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COVID-19 and the state of politics (Read 180473 times)

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#50 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 01, 2020, 05:38:07 pm
 :agree:  with Nigel

Better put than I could ever have, but my thoughts exactly. Only when it happens on such a huge scale do enough people hopefully start to realise these emergencies (sickness, job loss, increased caring duties etc) are happening on a daily basis in normal times and could happen to anyone. It’s generally not a life choice, and £76/wk or whatever universal credit is isn’t sufficient. Hence why they’ve felt the need to increase it for ‘normal’ people who happen to be without work so it’s more palatable. [As an aside, I wonder if the government will struggle to justify how they can return UC back to the original amount once this is over].

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#51 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 01, 2020, 06:07:57 pm

The question of whether we end up paying for all this extra borrowing further down the line is an interesting one. I don't know. £200bn of it is coming from the Bank of England via QE / printing money, so unless and until inflation starts rocketing the answer is not necessarily as we don't owe that to anyone. It just adds to the existing £445bn pile of gilts they own which don't seem to be bothering anyone. If inflation stays unaffected but we get asked to undergo austerity MkII "to pay down the debt" I would start to ask questions...

From what I've read, the government are currently planning to fund some of this extra spending through regular investments rather than getting the BoE to buy bonds. Governments are the only people issuing new debt at the moment so investors are apparently quite happy to buy it.

I have no idea where we stand with inflationary pressures from this extra govt spending, but I strongly doubt there will be much. The spending is not an extra but to replace lost incomes, and anyhow people have far less to spend it on as nearly everything is shut and no one is doing anything. There might be a burst when lockdown stops but even then I'm not convinced there will be a sudden lightbulb moment in which life returns to normal.

Do we have to pay it back? Yes I reckon at some point it's inevitable, which is why the government should borrow over a very long time (as long as possible) and spread the debt out over a very long time. Whilst some growth will inevitably erode the debt/GDP ratio, further down the line there will be other emergencies that need paying for, so worth getting it down a bit to give goverments more room to spend later. I have no problem with this, but we have to avoid stupid, damaging and unsustainable idiocies like trying to get rid of the deficit in five years.

Just to weigh in on the "does this prove Corbyn right?" question... Corbyn was suggesting an awful lot of middle class bungs, such as student loans, nationalising railways, free broadband, etc. I'm not sure there is a railway crisis in the UK that warrants limited government attention and money over and above, say, social care or the NHS. To me that's (vegetarian) pork barrel politics.

More seriously, the questions over nationalisation shouldn't be around the costs: if the government run the newly nationalised utility as a profit making enterprise just as the private sector would, then it would have a new asset and an income stream to help pay the cost of acquiring it. The problem then comes when the utility is then used inefficiently for political ends - as a method of redistribution, rewarding the leadership's favoured client groups, or with management positions reserved for political allies, or even sweated for cash for other government goals rather than using any profits for reinvestment. Corbyn's track record is of a man who prefers loyalty to the cause and its leaders over competence. I strongly suspect he would use nationalised utilities for all those things.

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#52 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 01, 2020, 07:51:46 pm
From what I've read, the government are currently planning to fund some of this extra spending through regular investments rather than getting the BoE to buy bonds. Governments are the only people issuing new debt at the moment so investors are apparently quite happy to buy it.

You may well be right Sean, I don't know what the breakdown of all the bond issues is. The BofE has definitely increased QE by £200bn though: https://www.moneyobserver.com/news/bank-england-slashes-rates-again-and-increases-qe-will-it-do-any-good  Most of this will be on government bonds so unless it is somehow hypothecated then *I assume* that yes it will be used for coronavirus measures. I am happy to be told that assumption is wrong though!

Interestingly para 3 of that article mentions that some of this QE is going on "sterling non-financial investment-grade corporate bonds". It doesn't say how much, or which corporate bonds, but as far as I know that is the first time the central bank have printed money and invested directly in companies. Be interesting to know more about this. Sounds a lot like interfering in the market by "picking winners"! Fingers crossed its in vaccine and ventilator companies.

Do we have to pay it back? Yes I reckon at some point it's inevitable....I have no problem with this, but we have to avoid stupid, damaging and unsustainable idiocies like trying to get rid of the deficit in five years.

Assuming for a moment you are right about the source of this money, then overall I agree with the sentiment that hopefully we won't have red-in-tooth-and-claw austerity back. There was never a need for this ten years ago anyway. Continuing to further punish key workers after this crisis is unlikely to be popular politically. We can just grow out of it over a long period of time. We managed that after each world war when debt/GDP hit 200%ish. Currently 80%ish. If we are in "wartime" measures then historically we do have headroom. That said if QE does turn out to have paid for this then there should be no problem based on last decade.

