Today’s Autumn Statement of tax hikes, giving the U.K. the highest tax burden in 70 years (at 35.5% of GDP), is a direct consequence of the disastrous decisions taken during the pandemic to borrow and spend so much on lockdowns and other measures, the Telegraph has said in a leading article today.
This time last year, the country was still in the grip of a Covid pandemic panic. Despite the vaccination of much of the country, a surge in cases and a rise in hospitalisations caused by new variants led to the reimposition of mask wearing and other controls. At one point, it appeared that Christmas would be cancelled again until the Cabinet pushed back against scientific pressure for a new lockdown.
Rishi Sunak, then chancellor of the Exchequer, was among the strongest voices opposing further mandatory restrictions because of the impact on the public finances. But even so the Treasury had to dig deep into the national coffers again.
A year ago, Mr. Sunak may have had his doubts about the wisdom of yet more spending but he had already presided over the biggest peacetime accumulation of debt, ostensibly to sustain the economy through the pandemic shock. His difficulty now that he is in No 10 is that the bills must be paid. Today’s Autumn Statement, likely to be the most painful fiscal retrenchment for decades, is at least in part the consequence of a series of wrong decisions that has left the U.K. in a worse position than most other similar countries.
The war in Ukraine and its knock-on effects on energy and inflation add to the woes, the Telegraph says. “But the real context for his statement and for the country’s – and the world’s – economic woes is the pandemic and specifically the lockdowns it engendered.”
Ministers became “excessively cautious when it became clear that the risk to the wider population was smaller than feared” and “this continued even after vaccines were available”.
The goal of protecting the NHS was misplaced as it was “operating at well under capacity throughout”.
Yet now the growing backlog of routine treatments is “hindering the economic recovery because so many are off work” while “much younger people are dying as a result of late diagnoses of conditions that might have been treatable had they been caught earlier”. With excess deaths running high despite the expected mortality displacement of the pandemic, the aim of protecting the NHS has “engineered a health crisis whose long-term impact will be greater than Covid”.
Some attempt should have been made to “carry out a cost-benefit analysis of lockdowns”, the Telegraph says, as “no Government had ever planned for putting the economy into a coma and then expecting it to wake up raring to go”.
Yet the opposition would have “locked down for longer and borrowed more” so has no grounds to criticise.
Today’s Autumn Statement is thus the “reckoning” for lockdowns, the Telegraph says.
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: Isabel Oakeshott made the same point on TalkTV earlier.
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Let’s make that 100%. This is our ‘window of opportunity’ as Klaus Schwab might say… bring on the tumbrels. No Mercy. Information, resources and useful links: https://www.LCAHub.org/
I was l thinking it should be 100%
ICYMI: Vaccinated Can’t Donate Blood, COVID Vaccine Wipes Out Antibodies – Red Cross [VIDEO]
https://www.redvoicemedia.com/2021/09/vaccinated-cant-donate-blood-covid-vaccine-wipes-out-antibodies-red-cross-video/
Upcoming events anti lockdown roadside events with the Big Boards to a Grand Stand in the Park
Wednesday 15th September 5.30pm Rebels on Roundabouts
Downshire Way, Bracknell RG12 7AA
near Premier Inn/Bracknell Fire Station
Saturday 2nd October 2pm GRAND STAND IN THE PARK BERKSHIRE
– with a couple of guest speakers and a stroll thought the town centre at the end
Reading River Promenade
Reading RG4 8BX
Stand in the Park Reading River Promenade Reading
Sundays from 10am
Telegram https://t.me/standindparkreading
Stand in the Park South Hill Park Bracknell –
Sundays from 10am
Wednesdays from 2pm
Make friends – keep sane
Telegram http://t.me/astandintheparkbracknell
How many of them work for the government or civil service? It’s evident they don’t think rules apply to them.
Just following the example shown by our “leaders and betters”, like the BBQ the G7 had in Cornwall, Obama’s birthday bash, visiting opticians etc.
Lucy Moreton, of the Immigration Services Union, said the quarantine system “very much relied on the honesty of people to do the right thing, rather than any type of meaningful enforcement”.
