Coronavirus - how has the UK done? (Part 1)

          If you are a conservative politician, particularly PM or a cabinet member, then today must feel like a victory. Finally, managed to hit a target in relation to Coronavirus. One set only a month ago. Surely this shows that this government means what it says and now Boris Johnson PM is back in charge everything will turn out alright? As a voter who wanted them in power, who thinks that a Labour government would have been far worse, this must feel like vindication.

          Well, if you believe that, then I have a genuine Picasso to sell you, guvnor. Honest. Boner Fidey it is. What we have seen during this crisis is some masterful propaganda. Genuinely a masterclass in managing the public perception. Because, based on what information we have at the moment, we have fared worse than almost any other country in terms of our response to the challenges of Coronavirus. This is not just based on opinion or preference or political leanings. We, as a country and as a society, have lost far more people, suffered more death than we ever should have done according to the latest death tolls.

          That may seem like a bold statement, but it is based on the available statistics. Ultimately if we are going to compare countries, then this needs to be based on the outcomes – how fatal or damaging this virus has been. That is a really difficult thing to measure, but the consensus appears to be to use fatalities from Coronavirus (whilst we wait for the data to be considered in more detail over a longer period). The obvious comparisons against the UK are other European states. Proximity, similar socialist outlooks (i.e. healthcare, schools, sick pay etc.), access to world travel, genetically, social / ethnic mix, etc.It is worth saying up front - the data is not complete yet. Nor is it all directly comparable. In fact no two countries are the same in their demography or how they collect and report statistics. In time, there will be long statistical and research studies performed that will produce that information. But by then it will be ignored. The only limited defence that I can use is this - if we compare against 4 other countries that the OECD (and others) regularly compare us against as being similar, this should mitigate some bias. The changes of all 4 being incorrectly reported IN THE SAME DIRECTION are vanishingly small. 

          What do the available statistics tell us? Well in the UK in the first 5 weeks of Coronavirus impacting us (i.e. since we started recording 10+ deaths per day) there have been 26,097 reported deaths. From a population of 68 million. That means we have seen 0.38 fatalities from Coronavirus per 1,000 population. In Italy, over the equivalent first 5 weeks, that was 15,887 deaths against 60m (gives 0.26 per 1,000 population). In fact, if we look at number of deaths for similar size European countries, they are easily to tabulate. Simply put, we have seen a greater number of deaths than any country in Europe on that basis.

Country	Deaths per 1,000 population in first 5 weeks
UK	0.38
Spain	0.37
France	0.29
Italy	0.26
Germany	0.05

Based on information collated by Statista.com

         
          So, we can’t argue otherwise – we have the worst outcomes in the early stages of any comparable European country. Yes, statistics are tricky, and there may be under-reporting or other issues. But there is no reason to believe that these issues would unfairly treat us compared to 4 other countries all with the same challenges. Why? Why have we done so badly compared to other countries? Particularly given when we have, according to international comparisons one of the best healthcare systems in the world?

          There are lots of news articles calling out specific activities that did or didn’t happen that, frankly, I am going to dismiss. Whether your feeling is that Dominic Cummings should not have sat in on meetings of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), or that Boris Johnson should have been present for the 5 Cobra meetings that he missed, whilst these may show the method of operation of this government, they really can’t account for the difference in death rates. In fact, many people would argue keeping Boris Johnson away from making decisions is probably helpful rather than a detriment. I instead think we should be focussing on 4 key areas that do seem to have made a difference to the success of different countries in reducing the death toll. They are:

• 1.    Speed and scope of social distancing measures;

• 2.    Ability to increase capacity of health services;

• 3.    Provision of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE); and

• 4   Testing for Coronavirus.

I don’t want to spend time going in to why each of these is important in the fight. After all, since the start of this crisis the people who were previously constitutional experts on Facebook have re-trained as virologists it turns out. But the world over these 4 tools or levers (along with track and trace as a fifth in some countries) have been the available actions open to governments to use. I am going to consider the first two in this blog (part 1), and then look at the second two and the media management in part 2.

