Monthly Archives: May 2020

Re-opening schools

The Socialist Labour Party issued the following statement from its Leader, Arthur Scargill on 2nd May, 2020

No Schools, Colleges or Universities should be re-opened until there is a drug to cure anyone infected by the virus or we have a vaccine to prevent it. In the event that a decision is made to re-open Schools the maximum allowed in a classroom should be 15. This will require the building of hundreds of new classrooms; a task which could be achieved quickly as shown by the building of new Hospitals in 7 to 10 days. The health of our children and grandchildren is our responsibility; and we should protect our students at College and University in the same way.

We are pleased to note that the leaders of the Scottish National Party, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly have all issued statements today, 11th May, 2020, echoing the Policy of the Socialist Labour Party’s opposition to the Tory Government abandonment of the policy “Stay Home; Protect the NHS; Save Lives”

Socialist Labour Party 20/5/2020

Deaths from Covid19 Pandemic in UK: official and real.

Arthur Scargill, Leader of the Socialist Labour Party, has noted the announcement, now over a week old, that the figures for death from the Covid19 virus across the UK was more than 10,000 higher than the figures released as the official ones. One week on he points to the headline figure in the Mirror, just one of the papers that revealed the real figure last week, and is wondering why the lower figure is still in circulation.

The Daily Mirror’s headline today announces that the official death toll in the UK is today, 23rd May, 2020 35,023 with 227 added overnight. A week ago the Mirror itself announced a different figure

“Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) reveals that by May 8, the number of Covid-19 deaths in England and Wales was 39,006 – compared to 29,349 previously declared by the Department for Health. It brings the current death toll to more than 44,000 when Scotland and Northern Ireland’s deaths are accounted for, and those confirmed by NHS England on dates after May 8.”  

This was corroborated by an ITV report.

Other news outlets are using the old outdated lower figures. Why? Arthur Scargill thinks that the figure of 44,000 announced over a week ago now could have passed 50,000. What are the reasons that updates based on what is the real figure have vanished?

We are not being told the truth as in many other key contentious areas such as personal protection of workers putting themselves at risk, the state of testing and tracking, the movement of people from hospitals to care homes and how safe it is to re-open schools and work places. New Zealand by contrast had things up and running from early on and it tells.