Covid - coming out of Lockdown 3 - no politics, less opinion and more facts and information.

[Nearholmer]

To my limited observation (one 2hr trip on a lightly loaded train last week, first since Feb 2020), backed-up by plenty of experience interacting with customers on very busy stations, enforcing mask-wearing on trains is a practical impossibility for a host of reasons, many of them mentioned by Hobby.

What I found weird was that the c20% ‘breachers’ on that train were a sort of random selection of the old, the young, men and women, of no obvious “type”. Several cases of two people travelling together who one might eyeball as ‘the same sort of person’, but one clearly a staunch masker, and the other couldn’t care less.
 

The only effective tool is social pressure, people glaring and tutting at flouters, and that only works with people who actually have consciences, and are susceptible to social pressure - some simply don’t and/or aren’t. 

So, the only question in my mind is whether social pressure will be more effective with or without the law behind it. I’m not totally sure, but I think that having the law there legitimises the social pressure, emboldens the tutters and glarers, and if push comes to shove (which I imagine it could between some individuals) it makes very clear who has the moral high ground.

 

I do think the message could be pushed a bit more effectively by operators though. The present tone is all very polite and recessive, whereas something hard-hitting, along the lines “Don’t be selfish: wear a face-covering, unless you really can’t.” might get through to a further couple of percent. If done well, with a bit of humour, like the WW2 “squander-bug” and “careless talk” posters, it needn’t be offensive to those who are doing the right thing.

 

Now the grumpy old bloke bit: the trouble is partly that forty years of selfish-consumerist, me, me, me culture has rather stripped away the vestiges of social-conscience that lingered for several decades after WW2, so getting people to do things for their fellows ain’t simple. A lot of people do have social consciences, but a lot don’t.

[hayfield]

Sainsbury's to encourage mask-wearing from Monday

 

Simply businesses will react to customer demand, if they feel its in their interest financially then they will act. But there will be cases where some will not want to comply, the safest and quickest action is to allow them to carry on without a mask. Lets face it its been going on when it has been mandatory to wear a mask.

 

Most folk will be happy to wear a mask purely for the benefit of others, but the usual suspects wont give a dam.  To be quite honest I am of a persuasion ( and in a position) to standing back at a distance and watch the virus rip through those who refuse to act responsibly.  I feel sorry for those who do not have this choice 

[bourneagain]

35 minutes ago, alastairq said:

When I drove buses [decades ago, now] If I was confronted by a passenger who obviously was not going to comply with the Conditions of CArriage, then, very early on in the confrontation I would get them to voluntarily give me their names & addresses....usually with the bribe that the company might have something to offer them?

Once one had some relevant details, one could then leave it up to the Company to literally, drop them in it. But I would not suggest that would be the outcome to the person themselves.....

The company employed individuals to deal with transgressions of this nature.  I would not put myself at the pointed end of the argument..not on my wages!

 

Things got better when we got radios that actually worked...and we could summon Company Inspectors etc, to join the bus further up the route. En masse, sometimes.

I believe that the majority of buses now have CCTV systems installed to record such incidents with disruptive passengers and with the most serious incidents the driver would contact the police direct to intervene. Not many drivers would nowadays get personally get involved in these situations, especially in the larger inner-city areas where the outcome could end with a tragic result.    

[Hobby]

We really only get the BTP involved as a last resort, timekeeping is more important than, for instance, getting them to sort out a non-mask wearer, an all out fight is OK though, we'd get them for that... But as I said earlier the BTP are few and far between and the local police don't really want to know as it's not under their jurisdiction... I've nearly had one stand up row about masks due to a chap challenging another passenger, who, I must say, I would have accepted as being in the "I can't wear one" category, I diffused it by chatting to the unmasked and suggesting he got a lanyard like I was wearing... 

[alastairq]

5 minutes ago, Hobby said:

suggesting he got a lanyard like I was wearing... 

  ''Communication  cord?'' 

