The Guardian (August 22)
“England currently feels like an eerie, unpoliced, ungoverned, unstable country after a coup. One government is gone but another hasn’t replaced it, and opposition cannot rise to the challenge.” A macro analyst recently wrote that the UK increasingly looks like “an emerging market country…. Brexit coupled with Covid and high inflation have succeeded…. The UK economy is crushed.”
Tags: Analyst, Brexit, Challenge, Coup, Covid, Economy, Eerie, Emerging market, England, Government, Inflation, Opposition, UK, Ungoverned, Unpoliced, Unstable
The Guardian (December 28)
The UK has seen another record rise of daily Covid cases, with 138,831 reported in England, Scotland and Wales alone.” Still, there may be cause for hope. “Although hospital admissions had increased in recent weeks as Omicron spreads through the population, fewer patients were needing high-flow oxygen and the average length of stay was down to three days.”
Tags: Admissions, Cases, Covid, England, Hospital, Omicron, Oxygen, Patients, Record, Rise, Scotland, UK, Wales
London Times (December 20)
“Although Boris Johnson is unlikely to impose further restrictions before Christmas,” anything is possible thereafter. “A full lockdown is not off the table.” Modelling suggests hospital admissions will soar beyond 3,000, possibly reaching 10,000 per day in England, a number “far higher than January’s peak of 4,000.”
Tags: Christmas, England, Hospital admissions, January, Johnson, Lockdown, Modelling, Peak, Restrictions
The Scotsman (November 8)
“It is clear that the four-nations approach that the UK government pursed at the start of the pandemic has been replaced with something far less constructive. If Mr Johnson baulks at the suggestion that he is starting to look more like a Prime Minister of England than the UK, then he should really stop acting like one.”
Tags: Baulks, Constructive, England, Four nations, Government, Johnson, Pandemic, Prime minister, UK
The Guardian (November 1)
“Here we are again. Once more, England will enter lockdown on Thursday…. Once more, the government has been far too slow to act….. What is truly depressing for many people is not lockdown in itself, but the growing conviction that this government has no exit plan, and no ability to execute one even if they stumble across it.”
Tags: Ability, Act, Conviction, Depressing, England, Exit plan, Government, Lockdown, Slow
Time (September 22)
“England’s COVID-19 reopening went terribly wrong.” Britain hit 4,422 new cases on September 19, “the most in a single day since late May, when the country was still under national lockdown. The vast majority of those new cases (3,638) were in England…. On Monday, the government’s scientific advisors warned on television that, at current rates, the U.K. could be recording as many as 50,000 new cases per day by mid-October.”
LA Times (July 12)
“A visit from The Donald is the last thing England needs right now.” There’s a heat wave, wild fires, Britain’s loss in the World Cup, but most of all, it’s the ongoing turmoil over Britain’s departure from the European Union that will set the backdrop to the Descent of the Donald; an event which, for our embattled prime minister, Theresa May, must seem distinctly hellish.”
Tags: Brexit, England, EU, Heat wave, May, Ongoing turmoil, The Donald, Wild fires, World Cup
The Economist (September 27)
With the Scottish issue solved, the UK now turns to the sticky English question which gives Scottish representatives votes on English issues, without any reciprocity. “It is simply not fair to disadvantage English voters in this way. The system must be changed, ideally in a way that enhances democracy, buttresses the union and does not increase bureaucracy. Sadly, these aims clash.”
Tags: Bureaucracy, Democracy, Disadvantage, England, Reciprocity, Scotland, UK, Union, Voters
New York Times (February 13, 2014)
On September 18, Scotland will vote on whether to go independent or remain in Great Britain, which also includes England, Wales and Northern Ireland. “As the countdown begins for the fateful vote, the Scots should certainly weigh the potential economic consequences, but also the pros and cons of dropping out of ‘Team G.B.’”
Tags: Cons, Consequences, England, Great Britain, Northern Ireland, Pros, Scotland, Scots, Vote, Wales
The Economist (January 12)
“In the rich world, men are closing the longevity gap with women.” The major factor has been the reduction in smoking among males. The results have been staggering. “In England and Wales, the biggest peacetime difference between the life expectancies at birth of the two sexes was 6.3 years. That was in 1967. It is now 4.1 years, and falling.”
“In the rich world, men are closing the longevity gap with women.” The major factor has been the reduction in smoking among males. The results have been staggering. “In England and Wales, the biggest peacetime difference between the life expectancies at birth of the two sexes was 6.3 years. That was in 1967. It is now 4.1 years, and falling.”