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#53 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 01, 2020, 08:18:07 pm
From what I've read, the government are currently planning to fund some of this extra spending through regular investments rather than getting the BoE to buy bonds. Governments are the only people issuing new debt at the moment so investors are apparently quite happy to buy it.

You may well be right Sean, I don't know what the breakdown of all the bond issues is. The BofE has definitely increased QE by £200bn though: https://www.moneyobserver.com/news/bank-england-slashes-rates-again-and-increases-qe-will-it-do-any-good  Most of this will be on government bonds so unless it is somehow hypothecated then *I assume* that yes it will be used for coronavirus measures. I am happy to be told that assumption is wrong though!


No I stand corrected! I think the government will be borrowing an awful lot just to make up the expected fall in taxes which is going to be very sudden and very sharp.

Interestingly para 3 of that article mentions that some of this QE is going on "sterling non-financial investment-grade corporate bonds". It doesn't say how much, or which corporate bonds, but as far as I know that is the first time the central bank have printed money and invested directly in companies. Be interesting to know more about this. Sounds a lot like interfering in the market by "picking winners"! Fingers crossed its in vaccine and ventilator companies.

I think what they are doing is buying short term corporate debt to help companies keep going right now:
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/2020/march/the-covid-corporate-financing-facility

It's definitely not "picking winners" and it should absolutely not be in ventilator companies: there is a huge demand for their products right now.


Do we have to pay it back? Yes I reckon at some point it's inevitable....I have no problem with this, but we have to avoid stupid, damaging and unsustainable idiocies like trying to get rid of the deficit in five years.

Assuming for a moment you are right about the source of this money, then overall I agree with the sentiment that hopefully we won't have red-in-tooth-and-claw austerity back. There was never a need for this ten years ago anyway. Continuing to further punish key workers after this crisis is unlikely to be popular politically. We can just grow out of it over a long period of time. We managed that after each world war when debt/GDP hit 200%ish. Currently 80%ish. If we are in "wartime" measures then historically we do have headroom. That said if QE does turn out to have paid for this then there should be no problem based on last decade.

Of course you're forgetting that there was an unprecedented 30 years of high growth after the war which made reducing debt much easier than it would be in today's world of much lower growth.

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#54 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 01, 2020, 08:43:04 pm
I think what they are doing is buying short term corporate debt to help companies keep going right now:
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/2020/march/the-covid-corporate-financing-facility

It's definitely not "picking winners" and it should absolutely not be in ventilator companies: there is a huge demand for their products right now.

Thanks for the link, I understand it now and you are right of course. Still, I think this is unprecedented?

Of course you're forgetting that there was an unprecedented 30 years of high growth after the war which made reducing debt much easier than it would be in today's world of much lower growth.

Well yes again you are quite right. Equally the last ten years have been historically low. Maybe after this there will be a productivity revolution and we'll find a middle ground. Wishful thinking I know!

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#55 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 02, 2020, 03:16:11 pm
Just to weigh in on the "does this prove Corbyn right?" question... Corbyn was suggesting an awful lot of middle class bungs, such as student loans, nationalising railways, free broadband, etc. I'm not sure there is a railway crisis in the UK that warrants limited government attention and money over and above, say, social care or the NHS. To me that's (vegetarian) pork barrel politics.

More seriously, the questions over nationalisation shouldn't be around the costs: if the government run the newly nationalised utility as a profit making enterprise just as the private sector would, then it would have a new asset and an income stream to help pay the cost of acquiring it. The problem then comes when the utility is then used inefficiently for political ends - as a method of redistribution, rewarding the leadership's favoured client groups, or with management positions reserved for political allies, or even sweated for cash for other government goals rather than using any profits for reinvestment. Corbyn's track record is of a man who prefers loyalty to the cause and its leaders over competence. I strongly suspect he would use nationalised utilities for all those things.

I had to rush off for my tea last night so thought I would quickly respond to the above section of your reply. Your general point about nationalisations being an asset acquiring process I agree with. This is usually skipped over by the free-marketeers who focus only on the initial cost / debt. I note they don't usually have the same concern on let's say for example their buy-to-let houses, which are also usually a debt funded asset acquisition paying an indefinite income stream. Usually seen by them as a "good investment". They also give someone a place to live which is socially useful.

