Welsh lockdown

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Discussion

mac96

Original Poster:

3,715 posts

142 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advi...

I really cannot make my mind up whether this is evidence of a nasty racist undercurrent, or an entirely justified reaction, Either way, seems odd to be getting steamed up about visitors now- the summer season is definitely over.

Any thoughts?

FunkyNige

8,858 posts

274 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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Shouty people being shouty.

nordboy

1,438 posts

49 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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I think the issue is, that due to local lockdowns and the differences between the law in England and Wales, is that English people can seemingly travel from wherever they want to visit/ holiday in Wales. Yet if you're living in Wales, depending on where you are, you can't even cross the county border, which may be a couple of miles away.

The whole thing makes a mockery of the current lockdown laws. And people are getting a bit pissed off with it.

Evanivitch

19,794 posts

121 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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nordboy said:
I think the issue is, that due to local lockdowns and the differences between the law in England and Wales, is that English people can seemingly travel from wherever they want to visit/ holiday in Wales. Yet if you're living in Wales, depending on where you are, you can't even cross the county border, which may be a couple of miles away.

The whole thing makes a mockery of the current lockdown laws. And people are getting a bit pissed off with it.
Exactly this.

Wales was in national lockdown for longer than England, our local lockdowns are tougher. Even in English lockdown areas they can leave to go on holiday in non-lockdown parts of Wales or abroad.

It's a Welsh problem, and I can understand why some are taking that frustration out on English visitors, but it's not a good thing.

You could apply the same to Scottish, but they're nice lads.

mac96

Original Poster:

3,715 posts

142 months

Friday 9th October 2020
quotequote all
nordboy said:
I think the issue is, that due to local lockdowns and the differences between the law in England and Wales, is that English people can seemingly travel from wherever they want to visit/ holiday in Wales. Yet if you're living in Wales, depending on where you are, you can't even cross the county border, which may be a couple of miles away.

The whole thing makes a mockery of the current lockdown laws. And people are getting a bit pissed off with it.
That's a good point. Particularly in North Wales the county boundaries are not logical zones for this either- Conwy in particularly has larger rural areas whose inhabitants probably can see no reason for restrictions.

I definitely agree that it is ridiculous to allow people from locked down areas in England (or Wales) to travel to counties not in lockdown.

Ian Geary

4,462 posts

191 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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But the lesser populated nations in the uk seem to take a certain amount of glee in imposing or removing restrictions out of step with the largest nation.

Surprise surprise it leads to confusion.

The travel writer was very measured, and hardly laboured the point at all about how tourism supports their local economy

Bite the hand that feeds etc.

On balance though, i'm sure people in Rotherham, Leicester, all over the NE would love to be able to tell other people to foxtrot Oscar in order to keep the spread of covid down.

So I suppose it's a unfair to expect the Welsh not to...

...but they could still be a bit more tactful about it, especially as the chap had mirrored visit Wales's advice.



welshjon81

631 posts

140 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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I've booked a week in Cornwall over the half term for my family but we can't go due to local lockdown. I'm absolutely fine with this as we are in the middle of a pandemic and we all need to make sacrifices and pull together.

On the other hand:-

Why should I be OK with someone from Leicester (for example) coming to stay down the Gower where I live?


mac96

Original Poster:

3,715 posts

142 months

Friday 9th October 2020
quotequote all
welshjon81 said:
I've booked a week in Cornwall over the half term for my family but we can't go due to local lockdown. I'm absolutely fine with this as we are in the middle of a pandemic and we all need to make sacrifices and pull together.

On the other hand:-

Why should I be OK with someone from Leicester (for example) coming to stay down the Gower where I live?
You shouldn't be OK with it. But that is a bit different from the 'no foreigners here' attitude' of some people. I am sure they are in a small minority. I am English and have been a regular visitor to North Wales as long as I can remember apart from the hard lockdown earlier this year; I have never been told to 'f off home'. Well, actually once, but that was when I was about 12 , and the other lad was about the same age, so I don't count that!


mfmman

2,362 posts

182 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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A couple of points on this

Cases have been lower in the bulk of the south west of England than the rest of England throughout the pandemic. We have still been subject to the same restrictions in the main until very recently though. There was much fuss locally when restrictions first started lifting in June about people coming from Birmingham to WSM etc but nothing I saw as vitriolic as in that article.

