Portugal is due to be removed from the Government’s “Green List”, being placed on the “Amber List” from next Tuesday. It seems completely incomprehensible, given that the British Government just allowed 16,500 English football fans to travel there en masse to watch last week’s Champions League final. The Telegraph has the story.
Portugal is set to be axed from the U.K.’s green list, forcing thousands of British holidaymakers to cancel their trips or cut short their breaks to avoid quarantine.
Ministers are understood to have decided on Thursday morning to add Portugal to the amber list from next Tuesday at 4am after tests revealed what are believed to be previously-unknown variants of Covid. It will mean anyone returning from Portugal after then will have to quarantine for 10 days and take at least two PCR tests.
Sources said ministers had decided that with just weeks to go to the lifting of the final Covid restrictions on June 21, they should “not do anything that jeopardises further unlocking at this point.”
In another report, the Telegraph speculates that cases could be rising in Portugal due to – you guessed it – the British Government’s decision to allow English football fans to attend the Champions League final in Porto.
Two events have served to spark new concerns over rising infection rates in Portugal – and both involved football.
The celebrations for Lisbon’s Sporting Clube de Portugal title win saw thousands of fans gather in a cavalcade before moving into the city centre, many maskless, with few socially distancing and most singing.
It has been linked by experts to a surge in cases in the capital that saw the city centre placed on alert last week, with more than 120 cases per 100,000 people per fortnight.
The second involved the 16,500 English fans who arrived in Porto at the weekend to see Chelsea’s 1-0 victory over Manchester City in the Champions League final. Thousands were pictured ignoring social distancing rules and wearing face masks as they thronged in bars by the Douro river.
The regional health authority for the Porto area said those who were in or near fan zones at the weekend should “reduce contacts over the next two weeks” and look out for Covid symptoms.
Worth reading in full.
What makes this decision so odd is that cases don’t appear to be rising in Portugal – at least, hardly at all.
Stop Press: No countries have been added to the “Green List” today. MailOnline has more.
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First! And good morning to one and all!!!!!!!
Oh wait a moment, we don’t do that any more? Well – Nth – and good morning one…
Seriously, dig out that old password, or get a new one, or find a few quid down the back of the sofa – whatever it takes, please come back – we’re missing you! And do at least keep reading. I wonder if admin/ Toby Young could do anything about this to explain it to people if some are finding it difficult? There may have been issues over the years, but for some of us, the btl comment has been the best part, and they have made a fantastic contribution. 87 comments or so yesterday – obviously a lot less than in the past, but not completely dead by any means, and I hope this will gradually increase. Please don’t give up on us just yet. From my point of view, the only thing that has significantly changed is the calendar on the right of the screen to find specific dates. This can still be done via the archive (see top of page) even if it does take longer. And similar articles are now grouped together there, which should theoretically make it easier to find something you are interested in.
Yes there’s a cost to commenting, but only the price of a pint of beer in some places for a whole month. I’m not rich or a computer expert but have managed, so it is definitely possible. I look forward to hearing from you all soon.
To be honest, my guess is that Toby et al. aren’t all that keen on all the BTL activity. I wonder if they see it as a big hassle to administer and feel it makes the DS less serious.
If they wanted to promote reader comments, they should have a little comment icon on each news item box indicating the number of comments so far on that news item. It would show readers at a glance where there is some BTL activity.
Impossible to know unless they tell us. But let’s have it right though. We have been allowed to post pretty much what we want, and that’s good enough for me. There are sites these days – too many sites – which would delete comments or ban people for giving their honest opinion about things, and regardless of whether they meant to be offensive. We have genuinely been able to give a broad range of opinions on here without fear of censorship, and I thank Toby for that. Toby posted that he is not going to censorship content at the behest of advertisers, so there is a genuine commitment to freedom of expression.
I may be biased as I joined his Free Speech Union prior to lockdown, but I fancy I’m right on this at least.
“To be honest, my guess is that Toby et al. aren’t all that keen on all the BTL activity. I wonder if they see it as a big hassle to administer and feel it makes the DS less serious.”
If that’s the case he could simply remove comments altogether or ban people he doesn’t like or remove posts he doesn’t like, but he hasn’t done any of that. Charging people to comment seems odd but sort of makes sense – commenters are likely to be the more committed DS readers – it’s the casual punter he doesn’t want to put off. Some commenters are value-add so arguably should get it for free, others probably get more out of it than they put in (me included no doubt).
I just think TY was in a an awkward position, £5 a month is cheap if you believe that DS has an important role to play in the battle against the clown world, comments will slowly pick up, and maybe advertising will fill the gap (though many advertisers will not want to be associated with literally Hitler).
My comment isn’t just speculative.
The first version of Lockdown Sceptics had just the one comment section for the each day. And I know for a fact that the editors were not entirely happy with how the comments section was going. I’m not sure whether the shift to a comment section per news item made things easier or better for them, but I know they were hoping it might.
