every point.”
This follows his comments last year, in an interview with Steven Edginton on GB News, where he said it was not his ambition to deport all illegal immigrants, saying “it is a political impossibility.”
During the press conference, Farage also said:
“We will bring a total end to all asylum claims from people who have come here on travel visas, or who are overseas students.”
“We will demand the deportation of all foreign criminals.”
He promises Reform will appoint a Minister for Deportations if the win the next general election.
He also suggests the citizenship of foreign nationals given the right to remain in Britain may be revisited if they commit crimes.
Are Reform listening to criticism that they have softened on immigration lately?
Farage promises further policy announcements in three-to-four weeks’ time.”
https://x.com/Con_Tomlinson/status/1915357142988546439
They are still building the policy platform, and so some fluidity in the detail is to be expected.
Is that Neil-speak for Nigel’s flip flopping? He seems to be blowing in the wind these days, particularly since his chairman bought his way in and they set up yet another limited company together
Nationalities don’t commit crimes. People commit crimes and people also have a nationality. That there are lots of Albanian criminals in the UK doesn’t meant lots of Albanians are criminals (they might or might not be but nothing about this follows from the initial observation).
You’re right, but at a group level, some groups are more inclined than others to certain behaviours. The much more interesting question is what do you do with the information. There are various options, none of which will be followed.
Groups have no behaviour. If some set of people is artificially partioned into some set groups and one then looks for a certain propery among group members, the rate of occurence of the property will vary between the artificially created groups, as it would also vary for any other conceivable artificial partition. This is essentially historical information of no conceivable use beyond being descriptive for the period of time which is covered.
In addition to this, the population numbers used to calculate the imprisonment rates are estimates aka guesses as the actual numbers are unknown and the rates are really pretty low. Eg, according to the Noah Carl article, 70.3 of every 1000 Albanians in the UK are in prison. That’s 7.03% which means that about 13.2 Albanians in the UK aren’t in prison for every Albanian in the UK who is.
If you have an idea what should be done to these 13 Albanians because of the 1 Albanian in prison, I’d like to know about it. My idea would be nothing.
I would stop all immigration for a few centuries. If I ever restarted it I would favour races that had a track record of developing advanced civilisations whose history and culture were similar to ours- basically, white Europeans. I believe that would make our country a better place to live in than alternative approaches. As to those already here, deport all illegals and cut back welfare hoping that at least some of those making a negative contribution would decide to leave. Deport all foreign criminals.
That’s principally something I agree with. But not because of statistics like the one mentioned in this article which I consider essentially meaningless minus better truisms like Operations of criminals are more mobile than those of people who aren’t.
Kind of welcome but only a baby step in the right direction.
Valuable chiefly as an indication that the political weather is finally starting to change on this vital issue.
Long long way to go.