Category Archives: Politics

Rishi Sunak’s Sick Note

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I don’t know about you, but I was appalled by Rishi Sunak’s assault on the sick last week. He patronised, he scapegoated and he blamed.

Not content with going after experts, civil servants, teachers, lawyers, doctors, nurses, rail workers, and anyone else they can think of to try to divide us, they’ve gone for the unwell.

Listening to Sunak’s speech (announcing policy, once again, outside Parliament and in contravention of our democratic norms) I thought I wouldn’t give the bloke so much as a ‘Fit Note’ to carry on in his job.

In fact I took it upon myself to write him a Sick Note.

By popular demand, I’ve made that Sick Note ‘signable’ – so please, if you concur, add your name and share with friends and family.

You can sign Rishi Sunak’s Sick Note at Action Network here.

 

If the Guv’nor wrote honestly to the Chancellor

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BANK OF ENGLAND
from the Governor

 

Jeremy Hunt
Chancellor of the Exchequer
HM Treasury

27th August 2023

Dear Jeremy,

I think it’s time we were straight with the British people.

Interest rate hikes are the wrong tool to curb the UK’s inflation. Continued hikes will be very harmful to our fragile economy, and Government must seek other, more effective and more equitable means to bring it back down to target.

Our most recent analysis shows that, on current trajectory, 50% of all businesses, and up to 70% of smaller ones, will face debt distress by the year end. This is an emergency. Although we have previously indicated that we would maintain high interest rates for years rather than months, it is now clear that to do so, would entail severe damage to UK businesses and individuals.

We both know that interest rates are a better method of controlling inflation when it is caused by too much money chasing too few goods (or “demand driven”). But that is not the case with the inflation currently troubling the UK, which is and remains supply-side driven. It is not caused by too much money in ordinary people’s pockets – after all, we know that real median wages have fallen by 5% since 2010. Even recent pay increases have not kept pace with inflation, which, we ought to admit in all honesty, means that they tend to pull overall inflation down, rather than add to it.

The sources of our inflation are not the ‘fault’ of British consumers – they stem back to the war in Ukraine, and to trading frictions exacerbated by Brexit. We have avoided admitting the latter too, but in the end, economic stability depends on fundamental institutional trust, so this is something about which we, as leaders of the UK’s two most important financial institutions, ought also to be honest.

My role as Governor gives me only one lever to help bring inflation down to target. I am no longer happy to suggest to British businesses and individuals that the lever of interest rates offers the whole solution – or even anything more than a partial, incidental remedy – to the inflation the country is currently facing.

Instead, we must look to Government to take the right steps. Only Government can cap energy prices at a rate low enough to ameliorate inflationary pressure, as has been done in other countries. Only Government can level meaningful windfall taxes on the excess profits of energy companies to pay for capped prices. Only Government can work with our trading partners in the EU to reduce the frictions caused by Brexit, and the cost increases those frictions cause, in order to bear down on prices in the UK. (The Windsor Framework shows that Government CAN negotiate for smoother trade; in this profound crisis, it must continue, and redouble, such efforts.)

Only Government can re-empower regulators such as Ofgem so that they can fulfil their obligations to ensure value for money and keep price rises for essential services at bay. Only Government can lead the way in building capacity in green energy generation, thereby smoothing out the supply shocks of the future (not to mention addressing the climate emergency).

Interest rates have a far smaller role to play in tackling the inflation confronting the UK than we have thus far implied. Yes, they indicate to markets that we are serious about addressing inflation (but only in the way that a doctor applying leeches indicates an intent to deal with a disease). Yes, they have the effect of increasing the value of the Pound in foreign exchange markets, which in turn reduces the price of imports. But their core traditional function as a brake on spending, as a method of dampening demand-led inflation – when too much money is chasing too few goods – is the wrong fix at the wrong time. The problem is not demand, it is supply, and only Government, not the Bank of England, can act to lubricate supply, use the fiscal system to cap abnormal prices and profits, hold down core prices, ensure proper long term regulation, and invest in a smoother, greener supply side future.

With half of all our businesses facing debt distress before the end of this year, and millions of Britons facing dramatic increases in mortgages and rents, it is time to change tack. This is not a traditional inflationary cycle, and traditional methods aren’t going to work. The sooner we are honest about it, the better.

