One of the raison d’etres of Government is to offer citizens protection. For that we, as individuals, agree to give up certain freedoms for the greater good.

We expect Government therefore to be knowledgeable about risks to our wellbeing, to anticipate events and to put appropriate insurance policies in place to protect us. The Covid epidemic has demonstrated that some countries in the world have demonstrated just such effective government, with the result that their peoples have suffered less during this pandemic.

Whilst the UK Government boasts about British exceptionalism and being ‘a much better country’ than others, the reality is that many Asian countries have governments which are more competent and professional.

Quietly and unobtrusively countries like Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and even China have focused on creating outstanding government. Singapore spends less than 20% of GDP on government but their government is widely recognised to be world beating; using technology to create intelligent cities,  providing  health and education systems that are the envy of the world and all this is managed and led by civil servants and ministers who are the brightest scientists  and engineers of their generation (and paid accordingly).

No wonder some of these countries have the longest life expectancies in the world; the lowest infant mortality rates and have schools that are top of world-wide league tables.

These countries also took preparing for a global pandemic seriously. They learnt the lessons of Sars. They noted ‘The Global Health Risk Framework’, published four years ago which forecast that a global pandemic could kill millions of people and  that countries should prepare for a fast-moving pandemic due to a virulent respiratory pathogen, with a recommended expenditure worldwide of $4.5 billion.  

These Asian countries analysed the risk to their people and their reaction was to put in place detailed plans for quarantines, hospital readiness, test and trace processes and stockpiles of protective equipment should the need arise. In other words, mitigating insurance policies. Because that’s what competent government is all about.

We in the West did generally nothing, ignoring what these countries were doing – presumably relying on our belief in our innate superiority and exceptionalism -whether out of ignorance about how Asia has changed or unconscious racism.

As a result, these Asian countries have had significantly fewer deaths and much more limited damage to their economies.

The Framework’s recommended preventative expenditure was $4.5 billion worldwide.  Because this Framework was not actioned in the UK, our government has this year had to spend over £230 billion on rescue loan packages alone!  (51 times more!)

Not surprising really.  We all take out insurance policies to avoid exponentially larger and potentially crippling costs should we suffer uninsured loss!

So why did so many western governments fail us? Perhaps its just that we lack some humility, some curiosity and a recognition that we can learn from countries ( who perhaps we pigeon hole as underdeveloped) but who in fact are doing things better?

Some may say that this is easy to write with the benefit of hindsight. However, there is another risk about which the world’s health professionals also having been warning us for years and that is anti-microbial (including antibiotic) resistance. See the report by Jim O’Neill for the UK Government in 2014 – and guess what, hardly anything’s been done to implement the recommendations in the UK.

Let’s examine our ‘Liberal Establishment’ and two of its distinct parts; both of which I think have let us down.

The Economic Liberals

Economic liberals have been in the ascendency over the last thirty years, arguing for laissez-faire economics, bank deregulation (before the financial crash) and globalisation. They like markets, economic efficiency, gross domestic product and wealth creation.

Financed by individuals of wealth (many living in tax exile) and championed by most mainstream newspapers, this liberal establishment is composed of pressure groups, individuals  and political parties. And they have well and truly delivered for their supporters – reducing tax burdens for the better off, deregulation and above all Brexit.

In addition, they have managed to pull off one of the greatest conjuring tricks of all time. They have attached the blame for the consequences of austerity to the very opponents of austerity itself. And in this, I believe, they were aided and abetted by the behaviours of our second type of liberal.

The Social, Left of Centre Liberals

These liberals pride themselves on their tolerant, open-minded, international view of the world. They recognise that they are materially better off than their parents and they perceive themselves as wanting to leave the world a better place; with, of course the small addendum that some of them think they know what’s best for others.

A corollary of this may well give rise to the fact that many members of this group appear to disdain or dismiss the genuine feelings of others.

Once the public face of social liberalism was positive, joyful, human and freeing. Now it can sometimes be associated with a list of things that you can’t say or think; accompanied with a spirit of smug and sometimes vindictive self-righteousness, whilst the virtue of tolerance can tend to be ignored.

