Is This a U Turn?

The plan was to trial vaccine passports at football matches, the first intended victim being the FA cup final. However, now it seems not.

Boris Johnson has been accused of scrapping plans to introduce vaccine passports’ to go to the pub after the measure was missing from a list of high-profile pilot events including the FA Cup Final.

The football season-ending showpiece next month, its two preceding semi-finals and the League Cup Final are on the Events Research Programme which will examine ways of reopening mass-attendance venues safely.

But under guidance released by the Department of Digital, Culture Media and Sport today, Covid ‘certificates’ will not be used.

I suspect that Johnson, vacillating as usual, realised that there is a sufficient backlash among his own MPs along with the opposition would defeat him in parliament, so has backed down. Sort of.

Instead fans travelling to Wembley for the final on May 15 – which will take place with 21,000 spectators – will have to provide evidence of a recent negative Covid test and take tests afterwards.

Not exactly a massive difference, but still a welcome indication that some MPs have started to grow backbones.

The announcement prompted speculation that the Prime Minister has caved in to rebel Tory backbenchers, who had threatened to join Labour to vote down any law governing their introduction, on civil liberties grounds.

One rebel Tory MP told MailOnline today: ‘I think we’ve managed to take the wheels off this plan.’

On the one hand, yeah, this is a good thing. On the other, it’s got nothing to do with principles, which is the real issue here. Boris Johnson simply does not have any, nor do the charlatans advising hem.

13 Comments

  1. Johnson has finally realised that there is zero chance of Hancock delivering a defect-free system of Covid passports this side of eternity.

  2. Principles. Principles?
    You want principles?
    BoJo is of the Groucho Marx school of principles.

  3. If it’s not a U-turn this should put vaccine passports in mortuary:

    Royal College of Nursing against Mandatory Vaccination for Health Staff
    https://www.rcn.org.uk/about-us/our-influencing-work/position-statements/rcn-position-on-mandating-vaccination-for-health-and-social-care-staff

    “Top hospital trust abandons plan for mandatory Covid vaccination” – Chelsea and Westminster Hospital Foundation Trust is the first to say that it will not introduce a ‘No Jab, No Job’ policy, HSJ reports
    https://www.hsj.co.uk/exclusive-top-hospital-trust-abandons-plan-for-mandatory-covid-vaccination/7029894.article

    As for Jailer Johnson, he is an empty vassal who’s led by his dick

    @LR
    +1 All ministers, public sector should be personally liable for consequence of their decisions, not the taxpayers who are already liable for their own decisions

    • It is indeed a major issue that the ones taking decisions are not the ones affected by the consequences of said decisions.

      Penury, then hempen rope.

  4. “The plan was to trial vaccine passports at football matches”

    Foolball: meh, no thanks; but no ID Cards for anyone, anytime, anywhere

    Toby responds

    Yesterday, the Spectator published a piece by me setting out the case against linking the reopening of sports venues to vaccine passports, something I’m particularly concerned about because the one thing I’ve missed more than anything else in the past year is going to QPR games with my son Charlie

    Today, I’ve composed a more detailed version of that case…

    Please do read it in full and forward to your MP

    https://lockdownsceptics.org/lets-show-vaccine-passports-the-red-card/

    PS MPs:
    “Call for Evidence – COVID-19 Vaccine Certification”
    A consultation being run by a parliamentary committee set up to consider “potential ethical, legal and operational issues and the efficacy and appropriateness of a certificate system”

    Please do contribute by the deadline, May 3rd

    https://committees.parliament.uk/call-for-evidence/438/covid-19-vaccine-certification/

  5. Re: Lockdown 4 in October?
    https://www.longrider.co.uk/blog/2021/04/15/vaccine-passports-again/#comment-46310

    I’m not alone

    “Is Boris lauding lockdowns because he’s planning another for October? It certainly looks that way”
    The Prime Minister is “nudging us towards accepting another shutdown of the non-virtual economy in autumn”, writes Neil Clarke
    https://www.rt.com/op-ed/521179-boris-lauding-lockdowns-another-october/

    Also

    “Why has the Covid vaccine been relegated from ‘the best hope’ to ‘it helps’?”
    Writing for the Conservative Woman, Mark Pickles looks at how the message changed from “vaccination is essential” to “lockdown is essential”
    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/why-has-the-covid-vaccine-been-relegated-from-the-best-hope-to-it-helps/

    Australia, Canada, USA and more all reiterating same as WHO – vaccines are not freedom

    Which begs the question: Why take an experimental drug?

  6. “…still a welcome indication that some MPs have started to grow backbones.”

    Maybe. I wish I could believe it’s out of principle, rather than observation that people are starting to rebel and wanting to get out ahead of the trend to appear wise.

  7. The vaccine passport thing is moving in exactly the way that I thought it would, namely that the lack of interest in vaccines within the non-white public has meant that for once the woke obsession with racism is working in our favour.

    The NHS knows that if it forced all its staff to vaccinate or lose their jobs a) they would lose a lot of staff overnight as they are a huge employer of non-white staff, and b) those who were forced to leave would be all over the media calling them racists, as they would be disproportionately non-white. Same goes for the care home operators, and indeed anyone who employs a lot of non-white staff. They all know they face having to sack non-white staff en masse and can see the shitstorm heading their way. And companies who operate facilities with public entry face having to turn away non-white customers. Its all going to look like some sort of apartheid state, which it is, though ironically only the race element would ever be focussed on. The white people losing their jobs or being turned away from events would be invisible.

    Its also noticeable that many of the people who are sticking their heads above the parapet on this (who previously would have denounced covid and vaccine sceptics as ‘deniers’ etc) are using the ‘diverse’ codeword a lot – they can’t actually say they are only worried about black people, but thats what they mean. They wouldn’t care 2 hoots if it was white people who were refusing the vaccine, then they would be calling for ‘re-education’ camps.

    But like Churchill having to accept being on the same side as Stalin against an greater enemy, I guess we’ll have to welcome these former opponents into the camp……

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