Time to Put COVID Behind Us.

Local Medway blogger, @Ed_Jennings, has produced really regular and useful updates on the COVID19 situation in Medway.  However, in a very testy response, now deleted, to a tweet of mine reflecting on my experience of COVID19, which was very mild Ed responded to me quoting all the cases and hospitalisations and deaths that had occurred since the start of the pandemic as a put down.

I do not criticise Ed at all for doing this and I hope it would be accurate to say that Ed has been a supporter of lockdowns. My own view has been that lockdowns have extended the emergency, been a very blunt tool in dealing with COVID and has had devastating unintended consequences for individuals, businesses and the economy which which will be with us for many years to come.

The lastest wave, Omicron has been a disaster for the Government, Scientists, Data Modellers and the Labour leadership with the travel, hospitality and bricks and mortar retail sectors very badly affected and with little compensation.  The messaging has been confused, publication of stats especially over the Christmas period problematic and very unclear.  Undoubtedly there has been an increase in hospitalisations but substantially down on last year.  It is looking increasingly likely that Omicron has replaced flu for this winter?

The focus on aggregate case numbers is very problematic taken with other opaque and misleading data that has been used to justify Government decision making.  The reporting of COVID19 admissions and deaths is very misleading, probably intentional on the part of Government.  Some of our media are using COVID stories as click bait then providing a number of contradicting stories and the BBC seems entirely focused on the the most negative numbers.  Thankfully the @DailyTelegraph has stopped reporting daily COVID19 numbers.

Clear, unambiguous data is urgently needed so that individuals can see what is going on with COVID and that data needs context by comparing against other diseases. Year-on-year data would be much more useful as we do for every other disease. 

The Government should stop producing daily figure and move to weekly summary produced every Friday listing with it other reasons for hospital admissions and deaths to provide perspective.  At the end of February the stats should be produced monthly and from the end of April three monthly. This should continue until the end of 2022.

The Government should continue to provide advice and run campaigns to get more individuals to have at least two jabs and then move to an annual immunisation shot in the Autumn with the flu jab.  A cheap antibody test should be produced and freely available so that individuals can monitor their own immunity and make decisions based on those test results.

There should be no vaccination passports as these are against everything that we stand for as a nation that believes in Liberty and would represent a massive overreach by the Government.

There should be no further travel bans or disruptive requirements for testing pre or post travel.  The Government needs to work with our partners around the world to stop impinging our freedom to travel and which will allow countries relying on tourism, including here in the UK to rebuild their economies.

All civil servants should return to there place of work with immediate effect.  Government business is being hampered by home working and no-one really believes that civil servants are more productive at home.  Delays in passports, driving licences etc clearly prove otherwise.  If civil servants resist, the Government should step-up its use of AI and other technologies to rapidly fill the gap.

Finally, the Government should already be working on its response to the next pandemic especially around producing testing kits, PPE which should all be sourced and produced in the UK.

We are a resilient nation but Government scaremongering and propaganda has done permanent damage to what used to be called the Blitz spirit.  Time to stop and time to move on.

 

Venezuelan Economics and Incompetence in the Energy Market

It is difficult being a Conservative Party Member to see the failures of the One Nation brand come back to life under the current administration.  We have failed to learn the lessons that State intervention in markets has unintended consequences ad usually fails, miserably.  The really big issue to note that the Government is happy for private enterprises and their shareholders to bear the burden of Government incompetence on a grand scale.

The introduction of the price cap in energy, and lets not forget a Labour Party policy, was intended to protect consumers from swings in energy prices but really was a cover-up for capping the profits of companies supplying energy as well as covering up market failures and the fact that many consumers were simply too lazy to seek out a better deal.  It also placed huge power in the hands of the regulator OFGEM widely acknowledged as incompetent.

You then have to put into this sorry tale the rush for going green which is beginning to take the shape of a Boris Johnson legacy project.  The transition to green energy and zero carbon is probably the right policy but has to be done in a managed and pragmatic way that does not bankrupt the economy and has plenty of contingency built in for the many times the sun does not shine or the wind does not blow.  We need to consider the country’s needs rather than react to a teenage activists demands for her dreams to be protected.

Instead, we have placed our energy security into the hands of a narcissistic French President who will use Britain as his favourite bogey man whenever it suits him and the megalomaniac Russian President intent on serious mischief and taking over Ukraine.

The British people have been badly let down by many previous Governments energy policies who have ducked questions around replacing Britains ageing nuclear infrastructure and have heavily subsidised wind and solar at enormous cost to bill payers. We are now reaping what we have sowed.

Britain needs energy security, we still have reserves of North Sea oil and gas a if we undertook limited fracking large reserves of gas that would give us a huge advantage over our near competitors.  It is time that, ironically, a Conservative Government, stops acting like the proto-socialist Venezuelans and quickly.