People without face masks pack the streets in a crowded Broadway Market this afternoon, as the second national lockdown continues
Londoners flocked to Broadway Market for drinks and food this afternoon, despite the new guidance to stay at home as much as possible.
People were pictured queuing up for pints outside street food restaurants and packing the streets, with many not wearing face masks.
Comment: In England, unlike other countries in Europe, face masks are not mandatory outside.
Takeaway alcohol were originally going to be banned under the new lockdown restrictions but a Government U-turn allowed pubs, bars and hospitality venues to serve them.
Groups of young people socialise and drink at the viewing point on the top of Parliament Hill in Hampstead Heath, London, today
Comment: People aren't behaving as though they're in the midst of the 'second wave' of a 'pandemic', because they aren't.
Professor Tim Spector, who leads the Covid Symptom Study app aiming to track the spread of Covid-19 in the UK, confirmed that there were 'positive signs' the country has 'passed the peak of the second wave'.
Parks remained bustling today, with runners, walkers and cyclists seen at Bridgewater Canal in Manchester this morning, as people can exercise and socialise in public spaces with their household or one other person.
Costco in Watford, Hertfordshire, was also heaving with customers, who were spotted pushing trolleys piled high with toilet rolls, booze and water bottles.
And police were seen walking past the busy Olympic Studios Cafe and Bar in Barnes, London, today as revellers enjoyed drinks outside the pub.
Pubs in north London also opened for business today, with The Princess of Wales in Primrose Hill and The Draft House in Camden Town serving drinks to customers.
People in Borough Market took advantage of the loophole allowing restaurants and pubs to serve takeaway drinks if they are pre-ordered this afternoon.
Comment: When the rules being enforced are nonsense, people, eventually, find a way.
The images come amid warnings that the country needed 'dramatic action' to reduce Covid-19 transmission, despite the Government's 'ghastly' presentation of data to justify the latest lockdown.
Comment: Despite the governments best 'ghastly' efforts to scare people, clearly people are suffering from 'fear fatigue' - particularly because their lived experience proves to them there's no danger - and they just want to get on with their lives.
Today's case numbers saw a rise of just 3,045 on last Saturday's total of 21,915.
A further 413 people have died after testing positive for the virus, official figures released today have revealed, bringing the UK's total death toll during the pandemic to 48,888.
Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter said it would not be sustainable for the health service to deal with the levels of coronavirus cases and hospitalisations without tougher measures than those imposed under the three-tier system.
Comment: There are many other experts saying the opposite.
The statistician and chair of the Winton Centre for risk and evidence communication at the University of Cambridge told BBC Radio 4's Today Programme: 'If this is going to go down, it is going to go down very slowly unless some dramatic action is taken, which has been taken.'
Meanwhile, hundreds of people have been tested as part of a pilot mass coronavirus testing programme in Liverpool, with queues outside new test centres.
The armed forces have been brought in to the city to help deliver the scheme, which uses lateral flow tests to deliver results in under an hour for people who are not showing symptoms of the virus.
Comment: In a chilling precedent the army have been deployed to test children at a school without parental consent.
Mr Johnson has said the rapid testing pilot could be a 'real way forward through the crisis'.
In another day of coronavirus news:
- Britain records 24,957 new coronavirus cases - just 14% up on last week - and 413 new deaths bringing total to 48,888
- Top scientists have suggested that the UK's second wave of coronavirus has already peaked;
- Data published yesterday revealed Covid-19 infection rates were already falling across the country before ministers lost their nerve and ordered a second lockdown;
- Cities have been left deserted across England on the first weekend of Covid-19 lockdown restrictions - but beauty spots are crammed;
- Sandringham insider said staff have been told 'not to expect [the Royal family] back for Christmas' for the first time in 33 years;
- Newly-released official documents suggest that anyone spending time with family members from outside their own household at Christmas may be required to self-isolate for two weeks afterwards.
Comment: It's clear to everyone that lockdowns are destroying people's livelihoods so how is it possible that the government didn't know 'infection rates were falling'? They could have reversed their decision to lockdown, but they didn't.
But health experts said plans to screen the population of Liverpool were not fit for purpose.
Sir David said: 'The point is we are getting about 20-25,000 positive tests a day, that feeds through to about 1,500 hospitalisations a day, about 250-300 deaths a day and these are broadly stable but going up a bit - the deaths in hospitals and hospitalisations are going up slowly - and we are coming into winter.
'Those sorts of levels, even if they stay very stable and below the first peak of the virus, unless they start dropping, we are stuck with those for months and it seems to me and others that that's not going to be sustainable in terms of what the health service can deal with.'
Comment: Government claims of coronavirus overwhelming the NHS are easily refuted by the facts on the ground.
A group of academics said the potential for 'harmful diversion of resources and public money is vast', and warned the half-a-billion-pound project could be a 'costly failure'.
Comment: The UK's £10 BILLION track and trace project was a failure too. Maybe it will be incompetence that finally defeats tyranny.
The Government is expected to announce on Saturday that the blanket provisions allowing all pubs in England to serve takeaway food and drink will be extended, while Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club and The Lowry in Salford are among eight cultural organisations and venues which will benefit from the latest round of coronavirus funding.
New data shows the rate of infections across England and Wales appears to be slowing down.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said an estimated 618,700 people in England - one in 90 - had Covid-19 between October 25 and 31, up from 568,100 the week before.
The Government and its scientific advisers were lambasted yesterday for using 'dodgy data' to justify a devastating second lockdown, with Tory MPs warning SAGE's doomsday predictions had echoes of the controversial dossier that sent Britain to war with Iraq.