Even before woke culture dawned there were plenty of examples which, I believe, helped alienate the victims of austerity from social liberals. Here are just a few:

• In 2010 Gordon Brown called a Labour voter who had worries about immigration as ‘that bigoted woman’
• Hilary Clinton thought she could win a Presidential election by describing people who voted for Donald Trump as ‘deplorables’.
• Many Leave supporters in the Brexit referendum were routinely branded as ‘racist’ by Remainers
• In a recent Ipsos poll: 2/3rds of people felt that traditional politics no longer listened to ‘people like them’

Disdain never goes unnoticed by the disdained!

The two groups do have something in common!

However, both groups, I believe, do have something in common. I believe that one cause of their respective paradigms is that although they have come to their very different world views they share similar life experiences. Their social recognition and esteem comes generally, I perceive, through their personal, academic, economic and technocratic achievements; they are both interested in financial well-being – having, in the main, prospered considerably over the last 30 years. Equally they have been more than content to do little / nothing to improve the social recognition and esteem of those who earn their living through manual labour, running small businesses and those in the caring professions for whom  we all enthusiastically clapped during the lockdown with Coronavirus.

These two elites generally also share one other characteristic, a private education; and this makes their life experience different from the overwhelming majority of the population.

In the UK  7% of people receive a private education yet they dominate the leadership of both elites.

• 65% of all Senior Judges had a private education as did:
• 59% of all Permanent Secretaries
• 45% of all Public Body Chairs
• 44% of Newspaper Columnists
• 43% of Newspaper and Media Editors
• 39% of Cabinet Ministers
• 34% of FTSE CEOs

My experience over the years of working and having friendships with this 7% is that few of them have learnt about or even gained an insight into the day to day lives and experiences of the remaining 93%.  

If the two dominant liberal elites of our establishment are so disconnected from the majority of our people, is it a surprise that divisiveness and discord has grown over the last two decades?

People want a different approach

Despite all this though, I also believe that there is hope!

A survey out yesterday showed that:

• 71% of us believe that, for the future of our country, it is especially important that we stick together despite different views
• By a ratio of over 2:1 we say we need to be willing to listen to those we disagree with and show a willingness to compromise
• 60% of us feel exhausted by the division in politics and want it to stop

I believe we need a new strand of liberalism that enshrines discussion, debate and tolerance. A liberalism that ensures that people are not left economically behind; that addresses the perceived loss of status, dignity, voice, respect and ultimately economic power that many in our country now feel.  It should also address the alienation of the young from our democratic institutions which many see as failing them.

Instead we need to build a new middle ground. We should build bridges between different groups in our society; rethinking how we show respect and esteem to our carers, small business owners and manual workers. We should focus on ending divisions and brokering compromises.

We now know, what many suspected from the evidence of our TV screens in the spring and summer, that Covid is a deadly disease for identifiable and relatively small groups of people.

87% of Covid mortalities have been in people over 65; the average age of those who have died from Covid is 82.4; 95% of Covid mortalities have been in people with pre-existing medical conditions; if a person has a BMI count of between 35-40 there is an increased risk of death by 40%; if a person has a BMI count of over 40 there is an increased risk of death by 90%; and certain ethnic groups appear to have genetic susceptibilities which makes their rates of death higher.

I believe it is the role of government to try its utmost to protect these groups from this virus. I also believe it is the role of government to put this virus in perspective.

Since the Covid lockdown:

• 24,000 cancers have gone undiagnosed and that is expected to rise to 35,000
• 2.5 MILLION Britons have not been screened or tested for cancer
• 5,000 heart attack sufferers have missed out on hospital treatment
• 9,000 stroke patients are missing out on a treatment that can prevent disability following a stroke
• To name just a few of the health conditions for which people’s treatment is being delayed or not started

The Government’s approach to addressing the virus is causing significant economic damage and the longer-term physical not to mention mental health effects on our population are beginning to become apparent.

