[tomtom]

My gut feeling is that Burnham has thrown a lot of people under the bus in a bid to score some political points (mayoral elections are next May).

I doubt many round GM will share your gut instincts.

Interestingly the national media have not (yet) castigated Burnham as I might have expected. I was expecting a full Derek Hatton job on him.

[spidermonkey09]

My gut feeling is that Burnham has thrown a lot of people under the bus in a bid to score some political points (mayoral elections are next May). But to really understand whether that stacks up I think we need to know what the money is intended for. Obviously it can't be to pay people who's business is affected, because £60m is less than fuck all in a place like GM. Does anybody know or have a link?

What's happening in parliament on Thursday? Bill and debate to enact the restrictions?

Bloody hell Will, that's your first instinct?

I don't know what the 60m is specifically for and I don't doubt that there is some political mileage in this, but Burnham donates 15% of his mayoral salary to homelessness charities and has demonstrated his principles over a long career. On the other side, we have what exactly? The only principle this government is steering by is its dogmatic obsession with needlessly making peoples lives more difficult than they need to be. They spunked away 12 billion on a non functional test and trace system but can't top people's salary up to 80%? They're a disgrace.

 There is no redeeming aspect of this government's negotiation on this. 5m quid is fuck all to them, but it's quite a lot in the context of topping up minimum wage salaries.

[Paul B]

Will, you do know there was cross party unilateral objection to T3 restrictions just last week?

This isn't simply just about Burnham (who received the backing of Liverpool after they realised they'd been shafted having been 'told' when others were negotiating).

[teestub]

Will I’ve got to say your gut feelings smell like shit!

[Will Hunt]

It was bleeding obvious that there was going to be a second wave combined with the usual winter pressures. It should have been planned for. It shouldn't have had to start before people started to come up with the three tier approach (which SAGE clearly don't have faith in). There should be an adequate financial provision for those whose jobs are affected or who have to temporarily close their businesses. It shouldn't be down to regional leaders to hash out an agreement such that Mancs might end up with a better or worse deal than Scousers. As more and more regions go into Tier 3 the workload will become unmanageable so the process drags out and regional inconsistency emerges. And that negotiating time is precious time lost when what we know about anti-COVID measures is that they need to be enacted rapidly. The proposed help fund seems incredibly small. £60m dropped into the Greater Manchester area is a fraction of fuck all.

That much is on the government, who are not only cruel but also feckless in their cruelty. Rest assured, I vote against them at every opportunity.

What's on Burnham (who I am normally a fan of, and who I haven't made up my mind out about this) is that he was asked to go into Tier 3 restrictions and it is now a week later and that still hasn't happened. He is right to challenge the government - it is his duty to protect the interests of his citizens - but by the same token he needs to consider their health and there will, without doubt, be a lot of people in Manchester who will become acutely or chronically unwell and will die because the restrictions have been delayed. What's more, this has now become (in the eyes of many) an issue of the North vs Whitehall as opposed to a public health measure. I expect there will be a lot of non-compliance in Manchester in defiance of the government (a bloke walked into the charity shop where my mother volunteers in Liverpool and said he wasn't wearing a mask because "I'm not doing anything the government tell me"). Tier 3 is of limited enough effect; who knows how ineffective it might be with poor compliance?

That's why it's important to understand what exactly was on the table and what that might be used for. Without that information we can't really understand whether Burnham's demands were worth the increased risk to the population. If it were to come down to a quibble over £5m (I doubt it did) then it should end him. Even the difference of £60m is paltry. It's hard to express just how microscopic that is in the context of local spending in the area. The annual spend of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (the bit that Burnham leads) is around £1.3 billion. Then there's the Manchester City Council which has an annual spend of around £1.8 billion - that is just one of the ten councils in the Combined Authority area.

[tomtom]

Still smells...

Interesting again that none of tomorrows papers are ‘taking Boris side” here. Surprising.

The tiers system lost most of its credibility to me when it became apparent you could do side deals on what was in or out - or how much ££ you could get by toadying up/not causing a fuss.

Do some more reading Will - there’s plenty about what was on the table. About how GM came to the meeting with costed plans and the government had nothing. No reason or calculation for the govt offer - nothing ever given on paper by Westminster.

My crystal ball says: Full lockdown by mid November. Probably taking out Xmas & new year...