It emerged a graph brandished at a press conference by Professors Doom and Gloom that claimed England could see up to 1,500 deaths a day by December had been secretly toned down 'after an error was found' with the data.
The prediction caused widespread alarm because, if true, it would dwarf the 1,000 daily deaths recorded during the peak of the first wave in April.
SAGE's forecast for hospital admissions was also quietly revised from 9,000 by early December to 6,190.
The Government faced a stern rebuke from the UK Statistics Authority this week over its use of data.
Boris Johnson sent security experts to the homes of Cabinet Ministers to examine their personal mobile phones as part of a major leak inquiry.
Comment: If this isn't a publicity stunt, one wonders what other information the government was able to glean from ministers phones.
Senior figures, including Matt Hancock and Michael Gove, were told to surrender their phones as No10 hunted for the mole whose secret briefings forced the Prime Minister to make an early announcement of the new lockdown.
In the bid to unmask the 'chatty rat', as Government sources have dubbed in the Cabinet.
The Ministers' personal messages were examined under the investigation, ordered by a furious Mr Johnson after he was rushed into announcing the English lockdown at a hastily convened press conference last Saturday.
Boris Johnson sent security experts to the homes of Cabinet Ministers to examine their personal mobile phones as part of a major leak inquiry
Hawks believe that pro-lockdown 'doves' leaked details of the so-called 'quad' meeting of Johnson, Sunak, Gove and Hancock the previous day to stop the Prime Minister from watering down the shutdown plans.
It also led to the rushed presentation of dubious predictions, with the projection of up to 4,000 Covid deaths a day by Christmas comprehensively discredited in the days after it was revealed to millions of television viewers.
Last night, Health Secretary Mr Hancock categorically denied any involvement in the leak, but declined to comment on the investigation.
Mr Gove's allies said the Cabinet Office Minister and his advisers were happy to hand over their phones because they had 'nothing to hide'. Anti-lockdown Tory rebels, led by former party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith, called for the mole to apologise personally to the Commons if caught.
Comment: Scandals in politics in recent years shows that the probability that some of them had something to hide is highly likely.
The astonishing development came as:
- Some of the Tory rebels talked privately about sending letters to Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the backbench 1922 Committee, to try to trigger a leadership contest if Mr Johnson extends the lockdown beyond the promised end date of December 2;
- The coronavirus death toll rose by 413, the highest Saturday increase since May;
- The number of new infections was 24,957 - a rise of just 3,045 on last Saturday's total.
- Top scientists suggested that the second wave had peaked;
- Ministers plan to supply Vitamin D tablets to more than two million vulnerable people - including care home residents and those whose medical conditions mean they have to shield - over the winter amid growing evidence that it can make Covid symptoms less severe;
- The NHS stepped up preparations to roll out the Covid vaccine by early December, with one in five GP surgeries tasked with administering it;
- Britain imposed a ban on non-UK citizens coming in from Denmark amid concerns over a new coronavirus strain that has spread there from mink to humans, infecting 12 people and leading to a cull of 17million animals.
Mr Hancock is understood to have been subjected to a similar interrogation after a furious Mr Johnson ordered Cabinet Secretary Simon Case to set up the probe.
Lockdown hawks say that Mr Johnson had intended to spend last weekend studying the most recent and accurate data - and discussing it with the rest of the Cabinet - before deciding whether to extend his system of tiered, regional restrictions instead.
Supporters of the lockdown dispute this, and insist that the 'rat' merely accelerated the announcement of an inevitable decision.
Comment: There's evidence to show that the government knew weeks in advance they were going to enforce the first lockdown, and it's likely the situation with the second national lockdown was no different.
Mr Johnson sent a WhatsApp message to Tory MPs after the leak to say: 'Folks - so sorry that you've had to hear about all this from the newspapers.'
Senior Minister Michael Gove (left) and Health Secretary Matt Hancock were both quizzed forensically by Government security specialist
Meanwhile, a source told The Mail on Sunday last week: 'Our rat, whoever it is, seems to be very chatty at the moment.' Last Saturday evening, as the investigators swung into action, Mr Hancock phoned Mr Sunak to deny being the source of the leak - and to ask Mr Sunak if he was making that accusation. Mr Sunak denied that he was doing so.
Sir Iain Duncan Smith blamed the leaker for 'bouncing' Mr Johnson into the decision, saying: 'What happened just over a week ago was an outrageous contempt of the Commons and the British people on an issue of the utmost importance to the country.
'If it turns out to be a Minister, they should of course be forced to apologise to the Commons and then be sacked.
'But if it's an official, they should be made to come to the bar of the House and face the anger of MPs and most of all of the Speaker.
'What they did was appalling because they bounced the Government into taking their action'.
What are the rules for ordering takeaway alcohol during lockdown 2.0?
The Government U-turned on its restrictions surrounding the sale of alcohol when it introduced the second lockdown on Thursday, allowing drinks to be sold if they are pre-ordered.
When the second countrywide lockdown was announced last Saturday, topline guidance from the Government said while takeaway food would still be permitted, alcohol takeaways were set to be outlawed.
But it reversed course on Tuesday, saying alcohol takeaways would be allowed but must be ordered in advance, online or by phone or post, before being collected.
Customers cannot enter a pub, bar or restaurant to collect alcohol.
They are also not allowed to drink their takeouts near to the venue or in a seated outdoor area on the premises
They are the people who only get pleasure in the form of schadenfreude.
R..C.