When the restrictions took longer to lift in Wales, people from England couldn't travel into Wales on the same basis as they could within England, I took a pretty circuitous route to Ross on Wye as a result.


cuprabob

14,414 posts

213 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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You should have let them win at footie last night smile

foxbody-87

2,675 posts

165 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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I can understand being frustrated about the possibility of infected people visiting but the underlying tone of those comments is anti-English sentiment and I suspect it’s the perfect excuse to have a pop. Idiots will be idiots, I’ve not long come back from Wales and thankfully everyone I met was friendly and happy to chat.

Biker 1

7,690 posts

118 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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I spent a very pleasant weekend back in August in central Wales. Really hospitable staff made my B&B experience really good. Decent full English breakfast (no pun intended...)
Apart from too much rain, I have always found Wales a nice place to visit.
Like others have mentioned: there will always be morons - both sides of the border.

Sophisticated Sarah

15,077 posts

168 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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Like Scotland, the Welsh government have trickle-fed anti-English sentiment for a while. “Filthy English scum bring the virus to us!” is just one of the latest tactics which has resulted in increased idiots mouthing off. They’ll probably go for an independence vote at some point once they’ve riled up enough morons who believe them.


Evanivitch

19,794 posts

121 months

Friday 9th October 2020
quotequote all
Sophisticated Sarah said:
Like Scotland, the Welsh government have trickle-fed anti-English sentiment for a while. “Filthy English scum bring the virus to us!” is just one of the latest tactics which has resulted in increased idiots mouthing off. They’ll probably go for an independence vote at some point once they’ve riled up enough morons who believe them.
We've a few hundred years of good reason to resent the English. The somewhat unpopular Senedd doesn't really need to add anything to that.

Tony Starks

2,088 posts

211 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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It's just the Welsh and their shoulder chip. For some reason they think they were treated worse than Aboriginal Peoples or Native Americans.

I lived there for a few years and some of the older generations would cross the road to walk passed our house and then cross back, all because we were English. But, having the Brecon Beacons as your backgarden made up for small minded individuals.

Matt..

3,586 posts

188 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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Our lockdown rules in Wales are crazy and not actually enforced. We had two additional months of travel restrictions compared to England and it’s been a waste of time. The UK really should align on lockdown rules when we’re all so interconnected.

I suspect we will have travel restrictions for at least two months. That will mean approx 6 months of severe travel restrictions. Compared to Englands ~2 months. The impending mental health crisis in Wales is going to hit hard.

Mining Subsidence Man

418 posts

47 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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Tony Starks said:
It's just the Welsh and their shoulder chip. For some reason they think they were treated worse than Aboriginal Peoples or Native Americans.

It's the same down here with the Cornish. They're re-writing history and have completely rewritten the whole Cornish Language (from it's bare bones)

Thankfully, most sensible people keep quiet and vote accordingly.

Birkin1932

784 posts

138 months

Friday 9th October 2020
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As an Englishman living in wales to me its totally, "how can we be different to England" same with the Scottish leaders.

There was no reason at all to stay closed longer than England after the main lockdown, but the welsh did. Doing this has devastated the tourist based businesses, but civil servants still get paid so they do not care

I've lived in North Wales for 15 years, but still got looks during the lockdown at the supermarket and is wasn't a nice feeling.

Matt..

3,586 posts

188 months

Friday 9th October 2020
quotequote all
Birkin1932 said:
As an Englishman living in wales to me its totally, "how can we be different to England" same with the Scottish leaders.

There was no reason at all to stay closed longer than England after the main lockdown, but the welsh did. Doing this has devastated the tourist based businesses, but civil servants still get paid so they do not care

I've lived in North Wales for 15 years, but still got looks during the lockdown at the supermarket and is wasn't a nice feeling.
I’m English and have been in Cardiff for 12 years. I fully agree with you. It’s infuriating.

The travel restrictions have been completely pointless yet they continue to implement them.

They also have absolutely no rules enforcement still. We are going to need some huge bailout money from England to recover our economy. It’s ridiculous.

There are also a huge number of people that believe WG have done incredibly well during this crisis. However our case rates are huge, and we have often had way more areas in the UK top 10 than we should for our size.

Edited by Matt.. on Friday 9th October 19:52

Evanivitch

19,794 posts

121 months

Friday 9th October 2020
quotequote all
Tony Starks said:
It's just the Welsh and their shoulder chip. For some reason they think they were treated worse than Aboriginal Peoples or Native Americans.
I mean it's not like the English tried to wipe out Welsh language and customs through legislation, rule the population through military might, or strip the land of mineral wealth...