[Will Hunt]

Do some more reading Will - there’s plenty about what was on the table. About how GM came to the meeting with costed plans and the government had nothing. No reason or calculation for the govt offer - nothing ever given on paper by Westminster.

Gizza link? This is what I google but stuff was either paywalled or just talking vaguely about £5/60m.

[galpinos]

I found Hancock's comments interesting, that they will negotiate with each borough separately. The fact Burnham was negotiating on behalf of the GM councils did not go down well, hence Leese's comment in the big press conference that they are going to try to "pick off" individual councils.

Will, Andy Burnham was presenting and negotiating for the combined costed plan put together by the individual GM councils which came to £90m. I believe £65m was their absolute bottom figure. In the context of the other "recent" deals:

Liverpool: £44million, 1.5million people

Lancashire £42million, 1.5million people

Greater Manchester: £22 million, 2.8 million people

Personally, I do wonder whether they are regretting the amount given to Liverpool as they started to realise a lot more areas are going into tier 3, were tied to an ok deal with Lancashire as it's a Tory Council but wanted to set a firmer tone with GM. Combine that with the fact that Burnham, the man who lost to Milliband and Corbyn, who was deemed too vanilla and boring for Westminster and who's career had "run its course", is suddenly looking statesman like and is the new Messiah compared to everyone in the Cabinet, and they are panicking. Surely even the Tories can see how bad it looks when you compare Jenrick sneering down his nose about cosy funding deals with colleagues* on the BBC and Burnham talking with sense and passion and finding out about the governments decision via Twitter.

*£25 million from the Towns fund for Newark anyone? If I sign off your bid, will you sign off mine?

[galpinos]

Will, re your, “quibble over £5m” comment, this was Burnham’s response:

https://twitter.com/beardedgenius/status/1318580467151548422?s=21

[spidermonkey09]

It was bleeding obvious that there was going to be a second wave combined with the usual winter pressures. It should have been planned for. It shouldn't have had to start before people started to come up with the three tier approach (which SAGE clearly don't have faith in). There should be an adequate financial provision for those whose jobs are affected or who have to temporarily close their businesses. It shouldn't be down to regional leaders to hash out an agreement such that Mancs might end up with a better or worse deal than Scousers. As more and more regions go into Tier 3 the workload will become unmanageable so the process drags out and regional inconsistency emerges. And that negotiating time is precious time lost when what we know about anti-COVID measures is that they need to be enacted rapidly. The proposed help fund seems incredibly small. £60m dropped into the Greater Manchester area is a fraction of fuck all.

That much is on the government, who are not only cruel but also feckless in their cruelty. Rest assured, I vote against them at every opportunity.

What's on Burnham (who I am normally a fan of, and who I haven't made up my mind out about this) is that he was asked to go into Tier 3 restrictions and it is now a week later and that still hasn't happened. He is right to challenge the government - it is his duty to protect the interests of his citizens - but by the same token he needs to consider their health and there will, without doubt, be a lot of people in Manchester who will become acutely or chronically unwell and will die because the restrictions have been delayed. What's more, this has now become (in the eyes of many) an issue of the North vs Whitehall as opposed to a public health measure. I expect there will be a lot of non-compliance in Manchester in defiance of the government (a bloke walked into the charity shop where my mother volunteers in Liverpool and said he wasn't wearing a mask because "I'm not doing anything the government tell me"). Tier 3 is of limited enough effect; who knows how ineffective it might be with poor compliance?

That's why it's important to understand what exactly was on the table and what that might be used for. Without that information we can't really understand whether Burnham's demands were worth the increased risk to the population. If it were to come down to a quibble over £5m (I doubt it did) then it should end him. Even the difference of £60m is paltry. It's hard to express just how microscopic that is in the context of local spending in the area. The annual spend of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (the bit that Burnham leads) is around £1.3 billion. Then there's the Manchester City Council which has an annual spend of around £1.8 billion - that is just one of the ten councils in the Combined Authority area.