The question of how they are run is a separate one. Your perception of how Labour might hypothetically have run any newly nationalised industries is just that - hypothetical. I'll admit I don't know, but personally I don't ascribe Corbyn the Stalin-esque traits you clearly do!

On the subject of "middle class bungs", these were *on top* of the establishment of a National Social Care Service and a 4.3% per year increase in NHS funding. So the proposal at least was not either / or, as you have presented it - it was both. Whether they were necessary is a different question. Personally I think they would be practically good things - a nationalised rail service could for instance could simplify the fare structure, lower fares to a sensible level e.g. on par or less than driving, reintroduce commercially unviable but socially and environmentally useful branch lines, and remove the constant tension / blame game between Network Rail and the rolling stock operators. These social and environmental levers are often forgotten in the rush to assess the bottom line, but they do have at least as much value. Governments role is to direct resources for the long term welfare of the country so to hypothesize for a second, running a national railway at a loss for a decade might in the long run be worthwhile if it gets a lot of people out of their cars and reduces emissions. If enough people end up using it it may well turn a profit. I'm *not* saying this is specifically what I think (I don't know!) but this is the type of joined up strategic thinking we need to have to make society run better and save the planet. The argument that the market will prioritise these things over its bottom line is for the birds.

All that said politically it was probably a bad choice as to most voters it all looked too much, and opened up easy fronts for attack by the tories.

Anyway that's raking over old coals, back to politics and coronavirus!

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#56 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 02, 2020, 08:52:48 pm
Worth five minutes.

Not advocating this position, but it’s an interesting view:
https://www.newstatesman.com/2020/04/why-crisis-turning-point-history

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#57 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 02, 2020, 10:45:21 pm
Worth five minutes.

Not advocating this position, but it’s an interesting view:
https://www.newstatesman.com/2020/04/why-crisis-turning-point-history

I liked that OMM 👍

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#58 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 02, 2020, 11:01:16 pm
Worth five minutes.

Not advocating this position, but it’s an interesting view:
https://www.newstatesman.com/2020/04/why-crisis-turning-point-history

It is interesting, but I think that many people, including John Gray in this piece are perhaps struggling to find solace in the current situation by discovering that it proves a thesis or viewpoint which they already hold.
I think it's far too early to tell whether this is going to be something which changes everything, or actually changes very little. I do agree with him that reshoring of vital medical supplies will happen everywhere. There was an interesting episode of in business on R4 this evening where they discussed this, as well as probable refiguring of just in time supply chains.

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#59 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 12:28:23 am
Have you a link to that radio programme Toby? I feel it would be a better use of my time than then John Gray piece, which is junk.

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#60 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 08:27:24 am
Have you a link to that radio programme Toby? I feel it would be a better use of my time than then John Gray piece, which is junk.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000gvd3

Voila.

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#62 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 09:51:00 am
Quote
On the subject of "middle class bungs"

So as a business qualifying for small business rates relief, we are due a grant of £10,000. Staff costs are largely taken care of, which leaves rent as the biggest ongoing outgoing for most. So from here it looks like most of this huge handout will end up in the pockets of landlords. Commerical tenants have been promised protection from eviction for non-payment of rent, but that rent will still be due eventually. Tories protecting their own, or is there something I've missed here?

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#63 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 10:04:26 am
Speeding up the death of the old and vulnerable?

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/apr/02/uk-care-home-bosses-threaten-quit-over-return-coronavirus-patients


Isn't this just the sort of triage decision which, unfortunately, covid19 forces medical staff to make?

To put it in the same sensationalist language as you: slowing down the death of the slightly younger and slightly less vulnerable.

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#64 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 10:11:52 am
Quote
On the subject of "middle class bungs"

So as a business qualifying for small business rates relief, we are due a grant of £10,000. Staff costs are largely taken care of, which leaves rent as the biggest ongoing outgoing for most. So from here it looks like most of this huge handout will end up in the pockets of landlords. Commerical tenants have been promised protection from eviction for non-payment of rent, but that rent will still be due eventually. Tories protecting their own, or is there something I've missed here?

Yes. Very much in the same position.

We are trying a slightly tougher line with the landlord, asking for a rent holiday, leaning on them with the “you’d be at least three months without rent while you found a new tenant, if you could in the current climate anyway etc etc”.

Secondly, I will believe the £10k when it shows up, because there’s no actual time line on it yet; just as there’s still no actual process to recover the furlough costs (which we have to pay then claim back).

