Humphrey Appleby

As well as having an AZ vaccine maker on our pub quiz team, we also have a COVID tester who's currently doing that instead of being a chef at the moment. According to him, the lateral flow tests are self-administered and therefore are very dependent on those being tested following instructions, which all too frequently they don't. I'm not sure about the exact reliability, but neither he nor my sister who's a pharmacist think they have much value and are largely a waste of time. I suspect it's like those car performance figures you (used to?) get in car magazines, set by expert drivers under the most optimal controlled conditions, but clearly impossible for the average person to replicate under normal conditions. I think the point though, is that the tests should be largely redundant with vaccination anyway, and if the vaccination isn't as effective as being claimed, then that's yet another lie that's been fed to the population.

A fan testing centre perhaps?

I can't to be honest. One small rack - not even a standard 19" one - filled with fans and some small unrecognisable boxes that don't look to be standard CPUs or disks. Whatever they are, that setup wouldn't be astonishing even for a small business, let alone a substantial data provider. It would be like the Polish cavalry up against Panzers...

Bit of a younger looking Jools Holland it that...

The best thing that could happen is for anyone outside of Northern Ireland to stop meddling. One branch of our family were of the pipes and flutes variety, and even during my lifetime were irrational and appalling bigots. You'd go round and visit, and it wouldn't be long before the subject turned towards the evils of the Pope, how Papists were outbreeding them and taking over the world, and always referring to those of left foot persuasion as 'that Catholic Boy/Girl'. It was really quite pathetic and thank goodness subsequent generations don't seem to have bought into that nonsense. Probably because they all emigrated away, but it would be very easy to get sucked into it if you were surrounded by it. However, it must also be said the Church of Rome also behaved like a Mafia in these places. Catholic children were told not to play with the Prods, and woe betide a Catholic if they wanted to marry one. The local priest would be round in a shot threatening eternal damnation, and they'd be practically excommunicated unless the Protestant converted. The Protestants would have also looked at how relatively impoverished the Republic of Ireland was compared to Northern Ireland, its ridiculous laws banning birth control, divorce and so on, and drawn the conclusion they didn't want any part of that. But that changed in the 1980s with the change of economic and social attitudes in the Republic that have culminated in it being the wealthier and more progressive part of Ireland these days, whilst Northern Ireland has been sucked down by violence, industrial decline and emigration. I think many sane people in Northern Ireland simply decided they couldn't be bothered with it any more and moved away over the past 30-40 years. Of course, this means the bigots are even more influential than they probably should be, even though both parts of Ireland being in the EU allowed a deal to be cut that made the flow of people and trade across the border an irrelevant issue and allowed the Northern Ireland population to align with whatever state they chose. However, Brexit tore this up as now the UK and the Republic Ireland have different customs and migration regimes, border controls now have to go somewhere and you're either going to piss-off the Loyalists or Nationalists wherever you put it. Entirely predictable outcome from the moment the UK government decided it didn't want to align its custom regime with the EU, and the UK still hasn't come up with any solution of how to control migration over an uncontrolled border. So at some point there will likely have to be identity checks between Northern Ireland and the Mainland UK, which has absolutely nothing to do with the EU, but which will go down even less well with Loyalist community.

People don't pay to be vaccinated or to be tested if they think they've got COVID, so why should it be any different if the government wants this before information before you leave, or when they arrive in country? How on earth do they think that passengers paying nearly 4 times more for testing than they're probably paying for their flight is acceptable? Why was none of this deemed necessary for much of the past year as passengers freely came and went from the UK, yet suddenly is now apparently required? No, most/all of this is absolute BS, and it's obviously intended to prevent foreign travel whilst providing the illusion that borders have been re-opened. The reality though, is this isn't just about tourism, but is badly affecting necessary business and essential travel.

After taking COVID effects into account LOL... How on earth are they calculating that then? There's one born every minute.

It would be a slightly different matter if testing was offered for free at convenient locations such as airports, but of course the UK government expects its population to pay the rip-off commercial prices at the limited number of testing centres. It seems that it's fine to offer pointless twice-weekly testing for other purposes, yet it can't throw the airline and holiday industries a lifeline. And the question still comes back to what was the point of vaccinations?

I doubt much happens in Northern Ireland without the paramilitaries being behind it, as they're seemingly perfectly able to self-police their neighbourhoods when it suits them.

That's just the UK requirements. Other countries will have their own requirements as well. The upshot is that foreign travel is going to be completely impractical, regardless of what crap Boris may spin. The testing regime is just another corporate money-making scam, just there to enrich some company owners (no doubt friends of the Tories) and to disguise the real levels of unemployment. Ever feel you've been had?

Labour have been pathetic in their opposition to the most incompetent and authoritarian regimes in centuries

The issue isn't just the cost. PCR tests have to be done within 72 hours of travel, but realistically you don't get the results for 24-36 hours so you only have a few hours of validity in practice. If a flight is moved or delayed, which happens a lot currently, then you're screwed and need to start all over. There are also very few places that actually do private PCR tests that are acceptable to airlines and national governments, which means you need to travel somewhere for that, probably during the working week if you were planning to travel at a weekend. Then some national governments additionally insisted on a laminar flow test within 4 hours of departure, which again means more expense and only the larger airports do this on-site, so it makes departure from some regional airports essentially impossible. Quite aside from the outrageous cost of these tests, it's absolutely ridiculous to be requiring a test upon both departure and arrival. This is before we even get into what was the actual point of vaccinating everyone. Finally, there will be very few countries on the so-called green list anyway, and not really the most common holiday destination. So that'll also mean quarantining on return for most destinations. So even though BoJo will claim to have restarted foreign travel, it will basically remain almost impossible for all but the most determined and wealthy. Yet more lies from the consummate liar. It's time people started waking up and pushing back against this nonsense.

The tide seems to be turning towards a greater alignment / unification of Northern Ireland and the Republic - both culturally and demographically. Now that the Republic has finally thrown off the influences of the Church of Rome to become a progressive 21st Century state, and as Brexit introduces economic difficulties, even some Protestants are starting to think the previously unthinkable that they might be better off in Ireland. So of course the usual reactionary elements in the Loyalist community are going to be pushing back on this, and there seems to be some suggestion the DUP have incited some of this behind the scenes. Whether or not that's true though, the DUP as usual wants different things that are mutually incompatible and are impossible to deal with.

A piece written by probably the only (Republic of) Irish anti-EU journalist the Daily Mail could find. It actually doesn't even mention the EU until right at the end, instead waffling on about the history of Northern Ireland which we already know about. But yet fails to actually identify any specific issues, and more importantly any practical solutions. Just one sentence making some vague accusation that the EU is being inflexible It's really quite a pointless and poorly written piece that you'd normally expect to be in the Express rather than Mail which does at least generally have slightly higher journalistic standards. Reading it took 5 minutes from my life that I'll never get back... At the end of the day, Brexit created this situation not the EU, which is quite entitled to enforce its custom zones just the same as the UK bleats on about its sovereignty. There is no-one else to blame but those who implemented Brexit and their supporters.

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/home-office-immigration-data