This third iteration, charging for the right to comment, makes me think it wasn’t and that they’re perhaps hoping paying commenters will be more sensible and civil in their comments and less needing of moderation and management. This last bit, I am speculating.
I’m sure the editors can set me straight here if I am totally off the mark (and they care enough to comment
Turns out my speculation was off and they really would like all the commenters back – at 16p a day.
That definitely has to be the cheapest therapy on offer!
Hope everyone makes their way back on.
Except maybe Fingal…:-)
“Seriously, dig out that old password, or get a new one”
Are you suggesting that there’s been a cull?
I’m suggesting, as seems entirely plausible, that some people may have lost their old password and not be able to remember it. It seems I may be in a minority knowing mine by heart…
Morning.
we certainly can still do Good Mornings….hello from an absolutely beautiful sunny Whitby his morning…just got back from a lovely dog walk….
I have faith that people will return….the thing is I read ‘sceptics’ for at least a year before I dared post anything…and many of those posters left a long time ago…I still miss the fiery doom and gloom type posts that Chaos used to leave!! There have always been changes.
I think that Covid has lost it’s immediacy for many people, and sometimes it’s hard to keep saying the same things over and over…maybe after a bit of a break people will return in full vigour!? I really hope so….but until then I suppose we few will have to keep going and if someone, like me, is reading and hasn’t commented…please join us…..
I’ve happily signed up to make a small monthly donation. But I must say, although I’m sure I’ll get used to it, I prefer the old format of the site.
I’m missing all the comments as well …. and the information which was shared via links etc.
Give it time. Anything is better than nothing.
Good morning!
Do you really think these CCP nutjobs are going to meet their 2049 targets?
Well good morning to everyone who remain on here.
Thankfully the subscription will have stopped the likes of EF and fingal posting on here.
Let’s hope the comments sections pick up a bit.
Good morning Judy.
We can but hope. In the mean time, let’s make the best of it. It’s not all bad…
Good old “Titania McGrath! It must be getting hard to parody the woke mob these days…
Should be “Titania McGrath”!…
They entertain platinum violence?
sacrosong 2 fr. stan at DuckDuckGo (3:40)
Let’s have it right though. There was plenty of good will towards them when they got married. If that has changed now, it is entirely down to their attitude. They have opted out of the royal family, apparently because it is too much bother. That is their prerogative of course, but they can’t expect everything to be the same, and nor should anyone else, including these loony left republicans from the “United States”. (And fair play to Toby, he probably won’t ban me for this!).
For reference: Here’s the original article.
https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/racism-outshines-platinum-jubilee
But that’s really just a not very well written and fairly short flamebait. The one thing to remember here is that the people who are so keen on lecturing the world about its racism and savage, bloody and oppressive history live on continent whose native population was first decimated by their ancestors via savage, genocidal warfare and then forced into an Apartheid arrangement similar to the former Bantustans of South Africa, most of which took place after slavery was abolished in the USA. Obviously, criticizing the Americans of today for this is obviously as nonsensical as blaming the Brits of today for actual or perceived misdeeds which happened under British rule in the past.
The one thing to take away from this is that people like Nina Sharmer (the author of said flamebait) are simply sworn enemies of everything-European and should never be regarded as anything else. They have nothing positive to offer, to no one, not even to those on whose behalf they claim to be speaking. These are also just set pieces who must not step outside of the roles they’re supposed to play in the drama that’s supposed to be staged.
Allegedly…
Flipping disgrace that it was ever advertised in the first place. Given what we know, it is a minimum requirement for we here that Stabbit Jabbit’s “Conservative” party apologise for such human rights abuses and promise not to do it again. Instead, we are threatened with more of the same. Absolutely disgraceful.
The real question is not about the Deputy Director, but is there a Director in post, and why..?
There is indeed! Haroona Franklin is the Director.
The job advert has been pulled.
Savage has not said the job has been pulled.
Civil Service jobs and how they are filled:
The more senior positions have somebody ear-marked for them before they are advertised. The purpose of the advert is to show it was free and open to all comers but its just a box ticking exercise.
Whoever has been given the job may well have a different title but be employed to do the same “work.”
How did today’s “scheduled maintenance” go then?
The Covid Pass job advert has indeed been pulled the web – it was a pleasure to see Sajid Javid embarrassed, but I fear it is going to take a bit more that to stop the covert policy.
And it was a pleasure to see & hear what Mark Steyn said about it all last night on GBN. Apparently the offered salary for the job was £71K per year.
4 billion quid up in smoke…
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jun/10/4bn-of-nhs-covid-ppe-to-be-burned-as-it-is-unusable-says-committee-report
I would have thought that they’d want to hang onto this so we are prepared for the next plandemic.
I hope they’ll be capturing all of the carbon that is emitted from this useless junk.
It would have been quicker to just buy it and then dump it in the sea (where billions of useless face masks ended up)
But somebody turned a nice profit from the plebs’ taxes.
I seem to recall a few weeks back some guy in parliament laughing as he was saying it was £8.7bn worth of PPE to be burned.