I didn't say the ecconomy was dead, just the high street.
As for the fashion outlets that you mention, certainly Next are "crying", their on line sales are 30% down ?? and M & S are bleeding cash.
No idea about Harvey Nicholls but, they wouldn't put anything negative into the public domain.

Do you think the either Next or M&S will not be here at the end of this? My guess is their business model will adapt to the new environment.

The high street as we know will not exist - Covid 19 has just accelerated that transition. The high street in every in every town was a clone of each other as is every shopping centre - that is not sustainable - something had to give.

M&S profits peaked in about 1997. How they're still going I don't know. If it wasn't for their food stores I think they would have gone a decade ago. Their clothes and homeware stores are just a depressing jumble of tat.

Changing the subject, away from the recession, it seems that our ruling party have finally been called out on their endless lies and misleading the public over their testing targets:

It’s more than a week since statistical regulator the UK Statistics Authority wrote to Health Secretary Matt Hancock to ask for clarification of whether that target is for testing capacity, the number of tests administered, the number of tests completed or the number of people tested.

Mr Hancock is still awaiting the party spin doctor to tell him how to answer this one.
There certainly havent been anywhere near 100,000 tests per day at or since the end of April.
Yes, the numbers are massively increased but, actual tests carried out, not to mention completed tests and their results are a long, long way from 100,000 per day.
Worht noting that the PM doubled this target for the end of May, only 11 days away.

Maybe they will be counting envelopes that are ready to put the test in, before posting them out

It's not like the Johnson government to mis lead anyone so we should probably forgive him this one. After all, he's not been well

From todays briefing, it seems that the cloak and mirrors will continue with the track and trace system that has been promised.
Apparently we are training staff but, the app is some way from being ready but, apparently, we will be "ready" at the beginning of June ??

Why cant they just be honest

Massive political no-win for Johnson there, imo. We have already exited the the EU though, btw.

There isn’t even the outline of a new deal/relationship, so to continue and gamble on getting one by the end of the year... that’ll mean eating poop or a disorderly end to the transition.

Give up now and start preparing for no deal, with a huge recession looming - that’ll annoy those who wouldn’t vote for him anyway... and whatever is left of the pragmatic, moderate middle.

Agree an extension, annoying his redline/no new deal base.

His only hope, imo, is that his base is still so bought in to him as a personality that they’ll believe in/forgive whatever he does as necessary and for the best. Explaining away a delay as being okay given the exceptional circumstances (fair enough), or ignoring/spinning his compromises, as they did for the exit agreement. 5 or 6 weeks to decide - that’s ample time, I’m sure.

What has changed since we have left btw? We are still paying in and will do until the end of Dec. We are still subject to the rulings of the ECJ, EU boats are still shipping in our waters etc.

I disagree - we need to prepare for leaving with no deal anything above that is a bonus. The EU have shown their hand - we must follow their rules on state aid, participation of the ECJ, no changes to fishing etc. What possible benefit is having a delay going to give? IMO it would be the opposite you would showing the EU your concerns about going it alone and then you really would be on the end of a really poor deal. It is not in anyone's interest for us to leave on WTO terms but the economy wont collapse further than it already is going to - the impact of no deal will be very modest compared to impact Covid will have. The impact calcs. were based on the economy as it was not as it will be!!

I appreciate that any delay for the remain camp is a good idea because deep down the genuinely believe the result of the referendum can be null and voided if we never get to a deal, I suspect the EU are hoping for the same.

Isn't that like saying, "the window is already smashed. Just chuck another brick through it"?

The only upside of no deal will be that the world will be in such a state by then, we'll hardly notice.

The impact of leaving the EU on the economy will be lost within the impact of the virus. The problem will be the promises being made by Johnson because let’s face it, if you look at Northern Ireland he lied shock horror. The government appear to say that please ignore the additional workload but concentrate on the fact that we are not building new border posts like the EU requested but we are extending what is there already.
We cannot leave on a no deal because it is blatantly obvious that saying we are a big world player, we are not and the application of tariffs will have a big impact on a country whose people are suffering a severe recession.

Nothing much. But we have left, even if in name only in 2020, and this isn’t about Brexit anymore but about establishing a new relationship and securing a trade deal with the EU. Or, indeed, not doing so.



The Remain camp has been comprehensively defeated, and has ceased to exist in any meaningful sense. We went through the gamut of denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance, all the way to a political dead end. It failed to stop Brexit and it cannot mitigate it. That’s what we have to accept. There’s no good outcome from our POV (WTO-Australia or Canada-minus, who gives a poop?), all we can do is watch and enjoy the discomfiture of Johnson and Gove. They won, but it is a victory that has trapped them, and there’ll be a morbid joy in watching their dishonesty/stupidity coming back to haunt them. I mean, we’re all a wee bit stuffed as well, and that is going to be massively exacerbated by COVID, but that is all the more reason to find our pleasures where we can. I don’t want us to fail, but if we’re going to, I might as well have some fun slinging metaphorical turds at the divs who led the march. Loss can be so liberating.

I don’t have a horse in this race. Or rather, I have all three - agonising and ultimately futile delay, desperate race against the clock to a humiliating climb down or kamikaze crash out in the heart of an economic storm. In the absence of hope for something better, these are all defeats to savour.

As I see it, the EU wants the UK to carry forward too many of its rules to be tolerable for the UK government and public. The UK wants to retain too many of the benefits of membership without being a member to be tolerable to the EU. So I think we’re headed towards no new deal. The question, imo, is the timing of it. Any extension is meant to be about allowing more time for negotiation, but realistically could be used to avoid having to deal with one economic shock on top of another. That’s a tricky political sell but so is going the other way and looking stubbornly doctrinaire in the face of a crisis.

Absolutely agree