[Zero Gravitas]

1 hour ago, beast66606 said:

 

Nowadays you could be prosecuted - or the company could - for DPDR violations, you can't obtain personal information without explaining exactly what it is for and to what purpose it will be used and you can't lie to obtain said information and then use it for other reasons*, especially as until they are found guilty of anything they are innocent and you aren't law enforcement. Do that to someone who has a genuine medical reason and you'll be in even deeper do do, you can add discrimination.  (Not saying I disagree with your sentiments or actions by the way)

 

* Can you guess who's just completed his annual training on DPDR

 

You had training on Depersonalisation-Derealisation Disorder?

 

if however, you had training on the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), then that would make more sense; although your training department are probably currently holding their heads in their hands...

[The Stationmaster]

It is certainly going to get very confusing on trains.  The rail operator's group says they won't make mask wearing mandatory but it will be mandatory in wales (I don't know about Scotland) and it will also be mandatory on TfL apparently.  So we now get this sort of thing - starting from, say, Reading for Cardiff (other places available) you are not required to wear a mask i until you area approximately halfway through the Severn Tunnel, at which point it becomes mandatory to wear a mask.  if you travel east from reading o na stopping train you won't be required to wear a mask on a GW train but you will be required to wear one if you have the misfortune (in all other respects) to select a Crossrail train.

If you happen to take a train from, say, Newport to Chester via the North & West line there are two parts of the route where mask wearing will be mandatory and two where it is down to your common sense (or lack of).  

 

It begins to sound rather like the changing of armbands in 'The Dirty Dozen' as 'on masks' will no doubt be required to be announced over train PA systems as they crisscross the border between England and Wales

 

Quite how any of the mandatory requirements could be enforced any more effectively than they have been thus far is impossible to say but being required to wear a mask one minute and it not mattering the next when nothing around you has changed except the position of the train you are on becomes Kafkaesque to say the very least.  For myself I remain strongly in favour of mask wearing in indoor spaces including shops and public transport but observation indicates that many people don't share that view espexially where it is not enforced (as it is in many shops).

 

 

[Ian Hargrave]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

To my limited observation (one 2hr trip on a lightly loaded train last week, first since Feb 2020), backed-up by plenty of experience interacting with customers on very busy stations, enforcing mask-wearing on trains is a practical impossibility for a host of reasons, many of them mentioned by Hobby.

What I found weird was that the c20% ‘breachers’ on that train were a sort of random selection of the old, the young, men and women, of no obvious “type”. Several cases of two people travelling together who one might eyeball as ‘the same sort of person’, but one clearly a staunch masker, and the other couldn’t care less.
 

The only effective tool is social pressure, people glaring and tutting at flouters, and that only works with people who actually have consciences, and are susceptible to social pressure - some simply don’t and/or aren’t. 

So, the only question in my mind is whether social pressure will be more effective with or without the law behind it. I’m not totally sure, but I think that having the law there legitimises the social pressure, emboldens the tutters and glarers, and if push comes to shove (which I imagine it could between some individuals) it makes very clear who has the moral high ground.

 

I do think the message could be pushed a bit more effectively by operators though. The present tone is all very polite and recessive, whereas something hard-hitting, along the lines “Don’t be selfish: wear a face-covering, unless you really can’t.” might get through to a further couple of percent. If done well, with a bit of humour, like the WW2 “squander-bug” and “careless talk” posters, it needn’t be offensive to those who are doing the right thing.

 

Now the grumpy old bloke bit: the trouble is partly that forty years of selfish-consumerist, me, me, me culture has rather stripped away the vestiges of social-conscience that lingered for several decades after WW2, so getting people to do things for their fellows ain’t simple. A lot of people do have social consciences, but a lot don’t.

And an observation from an even older and probably grumpier bloke . I’ve travelled over the last few weeks with 3 different TOC’s and each appears to be approaching social distancing and mask wearing in different ways.

XC on journeys to Newcastle using a combination 220/221 Voyager units encourage pre booking and enforce a policy of both masks and inside seating only. Thus far I have witnessed no unpleasant altercations. On a journey from Crewe to Lime Street with LNWR …2X 350 in multiple…the train was full and there was no social distancing.Wearing of masks was in general adhered to…one or two weren’t 

.No visible presence of train guard/ crew which was understandable in the light of the nature of the service and the overcrowding. On arrival at Lime Street the guard apologised for this via p/a and added that he’d reported this to hq but added that in any case adding a third unit to overcome this  would be impossible .Both Winsford and Hartford platforms cannot accommodate a12 car train in any case.