Yours,

Andrew Bailey

Governor

Inspired by my excellent friends over at The 99 Percent Organisation

Gill’s Story – the NHS at 75

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The 75th anniversary of the NHS feels like the right time to share Gill’s story.

My friend Gill was a nurse for many years, starting back in her teens, working in youth care and elderly care. She has scars on her arms from being bitten by a dementia patient, and was invalided out of work after a patient threw himself at her and damaged her spine. She was lucky not to be paralysed. She now also has a wasting disease.

She wrote to me in late January after a difficult spell in hospital, with some cancer-like symptoms. The daily news rounds at the time were dominated by stories of the NHS in unprecedented crisis. Patients dying in corridors. Ambulances queuing and missing entire shifts. OAPs lying unattended for hours with broken limbs on their kitchen floors.

Here is what she wrote. Gill has given me permission to share. Please remember this was not intended for publication. I have edited only lightly, for clarity and to respect privacy.

Thank you Dom, I’m home now, hopefully I will stay at home now. I’m on double antibiotics and stronger painkillers, for five days, if I’m no better, I have to go back in. For tests. They think it’s either my bowel or ovary. There’s a lot of bowel cancer in my family. It’s probably a diverticulitis infection. At least I’m not in agony now. They couldn’t find a slot for me to have a CT scan until next week, understandably they keep slots free for people in life threatening circumstances. I have an appointment on 26th unless I’m bad again.

There were two nurses in the surgical assessment unit, where patients were coming back for surgery. They had to wait for two more nurses to come from another ward, to get a paralysed man into bed because they have to have one nurse per limb because they can be sued, if he got hurt. He was so demanding, absolutely horrid to the staff. First it was because there was no ambulance available to take him to his nursing home. He was shouting and calling the nurses callous evil devils. I’ll spare you the bad language.

This young man, another patient, started really shouting at him. He said “You are just so low. These nurses are trying their best to look after us.” He said, “Don’t you watch the news and read papers? People are actually dying from the lack of ambulances.”

The paralysed inpatient patient said, “It’s left wing propaganda! It’s not real. These lefty unions are trying to bring down a democratically elected government.”

The young lad said, “You are witnessing it and you still can’t see it!”

The inpatient seemed to be demanding every few minutes. “Nurse I need a drink.” “Nurse I need my meds.” “Nurse get me a bed now, if I have to stay in this god-forsaken hole.”

Then a man, Len, came in in agony. The nurse was doing his obs, then Mr Inpatient said, “Just because I’m a Conservative you do nothing for me.”

The young lad said, “You sit there and admit you are the cause of this.”

A little later, Len, the really poorly man slumped over and I noticed his breathing had altered, so I went down the ward to the nurse, who was with another patient, and told her. She ran back up the ward to him, called the other nurse and the two of them got him into bed and got him oxygen and called the doctor in.

Mr Impatience started shouting again. “Nurse get me a drink now.” So I got out of bed and poured him a cup of water and took it to him. He said, “At least someone cares, thank you. You should do this job.”

I said, “I did – I was a nurse until I became disabled.”

He said, “Oh so you’re a benefit scrounger are you?”

I felt like throwing the water in his face.

I said to him, “Look, think yourself lucky that you can sit here demanding everything every couple of minutes. The nurses are with that other man [Len] because he’s in a life threatening situation. That’s why I went to get the nurse.”

The young man said to him, “Do you get disability benefit?”

He said, “Yes, I’m entitled. I’m disabled. I’m paralysed.”

He said, “So are a lot of people you describe as scroungers.” He pointed at me – he had seen me pass out twice the night before – and said, “Just because Gill isn’t physically paralysed… you’re not a doctor… how can you call her a scrounger?”

Then something happened. Mr Impatience apologised to me, and for voting Tory.

I said to him, “Can’t you see the nurses have to choose – who is in danger of losing their lives? They have to treat them first.”

He didn’t realise these two nurses were looking after twenty eight of us.

After they got the other two staff, and they got him into bed, he apologised to the nurses too.

He said we had opened his eyes to what was going on. The young lad offered to take him over to the window to see the ambulances queuing. He looked at me and said, “Is it really happening?”

I said, “Sadly it really is.”

One of the nurses said, “It’s heartbreaking. People are dying, who shouldn’t.”

When the sister was checking me out, she said, “Thank you for talking to him. And for probably saving Len, the man with breathing problems.”