I suppose 10k sounds meaty. Even for a fairly well paid person that sounds like a couple of months salary. However, even for a small business, with a turnover below 100k, it’s tiny.

I managed to get a cash advance from our card handler (at a fixed fee, no interest and recoverable at 10% of future card sales, no fixed repayment, just a minimum every 90 days), just before everything kicked off. They were all over it, realising they were looking at losing all those transaction fees. Much more reasonable than the banks.

However, if the government don’t deliver by the end of April? Well, then everything stops until they do.

The fact that this scheme is being used by large companies, owned by billionaires too, who are capable of bailing their own companies out, is galling. I suppose I grudgingly understand it and the reality is that the billionaires are untouchable, but it’s not “right” somehow.

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#65 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 10:14:45 am
Speeding up the death of the old and vulnerable?

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/apr/02/uk-care-home-bosses-threaten-quit-over-return-coronavirus-patients


Isn't this just the sort of triage decision which, unfortunately, covid19 forces medical staff to make?

To put it in the same sensationalist language as you: slowing down the death of the slightly younger and slightly less vulnerable.

Yes Pete.
Though sending the (possibly) infected into places that are not equipped to provide appropriate isolation, seems likely to spread the infection and compound the problem?


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#66 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 10:21:00 am
Quote
To put it in the same sensationalist language as you: slowing down the death of the slightly younger and slightly less vulnerable

However people with learning difficulties being sent Do Not Resuscitate forms to sign has a horrible whiff of eugenics. Eugh. https://twitter.com/VoyageCEO/status/1245415024396587008

Quote
We are trying a slightly tougher line with the landlord, asking for a rent holiday, leaning on them with the “you’d be at least three months without rent while you found a new tenant, if you could in the current climate anyway etc etc”.

However, even for a small business, with a turnover below 100k, it’s tiny.

Yes, planning the same. Outgoings last year >600k. If he has a mortgage he can get a holiday. If not, tiny violin (pretty sure he was given the building by his Dad). We also have some context of an impending 30% rent increase.

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#67 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 10:59:49 am
Speeding up the death of the old and vulnerable?

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/apr/02/uk-care-home-bosses-threaten-quit-over-return-coronavirus-patients


Isn't this just the sort of triage decision which, unfortunately, covid19 forces medical staff to make?

To put it in the same sensationalist language as you: slowing down the death of the slightly younger and slightly less vulnerable.

It's not triage to put infected people in the place with both the highest risk to others and the least government help in staff preparation and protection to deal with it. I'd say it's the legal H&S duty of care home managers to refuse returned people to their care who have not tested as negative for infection.

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#68 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 11:24:03 am
Quote
On the subject of "middle class bungs"

So as a business qualifying for small business rates relief, we are due a grant of £10,000. Staff costs are largely taken care of, which leaves rent as the biggest ongoing outgoing for most. So from here it looks like most of this huge handout will end up in the pockets of landlords. Commerical tenants have been promised protection from eviction for non-payment of rent, but that rent will still be due eventually. Tories protecting their own, or is there something I've missed here?

I don't think you have missed that. People are real but arguments about the economy increasingly become academic and problematic given the complexity and dishonesty of where we are in the world these days. I suspect we all live in a world kleptocracy, due to the reliance of the worlds two biggest economies on shadow banking. The super rich too often use finance in parasitic ways to increase their own wealth and too often hide that in tax havens.

There was a paper I saw on the UK shadow banking, published about 5 years ago looking back at the period running up to the 2008 crash. They said most UK money that was in the UK was if you tracked it back, based on UK property..... arguably a bubble but not massively so.... most of the huge amount of international  money held in the UK was in dodgy financial vehicles, mostly based on sub-prime US property. The UK handled a lot of this as we had laxer rules than the US  on the number of loops  you could take the money around, loops which multiplied up the value of products compared to the value of the security it was based on (in terms of subprime, this was several times a big number secured on something almost worthless). Given the limited effect of 2008 on shadow banking, another crisis will come, not long down the line, maybe even off the back of Covid19.

On another point, to support Nigel's arguments above, various economic think tanks costed Corbyn's plans and the tory plans assuming various degrees of hardness of brexit and the Corbyn fantasy (as he couldn't win a big majority and any coalition would have reigned him in) vs a fairly significant risk of a tory no deal brexit were pretty similar in effect in overall GDP terms.
« Last Edit: April 03, 2020, 11:30:51 am by Offwidth »

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#69 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 12:34:49 pm
Agreed JB, suspect a lot of this will "trickle up" as per. Tell your landlord to take either a mortgage holiday, or a hike  ;)

The fact that there is not enough PPE and testing for the NHS is still grinding my gears, especially since the government have now deflected from the promised "ramping up" to 25,000 tests/day (which is nowhere near being achieved) not by actually doing it, but instead by promising 100,000/day by the end of the month. I hope they get there obvs but let's meet back on 1st May to see how they're doing shall we...