I still fundamentally disagree with your premise that quibbling over £5m somehow reflects worse on Burnham than the government. If its such a piddling amount then its the government who should have wound their neck in and stumped up for the sake of compliance and public health, rather than flouncing out and briefing the media. You're applying higher standards to local leaders than you are to government; reading between the lines your argument seems to be 'this government are shit and cruel, but instead of challenging their shitty behaviour Manchester should simply take the paltry money on the table as its all they are going to get anyway.' You might be right from a pure politics perspective (although I'm not convinced) but if a local leader doesn't stand up for their constituents then there is no point to them. By contrast, Sadiq Khan (who is obviously still the best person for the job regardless of this criticism) has rolled over and had his tummy tickled by the government, who have since doubled down and threatened to take control of TfL. It makes perfect sense to me that Burnham has stuck to his guns.

Whats interesting is that there seems to be significant cut through and there is no massive backlash against Burnham, because they know he has a point. Theres a few Tory MPs briefing against him but not brave enough to go on the record because they are swimming against the political tide. https://twitter.com/alexwickham/status/1318805466995097600

[petejh]

Will, Andy Burnham was presenting and negotiating for the combined costed plan put together by the individual GM councils which came to £90m. I believe £65m was their absolute bottom figure. In the context of the other "recent" deals:

Liverpool: £44million, 1.5million people

Lancashire £42million, 1.5million people

Greater Manchester: £22 million, 2.8 million people

So, is anybody going to post the true facts about the figure offered then? It was on newsnight last night.
Or is the point of this to make arguments based on incorrect assumptions?

[tomtom]

I think part of the issue here Pete is there is nothing on paper from the govt. Jenkins says one thing, Boris then can’t answer the question (asked 5 times) in his presser and Hancock is equally opaque on ££ in parliament after.

If there were a formula that the govt were using (population or breakdown of businesses/people affected) then this would be a lot clearer. But there isn’t.

[gme]

Will, Andy Burnham was presenting and negotiating for the combined costed plan put together by the individual GM councils which came to £90m. I believe £65m was their absolute bottom figure. In the context of the other "recent" deals:

Liverpool: £44million, 1.5million people

Lancashire £42million, 1.5million people

Greater Manchester: £22 million, 2.8 million people

So, is anybody going to post the true facts about the figure offered then? It was on newsnight last night.
Or is the point of this to make arguments based on incorrect assumptions?

I believe 60 million is still on offer and what they will end up getting. However if the above figures are correct for merseyside and Lancs this sworks out at less per person.

Not sure how its calculated but maybe its down to people working in the affected sectors.

Burnham did what he had to do as this argument is all about politics after all and little to do with controlling the virus.

[petejh]

The figures were put up in black and white on newsnight last night. They aren’t the figures people are using here.

To be fair, the media seem to be revelling in providing opaque explanations of the true figure, almost as if designed to provoke outcry.. and it’s easy to get the wrong idea.

Do I need to put up the correct figure, or is one of you making arguments on false info going to fact check yourself?

[teestub]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54624575

This says £22m for ‘enforcement’ and test and trace, with the offer of £60m for business support ‘still on the table’. On a brief search I couldn’t find whether the figures for Liverpool and Lance were a combined sum for these two things it just for business support.

[tomtom]

Pete - you're sounding a bit like a FAKE NEWS screaming survivalist with a MAGA hat on there... :D

AFAIK the confusion is - because no-one knows! I watched Burnham and Johnsons presser last night - and thats where I got my figures from. Nothing on the BBC about Newsnights figures (wherever they came from ). Stubbs post above shows its as clear as mud...

As I said 20 min ago....

I think part of the issue here Pete is there is nothing on paper from the govt. Jenkins says one thing, Boris then can’t answer the question (asked 5 times) in his presser and Hancock is equally opaque on ££ in parliament after.

If there were a formula that the govt were using (population or breakdown of businesses/people affected) then this would be a lot clearer. But there isn’t.

[mrjonathanr]

Burnham did what he had to do as this argument is all about politics after all and little to do with controlling the virus.

What does that mean Gav? If you are saying he is just posturing for political advantage, I do not agree.

I grew up on free school meals. The idea of cutting 30% of the budget for people on the breadline is disgusting. I do not doubt that he desperately wants funding to support the people on the lowest wages, many of whom are already struggling with food, heating and rent, to not be plunged into crisis.

In comparison, the no-expense-spared mentality of pouring public money into failing private business is ruining the pandemic response. To insult to injury, that is why these semi-lockdowns are imposed; they are a crisis measure because TTTI has failed.

