Conspiracy theory

 Well we are in lockdown II and already the moaning has started. We here on Wirral have been doing all we could during stage 3 restrictions and that had seen infections reduce from just over 300 cases per 100,000 to just below 250, tha'ts a good 16% improvement. That effort has been mirrored across the Liverpool City Region and may be why Liverpool has been offered the opportunity to be the first City to have whole population testing. As I type, 2000 army personnel are arriving to co-ordinate the task.

Rather impishly, and to spark some motivation for people to take a test I suggested successful roll-out would allow Everton FC and Liverpool FC to be playing home games in front of crowds before many of their competitors. I thought that might be a high value gain for people in this football mad City, but how wrong was I?

You see, it's all a conspiracy as far as the 'in the street' scouser is concerned. 'They just want all our DNA, mate' is the line people will feed you' Matches us to crime scene's then, dunnit'. How sad a view people hold on a process which could see them return to normality in time for Christmas.

If you have nothing to hide, why woirry? So let's see what the take-up is and hope that this pioneering initiative supported by Mayor Anderson, does provide the light at the end of the tunnel. That would be the best Christmas present for all of us! 

Here comes The Sun

...or maybe not if a very ill advised campaign in Scouseland gathers any more momentum.

The Hillsborough tragedy has hung over the area like a storm cloud,  for many, many years as the families of the victims sought justice for their lost loved ones in light of allegations of  police mismanagement and cover-ups as well as stories of drunken behaviour and irresponsibility on the part of the fans.

That justice was achieved earlier this year when an inquest into the death of the victims indicated they had died as a result of said police actions and that the fans were in no way responsible for the downfall of their colleagues.

The aftermath of Hillsborough continues to have a knock-on effect though as there is now a concerted campaign emanating from the powerful Hillsborough relative group, to ban the sale of the daily newspaper, The Sun, which published derogatory articles relating to the behaviour of fans at Hillsborough, after the event. Their reports have been largely discredited but the after taste remains.

The potential blanket ban on the sale of The Sun would be welcomed by many. It would, however, be a real civil liberties issue. There are many people in the Scouseland conurbation who are not native to the area and who have regularly or occasionally purchased and read The Sun, there are newsagents and other outlets who choose to sell it as it revenue earner.

It has a very well respected racing section, it appeals to a certain demographic who enjoy the eccentric head-line writing and page 3 style journalism, who can forget the 'Phew What a Scorcher' headline when 90 degree temperatures hit the Country, or ' Gotcha' as the Admiral Belgrano Argentine battleship was sunk during the Falkland war?

If Mayor Joe Anderson and his colleagues do ban this publication it will be a sad day for a City which has worked so hard to recover from the cronyism of the Derek Hatton era. It will also go some way towards confirming the remarks of Boris Johnson in The Spectator in 2004.

So lets keep the democratic process, the freedom of the press and the ability of people to buy their periodical of choice and focus on real time problems which we would expect our elected representatives to address on our behalf. Come on Liverpool, you're better than this.

One person one vote....

I am fairly ambivalent to the result of the European referendum. I don't know if that is because of my age, or because I no longer live in the South East. Merseyside voted to stay, and as a Labour hotbed, that is no surprise. They follow the party line up here, but that dictated by Joe Anderson and Frank Field rather than Jeremy Corbyn. Usually a vote for the Conservatives is a wasted vote, but last Thursday the one person, one vote system saw a much higher voter turnout, and a significantly close vote. I have not heard much disappointment voiced on the Wirral.

I think it was apparent even during the renegotiation that David Cameron did not have the appetite to manage a Brexit, and that was confirmed by his early resignation notification. Bonking Boris stood to win whichever way things panned out, and the clever people he surrounds himself with are likely to earn their money in the coming months.

Farange is a fringe play in all this, but it is disappointing that racial vandalism has reared it's head in some of the immigrant dominated areas of the Country. The authorities should move swiftly to stamp that out.

Our poisoned dwarf North of the border is rattling her cage, but she must remember that a once in a lifetime independence referendum does not become a best of three, overnight. She should be reminded that if Alex Salmond had been successful, Scotland would have  been running cap in hand to Westminster as the slump in oil prices would have almost made the Country bankrupt.
I would love to be a fly on their wall when she meets Angela Merkel to request EU membership. "Run along now Nicola, there's a good girl, what did you say you had to offer?"

The biggest winners here will be the financial institutions who are already manipulating the markets to their best advantage, and the large legal firms who are wringing their hands in expectation of the large fees to be charged going forward.

It's been four days now since the vote....the UK political process, and Labour in particular, have taken a real battering, and the EU have had a wake up call. People were fed up with the lack of dynamism at home and the increase in restrictions imposed from abroad. Those who voted to join a Common Market in 1975 did not want it to develop into a political superpower and have had a chance to make their views known. Now it's time for our elected representatives to earn their corn and plot a way towards a new Great Britain which shows leadership, originality and solidarity while still supporting Europe through tried and tested alliances.

All bumpy roads get resurfaced eventually.