 

  Returning the following morning from Lime Street with Avanti WC 390 was a much more comfortable affair but the difference between this and XC Voyagers is that aisle seating is allowed. There was no overcrowding.

 

   Social conscience ? That’s a difficult one. Both wartime and postwar Britain were ages of austerity when you got what you were given and were thankful for it though to hanker for those as the good old days is a mistake.They weren’t.  I think it’s a question of “ O tempora,O mores” and yes rules of both care and courtesy have loosened over successive generations and maybe we haven’t passed on the acceptable rules in the game of life. Let’s see how this generation handle this over the months and years to come.It’s a tough call and maybe those of us clinging on to the topmost branches should cut them some slack.

 

 

[Nearholmer]

2 minutes ago, Ian Hargrave said:

to hanker for those as the good old days is a mistake

Don’t worry, I don’t.

Certainly where I grew-up, a small rural  town in Sussex, the flip-side of social conscience was quite appallingly condescending snobbery, meted out by the “posh” incomers on the “local peasantry”, which even as a child one could detect a mile off, and as for being gay, black, or a woman, that was certainly to be treated as a variously lower form of life.

 

As ever, we swap one form of nastiness for another!

 

 

[Reorte]

33 minutes ago, Ian Hargrave said:

   Social conscience ? That’s a difficult one. Both wartime and postwar Britain were ages of austerity when you got what you were given and were thankful for it though to hanker for those as the good old days is a mistake.They weren’t.

A tricky one to be honest. There's a hell of a lot of stuff that's in the past and should stay there, but I've also got quite a strong view that there's a fair element of throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

 

Speaking very generally there by the way, not in relation to any specific issue.

[beast66606]

40 minutes ago, Ian Hargrave said:

XC on journeys to Newcastle using a combination 220/221 Voyager units encourage pre booking and enforce a policy of both masks and inside seating only.

 

The outside seating on a Voyager must have been one hell of a white knuckle ride, no wonder the policy is now for inside seating only.

[Ian Hargrave]

14 minutes ago, beast66606 said:

 

The outside seating on a Voyager must have been one hell of a white knuckle ride, no wonder the policy is now for inside seating only.

Especially when the dreaded trolley squeezed through. Now ,at least for the time being,no trolley,no seat.The outside seat rule exemption is when you travel with a child who must sit inside. I’m stuck with Voyagers so you have to get used to it.

[Free At Last]

[alastairq]

2 hours ago, beast66606 said:

 

The outside seating on a Voyager must have been one hell of a white knuckle ride, no wonder the policy is now for inside seating only.

 Heckova job keeping one's mask in place as well?

 

Isn't it about time they put grab handles on the ends between carriages. too?

[alastairq]

My [young-ish] next door neighbour has returned home from work [as a carer of a profoundly disabled person...pays more than joinery!]....to self-isolate.

One of his co-workers has tested positive for covid [amongst other things]

As a result, his wife and two small kids have banished him to the garden shed for a fortnight.....

 

Wife last seen fending him off with two broomsticks tied together...

[Bernard Lamb]

9 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

Exactly this I suspect, basically guards on trains have little or zero power to eject or demand of a passenger anything else be it stopping smoking, drinking or wear a mask……..what we need are “Train Marshalls” preferably armed with Tasers 

At work I had to visit various military establishments.

At one particular location there were two US Marines, heavily armed, who remained far too close to me for current social distancing guide lines while I carried out a survey of a building.

Knowing that they were authorized to shoot me if I touched the wrong thing was quite unnerving.

You do not take any liberties in that situation.

Over the top perhaps but it was highly effective.

Bernard

[monkeysarefun]

13 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

..what we need are “Train Marshalls” preferably armed with Tasers 

 

Two mates and myself were shown the way off a train at gunpoint by two of the NSW transit police's finest  in the early 80's because my mate had earlier said "That's f$#$##g  stupid!" or similar  when the bloke at the ticket office refused to recognise his Wollongong University student card.

 

NSW transit cops were those too simple for the actual police and spent their downtime on shifts watching Dirty Harry movies.