Like everything else about this scamdemic, the whole thing is theatre, the government pretending to be doing something, whilst reliant on the gullability of Jo Public.
Don’t know anyone that bothered following the regulations 100% on return.
Not a single person.
I’ve ignored every “regulation” from day one. It’s all a scam, though a very dangerous one. We have a duty to resist this nonsense at all times. It will go on until we stop it.
Yeah agree- This non news is filler I guess – who gives a flying fuck about an absurd token rule based on the whim of a bunch of criminals at large. I had to ‘self isolate’ v recently and just carried on as per normal (albeit I work from home anyway- but I went to shops etc for food). If I had an illness I would have stayed at home as always but I didn’t. The least complicit action is to ignore every single lie and just live like this wasn’t happening – since day 1 for me.
I doubt it made any difference.
I’m sure it didn’t (as ‘sure’ as you can be about anything).
“the honesty of people to do the right thing”
… which would be to totally ignore stupid restrictions that have no purpose.
Absolutely.
And , as far as ” the honesty of people to do the right thing” we should follow the lead of our elected representatives.
OK so it did not take too long to reboot from that principled position..
No meaningful enforcement, eh?
Good.
As far as I can research there are no laws/regulations requiring quarantine, there are rules and guidelines, these can, however, be run through with a coach and horses (loads of excuses).
Be warned that the Government can detain you through The 1984 Public Health Act which allows them to detain infectious people.
I’m returning from Italy soon and I’ve no intention of quarantining as I have had Covid and had a private test for antibodies. I haven’t had the vaccine. I also have to have 2 tests. My husband on the other hand having 2 jabs only has to take 1 test and doesn’t have to quarantine. The fact that the UK government does not recognise natural immunity is not “following the science”. Let them knock on my door, I’ll be taking my son to uni
The BBC have precisely zero credibility and exist only to push regime approved propaganda. This story is nothing more than seeding for the fraudulent manufacture of ever more spurious justification for the regime’s inevitable attempt to impose another unlawful ‘lockdown’.
Nice framing:
i) ‘breaking the rules’ versus ‘not following the rules’
ii) ‘breaking the law’ versus ‘not following the law’
The western regimes are always on about ‘nasty evil Russia not following the rules’. We can now see for ourselves what their ‘rules-based order’ is all about.
Is it me or are the so called arguments the government are using to control the sheeple getting more ridicules and even the dumbest of the sheep are seeing through the lies? Or is it just wishful thinking on my behalf?
I thought polls showed that almost everyone was in favour of travel quarantine measures. And yet a third are broke the rules…. hmm, how interesting.
For yourself, rules are rules until they become inconvenient to yourself. For everybody else, rules are rules, period.
Strange – I used to believe one was innocent until proved guilty. Still, I used to be young (No, not him!) and naive.
The scamps!
This increasingly resembles all totalitarian systems.
Totally stupid rules.
Everyone knows that.
People break them when they feel like it.
There is then just a risk of being caught and suffering a penalty.
But the whole thing is really just a power game and an ego trip by the people in “power”.
Cloaked as moral virtue and using human fear as the weapon.
The lack of logic is part of the point too.
If they know that about one third were breaking their stupid rules then that means a whole lot more were actually breaking the rules. Well done to all of them. Quarantine is yet more “be seen to be doing something” nonsense rather than anything which actually works when covid is already widespread.
So what if they broke the rules…anyone complying with house arrest is a bedwetting virtue signaller.
The virus is a hoax.
This is only being trotted out now to programme us into a more authoritarian approach later. I. E camps.
Well good on all who disobeyed the ‘rules’.
I was supposed to self isolate for ten days. I was staying with my friend and his 3 kids. How does ‘self-isolation’ work in this instance?
Also I had to do the ‘tests’ but guess who took them to the post office? Yup me.
Basically apart from doing the tests I carried on as per normal, I did get contacted by someone on my Thai phone number and when I was aked if she could share the information with foreign office I stated categorically NO. Whoever they were did not bother me again.