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.

National Insurance increases does not solve the funding of social care

 As the Government pushes through its increase in national insurance contributions for employees, employers and for those who receive dividends and yet it continues to make the same mistakes that all Governments since the 1940's have made in attempting to pay the bills of today from taxes raised today.

The Labour Party continues to peddle the lie that all of society's  problems can be solved by taxing the rich a little bit more and waging a tax war against multi-nationals.  Of course both fail as the very wealthy are able organise their tax affairs to reduce tax liability and multi-national ultimately pass tax rises on to consumers as the Digital Services Tax proves.

It is right that services that benefit all citizens should receive a tax contribution from all citizens.  Our problem is that the State consumes ever more resources without necessarily improving public services and there are inevitably unintended consequences.

The costs of social care is a burden that hits the middle classes hard most of whom have done the right thing all their lives and then find that they face losing their home to pay for care which many considered to have been covered through the taxes that they have already paid.

Rightly, the State continues to provide care to those who do not have the means to pay for it themselves but transfers some of that cost by negotiating much lower priced care home contracts subsidised by self-funders.

The increase in NI will hit all employees most of who will receive no benefit in the short term.  It will cause problems as all tax rises reduce economic activity and increase the disincentives for those receiving benefits to re-enter the workforce.  I have some sympathy with the argument that these increases in NI are protecting the inheritance for the offspring of the wealthier middle class who failed to vote for long term solutions in the past.

We need solutions that clearly address the the long term funding issue of social care.  For me the Government needs to think creatively rather than continue to make the same mistakes of previous generations, here are a few thoughts: -

1. There needs to be a clear contract between State and the Citizen on where the State's responsibility starts and ends in providing long term care.
2. It is unfair that the better off in private care homes are subsidising State funded residents.  The Government should consider a not for profit housing association style model for the provision of residential care for  those unable to fund their own care.
3. The additional NI contributions, not Employers NIC, for those under 45 should be placed in long term investment funds to pay care costs in the future for anyone over the age of 75.  It will be necessary to provide a legal framework to stop a future Government requisitioning those funds for other uses.
4. Those in work aged over 45 should be encouraged to start saving for their long term care with the Government allowing a proportion as tax deduction this would be in the taxpayers long term best interest.   
5. The Government must ramp up its public health message to encourage all of us to lead healthier lives in order to reduce the risk of needing long term care as we get older.

The increase in the tax on dividends, when added to increases in corporation tax, will hit a swathe of enterprises reducing the incentives to take the risk on setting up a business and will dissuade investors that Britain is an enterprise economy worthy of investment. Despite what the left says the wealth that funds public services comes from the private sector.

Boris Johnson tax policies are looking distinctly Corbynesque I find myself asking the unthinkable question when will Boris introduce a wealth tax?