So why, after the lockdown  ended, was not a more targeted approach adopted? This would have meant:

• Shielding the groups at risk, allied with testing and other investment to improve their quality of life
• Ensuring capacity in hospitals
• A health promotion campaign targeted at helping people to eat more healthily and lose weight
• Sensible precautions and behaviours for the rest of the population

Shielding the groups at risk, allied with testing and other investments to improve their quality of life

• People in such groups should be allowed to stay at home; off-work and be given at least 80% (or more) of their income paid by the government.
• They should be given free home delivery for food and all other shopping and living requirements.
• Parks throughout the country should be shut to the general public at specific times each week, so that those shielding can access them, in the knowledge that they will not meet anyone infected with Covid.
• National Trust properties, etc, should do something similar with the addition that staff, with whom the shielding groups would have to interact, would have had to achieve a negative test immediately before arriving at work.  Hospitals can turn around tests and know the results within two hours. Investment should be made to scale this up, so that those who need quick results can get them. If this is not possible in the short term (despite the government having had all summer to make this happen) then such staff should take a test and if negative, completely self-isolate for the intervening period until they serve those who are shielding.
• Similar actions could also be done by shops and supermarkets, with self-isolating staff, who volunteer for this, being paid full wages.
• People should be allowed to visit loved ones in residential homes, provided that  they have  tested negative immediately before arriving at the home or have tested negative a day or so before and then in the intervening period have completely self-isolated.

The principles underpinning this could be extended to other circumstances, which will make the life of those shielding less lonely and debilitating.

Of course, this depends on the testing system delivering and volunteers who are happy to self-isolate.

With respect to volunteers that should be no problem. I think we will be inundated with volunteers to help in such a way, given the huge response to the NHS Responder scheme.

Ensuring capacity in hospitals

The reason we entered the lockdown in the first place, and were right to do so, was because of the fear that the NHS and particularly intensive care would not be able to cope with the volume of cases.

The Nightingale hospitals were a stunning achievement. It was great that hardly any of that extra capacity was needed in the first wave. But that extra capacity is there and if the projections predict that we need even more capacity is needed, then we should be building such hospitals now.

I also think we should consider designating some hospitals for non Covid patients and others for Covid patients so that treatments for other diseases and conditions can restart and accelerate.

A health promotion campaign targeted at helping people to eat more healthily and lose weight

Our Prime Minister’s brush with Covid, was probably exacerbated by his excess weight and he has, we are led to believe, subsequently lost two stone. The UK’s population has one of the highest obesity levels in the world. Over 62% of the UK population is overweight, with a BMI count of over 25. 25% of the population are obese with a BMI count of over 30%.

The Government should be investing heavily in:

• Education in schools
• Promotion of cheap healthy eating options for families
• Promoting easy to access exercise classes and opportunities for everyone to do more exercise
• Provide free membership of groups like Weight watchers and Slimmer World
• Provide tax incentives for people to lose weight
• Initiate an imaginative and unmissable (dominating the media) marketing campaign to promote healthier lifestyles for a healthier Britain

Sensible precautions and behaviours for the rest of the population

The rest of the population’s main contribution will be to individually to try to ensure that they do not pass on the virus to anyone in these at-risk groups.

This will mean that most people can go about their life pretty near normally. It would be right for people to keep social distancing; washing their hands and using masks indoors and on all public transport.

An occasional lockdown for a limited period in specific geographical locations may be necessary if ICU capacity is threatened.

Any staff who work amongst people who are likely to have the virus but without exhibiting symptoms and  believe that they have underlying health conditions which cause them to be at greater risk of  suffering adverse side effects from a Covid infection should be entitled to be furloughed.

People living ‘normally’ will need to take responsibility of ensuring that they do everything in their power to socially distance especially when passing older people  – 50 is the age when the risks start increasing.

If people want to see relatives or friends who are in the at risk or shielding categories then it would be their responsibility  to visit only after having had a negative test immediately before the visit or they self-isolate for the appropriate period beforehand.

I supported the initial lockdown because I thought that there was sufficient evidence that, unless lockdown occurred, there could be a catastrophe for our hospitals and intensive care departments – unable to cope with the demand.

As I listened to the media and read my newspapers during the lockdown, I gained the strong impression that this virus is unpleasant to the many who get it and for some gives them some nasty long lasting side effects. For the unfortunate who have died it appears that Covid 19 kills pretty specific groups of people.