Have a read of George Monbiot’s article in the Guardian today. There is a lot that is not new, but pulled together in one place it is uncomfortable reading. I have held his final conclusion for some time now. It’s the only rational reading of events.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/oct/21/government-covid-contracts-britain-nhs-corporate-executives-test-and-trace

Edit ‘do not’ missing

[tomtom]

Have a read of George Monbiot’s article in the Guardian today. There is a lot that is not new, but pulled together in one place it is uncomfortable reading. I have held his final conclusion for some time now. It’s the only rational reading of events.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/oct/21/government-covid-contracts-britain-nhs-corporate-executives-test-and-trace

God I hate reading Monbiot...

But the last page and a half of that are quite striking - where he pretty much just puts down the links beween the people and the companies and the government....

[galpinos]

Will, Andy Burnham was presenting and negotiating for the combined costed plan put together by the individual GM councils which came to £90m. I believe £65m was their absolute bottom figure. In the context of the other "recent" deals:

Liverpool: £44million, 1.5million people

Lancashire £42million, 1.5million people

Greater Manchester: £22 million, 2.8 million people

So, is anybody going to post the true facts about the figure offered then? It was on newsnight last night.
Or is the point of this to make arguments based on incorrect assumptions?

I think my numbers are correct? They asked for £90m, absolute min was £65? Government wouldn’t go above £60m, Burnham said he’d have to take it back to the council leaders, government pulled the deal?

Government then announced via social media that there was £22m available and the rest had been withdrawn and Hancock said he would only deal with individual councils. They then rolled back on that and said the £60m is still on the table.

The numbers I posted above with populations were reflective of where we were when the plug was pulled. If the government had a consistent line of communication and weren’t briefing all and sundry differing “facts”, we wouldn’t be arguing over them.

[mrjonathanr]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54624575

This says £22m for ‘enforcement’ and test and trace, with the offer of £60m for business support ‘still on the table’. On a brief search I couldn’t find whether the figures for Liverpool and Lance were a combined sum for these two things it just for business support.

Sean Fielding repeatedly insisted on Newsnight he needed to see the figure in writing, and had not yet. In other words, he did not trust the statement made by Hancock.

There are 10 councils in GM. I suspect that Jenrick will now embark on side deals with individual councils to undermine Burnham and make a saving on his nominal £60m budget. And why is the extra funding for track and trace even a figure? It should not be needed, because there ought to be an effective local system, but if it is needed surely it is basic firefighting which is the government’s fundamental duty of care to the public anyway? Not to mention good economic sense to prevent the loss of revenue from damaged local economies.

We are governed by a campaign group which appears to think the virus will be amenable to the divide and rule tactics that got it into power.

One place Jenrick might find £5m would be the £25M hardship fund given to his Newark constituency, 270th least deprived in the country. https://inews.co.uk/news/robert-jenrick-probe-towns-fund-constituency-711476

[tomtom]

Sheffield and S Yorks going into T3 on Saturday night. https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-sheffield-city-region-gets-tougher-restrictions-as-1-8-million-people-head-for-tier-3-12109984

Meanwhile Gyms can open now in Liverpool...

[petejh]

So no-one’s interested in fact checking themselves then?

TT?
Teestub?
Galpinos?
Jonathanr?
Spider?
GME?


No-one? The figures were detailed in black and white on newsnight. Is one of you going to realise your facts are wrong?

[Bonjoy]

Looking from the sidelines on this debate it looks like at this point in time there are no facts regards the GM figure beyond the £22m, just vague and contradictory hearsay. I don't care which side tells me different but I'd be interested to hear if this impression is wrong. That said "still on the table" is next to utterly meaningless, I think we can all agree on that much.

[tomtom]

So no-one’s interested in fact checking themselves then?

TT?
Teestub?
Galpinos?
Jonathanr?
Spider?
GME?


No-one?

As Bonjoy mentions - and for the 3rd time from me Pete... it appears there are no facts here. Just several accounts (some of which tally).

I am, however, hopeful I am wrong and waiting eagerly for you to post up your fact checked figures on this. Then we will all know definitively. Hopefully.

[spidermonkey09]

Go on then Pete, I can tell you're itching to do it and prove how clever you are.

The £22m is separate to the £60m is the only thing I'd want to add before you enlighten us all...