I saw my GP. She thinks I may have cancer in my ovary. She said she will refer me to a gynaecologist for an urgent app. I’ve known her for over 20 years. She was very sad, she said in the community, you form a bond with your patients and to see this lottery of care happening, is heartbreaking. She said after all you have done and continue to do for youth care and elderly care in the area. She said, “I will explain what you have done for the community but it could be months until you are seen.”

Sorry for the essay, I got carried away. Stay safe and well – love to you and your family.

Gill’s GP was right. Gill was finally seen in the hospital on June 20th – five months after the above – to investigate her cancer symptoms. She was advised to be ready to stay in if the tests indicated urgent surgery.

Unfortunately, another emergency prevented the consultant seeing Gill, and although Gill underwent the CT and other tests, last time I checked, she was still in the dark as to the results.

Article: The Brexit Box

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Brexit has failed. If you still need convincing of that, this post is not for you. I’m taking it as a given.

If you too take it as a given, where does that leave the case for rejoining?

Surprisingly elusive. Why?

Because our debate has become boxed in, and confined to three dominant positions.

First: the Brexiteer position. They cannot countenance it being undone. They will argue democratic mandate, patriotism, sovereignty, EU malignancy and uplands upon which the sun, if only we wait long enough, or believe hard enough, will eventually shine. If you’re taking the failure of Brexit as read, you won’t be hugely impressed by such arguments.

Second: there is the Political Pragmatist’s position. Broadly where Starmer’s Labour party sits. Here the position is that the politics of rejoin are too dangerous. Who wants to open up that ugly debate again? And apart from being ugly, it is dangerous: the evidence of Brexit’s failure might not be enough to win a rematch, because it was never really about evidence. Such is the thinking, and you can see why politicians who want to debate other issues, and paint a positive picture of the future, feel the need to shy away from reopening festering wounds.

Third: there is the Resigned Remainer’s position. This school of thought extends the political pragmatist’s thinking and adds in: rejoining would be hard. The EU might not want us back. There will be various obstacles arising from our having left which will be hard to unravel. There might be genuine problems with the EU which need addressing. There are certainly issues within the UK which made fertile ground for anti-EU sentiment, and these have not been addressed. The EU might impose unpalatable conditions on a rejoining UK. The EU might insist on evidence that the UK is, on second coming, there to stay, and how would that be demonstrated? More god-forsaken referendums? Accession is never a quick process – it’s a ten year or more deal – and so we might as well accept our lot outside the EU and make the best of it.

Of course there are nuanced views, and there is some travel between the groups. I’d say Tony Blair’s position – ‘we’re out for a generation’ – has one foot in the Pragmatists’ camp, and one in that of the Resigned Remainers.

The problem with all of these camps is they are defeatist. The first because the Brexiteers can’t bear to have been found out, and wish to strangle at birth any attempt at repair. The second because, by design, it locks out debate and leaves its principal proponents, the Labour Party, far behind fast-changing public opinion. The third because, although it welcomes debate, it nevertheless looks out through an Overton Window of despair.

There must be a fourth camp. A camp where energy, urgency and hope thrive. Where we know that our standards are still more or less aligned with those of the EU because until recently we were a leading member of the bloc. An energised effort to maintain that alignment will make returning to the fold smoother and easier; it is not something to let slide for a few years while we wait passively for the stars to fight in their courses. Heaven cannot rescue us; we have to do it for ourselves.

In this fourth camp, of course there is acknowledgment that there’s work to be done in facing squarely the failings of our system. Inside or outside of a trading bloc, we cannot leave millions of our own people behind and call ourselves a decent society. Enough of that crap.

And there is, no doubt, more to be done to make the EU feel like it belongs to its member states rather than sitting on top of them. Energised determination to rejoin the EU does not mean blind belief that the UK or the EU are perfect as they are. On the contrary, it demands the political will to fight on a grand scale for the tough stuff: dramatic redistribution and re-engagement inside the UK, and real leadership and painstaking, unglamorous cooperation on the international stage.

We need to break our discourse out of the Brexit box, and shift it towards this fourth camp. We need our best politicians to step forward, occupy and lead this fourth camp. Drive. Belief. Statesmanship. Britain led in Europe before. Britain can lead in Europe again. Britain, and Europe, have nothing to gain from delay, and everything to gain from haste.

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