Now we have real data from the government. This is not data that is readily and openly being shared with the population, but it is there if you look for it.

• 87% of Covid mortalities have been in people over 65
• 95% of Covid mortalities have been in people with pre-existing medical conditions
• If a person has a BMI count of between 35-40 there is an increased risk of death by 40%
• If a person has a BMI count of over 40 there is an increased risk of death by 90%
• Anyone under 50 is more likely to die in a car accident than from Covid 19

Why is this data not at the heart of government briefing?

Why are our major television channels not devoting airtime to serious discussion about this data?

Why is the open letter from among other Professors Gupta, Heneghan and Sikora not being given widespread coverage (apart from the Daily Mail)?

Why is not one political party asking questions and raising a discussion about this data?

If this data is right, surely we should protect those most at risk and ensure that all those dying or being harmed by these restrictions can resume their treatment, like cancer and stroke patients, to name just two categories, in which predictions of extra deaths run between tens and a hundred thousand preventable deaths.

In addition, yesterday we were told that deaths are on the up in France and Spain and we are following behind them.

HOWEVER in May and April France and Spain had over 1000 deaths a day. In the last month, both have had an exponential growth in cases of Covid 19. BUT Spain had had only one day with 200 or more deaths whilst France has had only one day with 100 or more deaths.

We are told by our Government that all responses to the Covid 19 Virus are led by ‘The Science’.

As I understand it, publishing the results of research is an essential part of the scientific method. This enables other scientists to challenge, verify or confirm those results.

Isn’t it a pity then that this core foundation of science is not being used during the Corona virus?Membership of the key scientific committee which  advises the government (SAGE)  is secret  and papers which are presented to it are not being published?

Why?

Please could we have more facts about all those who have been admitted to hospital with Covid-19?

Given that the lockdown was initiated to stop our hospitals being overwhelmed, please could we be told what are the characteristics of those who have been admitted by age, gender, BMI, and with what underlying health conditions?

If, as I suspect, the overwhelming majority of people admitted to hospital fit into clearly identifiable categories of people with specific health characteristics, shouldn’t the government focus all its money and effort in helping these groups stay safe, in addition to those working in hospitals and the care sectors, rather than spending exponentially more in protecting people whose likelihood of ending up in hospital is tiny?

Is it just me or do you think an important part of HM The Queen’s VE Day Message to the Nation received hardly any coverage in our media?

She talked about “the greatest tribute to all those who did not come back from the war was to ensure it didn’t happen again,” “Once sworn enemies”, she said, “were now friends working side by side for the peace, health and prosperity of us all”.

Do you not think that one of the greatest contributions of the generation who enabled VE Day, my own parent’s generation, was that they did ensure that war in Europe, on the scale that had dominated the previous five centuries became a thing of the past.

I am very conscious that my generation and that of my sons have not had to go to war in Europe, unlike my forebears over many previous centuries.

Reflect a bit on war in Europe since the 1600s and I could go further back:

• Thirty Years War 1618-1648
• Dutch War Louis XIV 1672-1678
• War of the League of Augsburg 1688-1697
• War of Spanish Succession 1739-1748
• Seven Years War 1755-1763
• French Revolutionary and Napoleonic War 1792-1815
• Crimea 1853-1856
• (Britain in 27 wars in 1800’s in Asia and Africa)
• World War I 1914-1918
• World War II 1939-1945

The generation of the Second World War, I believe, said never again. And so, they developed an international community that forged a new foundation out of all that had been learnt from that suffering and built human rights and international law and rules to preserve peace and cooperation.

And, don’t you think, it’s an amazing achievement that they delivered?

The longest period of continual peace in Europe for centuries; not to mention all the other achievements to reduce war and increase cooperation as described in my second post ‘International Collaboration & Cooperation’.

Should this not be the centrepiece of such celebrations, especially at a time when around the world there signs of new brands of nationalism and a fascination with authoritarianism; both of which could lead to distrust, isolationism and hostility between nations? 

In September 2015 Jeremy Corbyn was elected Leader of The Labour Party on a huge wave of optimism particularly among young people, who had joined the party hoping that he would provide an alternative to austerity and a return to values of social justice and fairness in our government.