Edited July 15, 2021 by monkeysarefun

[Nearholmer]

Some cool assessment by Prof Whitty reported here https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57858864

 

Ive looked to see whether the on-line seminar was recorded, and is available publicly, so far without success - if anyone does find it on-line, could try please post a link?

 

EDIT: Found it! If you search “science museum” within YouTube, it is currently the first item up “Covid-19 and the hunt for a vaccine”.

 

What Prof Whitty says at 49:40 is particularly interesting in context of what gets talked about in this thread.

Edited July 16, 2021 by Nearholmer

[hayfield]

5 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Some cool assessment by Prof Whitty reported here https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-57858864

 

Ive looked to see whether the on-line seminar was recorded, and is available publicly, so far without success - if anyone does find it on-line, could try please post a link?

 

I get the feeling they are really stuck between a rock and a hard place, whilst not wanting to do it they seem to realise this is the best of a lot of other equally bad, if not very much worse options. Optimum time rather than a good time 

 

Plus on another related report those being infected in the main are either not or only partially vaccinated. We have seen a large rise in both hospitalisations and deaths, but nothing like the numbers previously suffered. I think we were all hoping for a much smoother transition, clearly its still a time for taking care of both ourselves and others.

 

My in-laws are panicking as their youngest daughter is getting married in 3 weeks, the hen (weekend)party starts tonight and my niece was in bits as one of her sisters is now having to isolate and cannot go. The clear fact is between now and the wedding its odds on more will have to isolate. Lets just hope all the main players will be there

 

My granddaughter had to cancel her first wedding date, then when she was allowed to hold one, only 15 guests were permitted, we all took the view it was best to carry on with limited numbers with many of us watching on line. So the niece is getting away lightly, though I don't think anyone a month ago expected this spike or its size

 

My other granddaughter postponed her wedding by a year and its going ahead in 2023, hopefully far more sensible

[eastglosmog]

Just had this from my dentist:

"Following the Government's latest announcement regarding the easing of restrictions in England, we would like to reassure you that the Dental Practice continues to remain open and is providing dental care according to current guidelines to all our patients."

Well, that's a relief, then!

 

[Nearholmer]

They’ve clearly decided not to spend all their time going out clubbing, and decided that you needed to know that.

[adb968008]

France tonight is back on the 10 day isolation list.

However theres only 10k daily cases in France than 50k in ours

 

Despite charles darwins laws of natural selection working in favour of the Indian variant, and that its practically eliminated all other variants in this country… the reason given is a lesser strength variant, South African could be imported… given if it is, its already 5:1 out numbered by the Indian variant, and that its 60% less strength than the Indian variant… its chances are surely regulated by nature much more so than any regulation of ours ?

 

Is it wrong of me to think and question this narrative we are being fed ?

This whole completely non-transparent secretive traffic light decision making is making no sense to me at all.

[Oldddudders]

9 hours ago, adb968008 said:

France tonight is back on the 10 day isolation list.

However theres only 10k daily cases in France than 50k in ours

Before this new ruling, had Sherry visited me here, it's true she would not have needed to quarantine on return. But, had I accompanied her back to Blighty, as we have done several times in the recent past, I would have had to quarantine, despite having a French certificate saying I have been double-vaccinated with the same AZ product. NHS needles must be sharper, or something. 

[Nearholmer]

10 hours ago, adb968008 said:

This whole completely non-transparent secretive traffic light decision making is making no sense to me at all.

So far as I can work out, The “South African Variant” is a vaccine dodger, and France has a lot of it, which is why the quarantine.

 

But, on lack of transparency in decision-making, I’m with you, and possibly annoyed several people by going on about it at great length earlier in the week.

[APOLLO]

Wonder what the UK will be like in a couple of months ? - Chaos I reckon.

 

Wonder what the World (not just the UK) will be like in a couple of years ? - I'm certain it WON'T be back to 2019.

 

Sitting tight, going nowhere, getting materials in for a couple of railway modelling projects, house repairs, garden improvements etc. Wife's greenhouse plants (all food - mainly herbs etc) are doing well. Making a couple of frames alongside this week.

 

Sod travel.

 

Brit15