In the first instance, given this is a SARS-type virus, if the government are not providing health care workers *all* of the PPE listed in section 6 of the following HSE link then surely they are in breach of their own HSAW Act? Do journalists ever ask whether the gov thinks it is complying with its own laws? I don't watch the briefings any more but I doubt it. If they've let themselves off it via the new coronavirus bill it would still be good to know:

https://www.hse.gov.uk/biosafety/diseases/sars.html

Given the old maxim "those who ignore history are condemned to repeat it" I thought I'd google "NHS preparations SARS 2003". I can't read the full article as I don't subscribe but from the first few paras of the below we had in 2003 plans in place for a special quarantine hospital in the UK while SARS-1 was still only present in China. Compare with known UK gov plans from December this time round? Anyone access the whole thing?

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nhs-told-to-prepare-for-sars-outbreak-rllwnrh5sps

From the same search the following article highlights 2 main things -
1) UK gov pandemic planning was based on an influenza type virus, rather than SARS
2) NHS resilience was/is compromised by a Conservative obsession with efficiency:

https://members.tortoisemedia.com/2020/03/30/chris-cook-coronavirus-nhs-at-capacity/content.html

And finally even if the pandemic was an influenza-type one as per the planning, then this Pandemic Influenza Response Plan document from 2014 shows that part of the response was (Pg 13):

 the collection and analysis of detailed clinical and epidemiological information on
early cases on which to base early estimates of impact and severity in the UK (First
Few Hundred (FF100), Appendix 9)

"reducing the risk of transmission and infection with the virus within the local
community by:
- actively finding cases
- advising community voluntary self-isolation of cases and suspected cases"

This seems to imply early contact tracing. Was this done?

Full doc here for anyone interested enough to read more than I did, which wasn't much: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/344695/PI_Response_Plan_13_Aug.pdf

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#70 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 01:11:11 pm
And from the Cabinet Office National Risk Register 2008 https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/61934/national_risk_register.pdf

Page 5 shows Pandemic Influenza on a chart as a relatively high likelihood risk (on par with severe weather) with much the highest relative impact of any other risk. I don't have the tech skills to put an image but I wish I could! How does that tally with relative spending across the risks?

There is a section on Pg 15 regarding New and Emerging Infectious Diseases e.g. SARS. It is, as far as I can tell, pretty vague but I'm outside my area.

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#71 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 02:48:55 pm
Quote from: Offwidth

It's not triage to put infected people in the place with both the highest risk to others and the least government help in staff preparation and protection to deal with it.

Under any other circumstance I’d agree. So you’re implying there is somewhere else they could go instead. I’m open to hearing your suggestion for a solution if you have one. Or were you just pointing out another shitty thing for the sake of it?

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#72 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 02:51:06 pm
It's pretty obvious...they stay in hospital if they are infected.

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#73 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 02:55:47 pm
Quote from: Offwidth

It's not triage to put infected people in the place with both the highest risk to others and the least government help in staff preparation and protection to deal with it.

This implies there is somewhere else they could go instead. I’m open to hearing your suggestion for a solution if you have one. Or were you just pointing out another shitty thing for the sake of it?

To be fair to Offwidth, shitty things are hard to ignore these days.

I think you are both right, but it’s not up to Offwidth to suggest an alternative.  I tend towards the “they know more than we do” end of the spectrum with regards to government decisions, but we’re surely all aware, sometimes, it’s actually a mistake. A detail that’s slipped through a hole in an overtaxed agenda.
The Media and even social media, seem reasonable ways to raise awareness. Like the PPE thing?

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#74 Re: COVID-19 and the state of politics
April 03, 2020, 03:11:15 pm
In the first instance, given this is a SARS-type virus, if the government are not providing health care workers *all* of the PPE listed in section 6 of the following HSE link then surely they are in breach of their own HSAW Act? Do journalists ever ask whether the gov thinks it is complying with its own laws? I don't watch the briefings any more but I doubt it. If they've let themselves off it via the new coronavirus bill it would still be good to know:

https://www.hse.gov.uk/biosafety/diseases/sars.htm


Sorry for report of above but am just fixing link - I don't know how to edit posts!

 

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