Over the last five years our Conservative Government has been unpopular – seen as uncaring and incompetent. Yet it is Jeremy Corbyn’s true legacy that he has enabled this government not only to survive but his tragic legacy is that he has bequeathed to the nation another five years of it.

Look at the opportunities he has squandered:

• During his time as leader austerity has done damage to this country and there is clear evidence from all polling that people have yearnt for a change of direction
• He failed to provide leadership during the European Referendum Campaign – the biggest decision of a generation. Instead he went quiet and allowed Tory claims that all the UK’s ills were the fault of the European Union and immigrants to go unchallenged when, across the board (apart from populists), there was widespread recognition that the Tory policies of austerity had significantly caused voter alienation from the political class.
• Across the floor in the House of Commons he had to face Theresa May; one of our country’s most ineffectual Prime Ministers
• He had the chance to have a General Election in 2020 at the time of his choosing rather than agreeing to a General Election on Boris Johnson’s terms. In 2019 he had no chance whatever, from the outset, of winning, with Brexit not having been resolved. And that’s not taking into account the toxic effect his leadership had on the electorate.

One wonders if Jeremy Corbyn is actually a closet Tory. He has let down all those Labour Party members who voted for him. He has created a style of sectarian politics within the Labour Party that is anathema to its proud history and traditions of safeguarding the oppressed. And then to compound matters his decisions and those of his immediate team ensured a Tory landslide.

He has failed to help those who need it the most:

• The British families who have 15% less cash coming in by 2020 than it had in 2008.
• Those with a 10-year gap in male life expectancy between richest and poorest areas
• The 5 million UK adults (16%) who do not reach adult literacy standards whilst countries like Finland, Norway, South Korea achieve 100%
•  The increasing number of poor people who live without a partner, a pattern attributed to increasing job insecurity, a lack of financial independence and more ‘chaotic lives
• The list of the disadvantaged and alienated could go on and on………..

Once this terrible disease has passed, let’s hope that we as a country can learn some lessons – so that we are better protected in the future.

• Why has the UK ignored the work of the Global Health Risk Framework for the Future which issued a report in 2016 recommending significant expenditure on prevention, detection and preparedness for such an event?  Last September the Co-Chairwoman of the Global Preparedness Monitoring Board described world leaders’ approach as being a ‘cycle of panic and neglect’.
• Why the UK has so few ICU beds per 100,000 inhabitants compared to other countries?
  • UK:                        6.6
  • Italy:                     12.5
  • Austria:                21.8
  • Germany:            29.2
  • Turkey:                29.8
• Why do we have so few ventilators compared to other countries?
• Why do we have so few testing kits?
• Why aren’t our doctors and nurses provided with proper protective equipment – three weeks into this crisis?

Who will do something about the following?

• In the USA the top 1% get in one week 40% more than the bottom 20% in a year; the richest 20% of income earners earn in total after tax more than the bottom 80% combined. With respect to wage growth: the top 1% got 150% increase over three decades; the bottom 10% got 15%

• In the UK In 1979 6% of the nation’s income went to the top 1%; today it has more than doubled to 14%.
• In 2000 the average FTSE 100 Chief Executive was paid 40 times more than an ordinary worker; by 2011 it had surged to 185 times higher – even though share prices were lower.
• The report from the High Pay Centre found that while over 400 people were paid more than £1m at just one business, Barclays Bank, there were fewer than 300 Executives being paid that amount in the whole of Japan.
• The director of BP was paid 3006% more in 2011 than his counterpart in 1979. The head of Barclays had gone up in same period 4899%
• 2014 national audit office revealed that one in five large British businesses paid absolutely no corporation tax in the previous year and more than half paid less than £10m.

Real disposable household incomes declined in all English regions apart from London from 2003 onwards. From 2004 the wages of the bottom half of society began stagnating, and for the bottom third they fell.

In the three years after 2010 British workers suffered the fourth worst fall in wages out of 27 EU nations – an average fall of 5.5%. Whilst according to Sunday Times 2014 Rich List the fortune of the wealthiest 1000 Britons had doubled in just five years.