Speed and scope of social distancing measures

In the UK, by the 5^th March we had breached the figure of 100 confirmed Coronavirus cases (it was 114 on that day). It seems a reasonable starting point for comparisons to be taken against other countries. To put some context around it, by then we had seen Italy (which reached that milestone on the 23^rd February) in clear trouble with an explosion in number of cases that was already threatening to overwhelm their health service – by the 5^th March this had turned in to 4,000 confirmed cases. By the 10^th March, this had turned in to 10,000 confirmed cases in Italy (along with 631 deaths). Our government knew that this was a problem, and one that required urgent action.

It is both surprising and appalling then that we did not initiate the social distancing measures we now see until the 23^rd March. That is 18 days when the government failed to take action to implement social distancing that had been seen to work in other countries and that scientists were saying was our best action at that point in time. 18 days. In that time period alone over 3,000 more people had been CONFIRMED as having been infected in the UK – when the rate of infection was doubling every 2 days. 359 people died from it in that period. Quite simply our government acted too late.

There has been lots of speculation and accusation as to why that is. Certainly, interviews given in the early to middle part of March by ministers and officials suggest that at that point the government was working to a “herd immunity” strategy. This changed very suddenly around March 18^th – when this was dismissed by (amongst others) Matt Hancock MP – the Secretary of State for Health. But why the sudden (apparent) change? Because the whole concept of herd immunity was rubbished by the science. It wasn’t something you could aim for; it was something that might be a side effect of not acting enough and letting lots of people die. But this wasn’t new scientific thinking – this was always the case. 

A fair challenge then, is why are there no members of SAGE coming out to say that the government ignored their advice? Every government minister who has given press conferences or updates, from the very outset, has stuck to the line - "we are being led by the science" or "we are following the advice of the scientists". Surely we should be raging at SAGE for giving such bad advice? 

This ignores a fundamental and very important aspect of scientific advice. Scientists provide answers. What they don't do, in this setting, is ask the questions. It is quite simple really to use the questions to lead your response. If you ask "What is the best way to reduce deaths and keep people safe from Coronavirus?" to a group of scientists you will get one set of answers. If you ask "What is the best route to take to manage Coronavirus whilst protecting the economy?" or "What steps will we be able to implement quickly on Coronavirus without worrying the public?" or many other, well you get very different answers. It is a very clever way of deflecting the blame from yourself as a government. We are being led by the science. What you never add is that the science is being led by you. 

What questions the scientists were being asked to opine on can be guessed at. But we don’t know, and right at this moment that isn’t important. What does matter is that because Boris Johnson’s government left it so long more people have been infected, and more people have died.

Ability to increase capacity of health services

One of the most worrying things for anyone following the news during the early days of this crisis was watching the health services of European countries struggle and collapse under the pressure. Countries worst hit by this phenomenon were Italy, Spain, and Portugal. There are a number of connecting themes for these countries – that are shared with the UK. The specifics of the Coronavirus mean that to reduce death tolls (amongst patients) requires 3 things – ventilators (along with the specialist spaces in hospitals); doctors; and nurses to run those beds. It is really that simple. Because we don’t yet have a really effective treatment regime or a vaccine the only thing that health services can do is treat the symptoms. Beds, doctors and nurses.

The common thread that runs through those 3 countries is that they were all hit hard during the last financial crisis, and that they all suffered from long, drawn out austerity plans that reduced the capacity and capability of their health services. They are 3 of the 5 “PIIGS” economies that were most impacted (the other 2 were Ireland and Greece) and faced the deepest cuts. Quite simply government spending on healthcare had been slashed in those countries in the run up to the current crisis. In fact, spending had fallen in Portugal and Spain and kept flat in Italy.

Why then didn’t we see the NHS facing the same catastrophe? This is a mixture of a number of factors, some historic and some based on government actions. The NHS has seen – over the years of Tory austerity – a marked reduction in growth of spending on it. The statistics and budgets make it very clear that since 2009 the NHS has not had the same level of government support it had previously enjoyed. This is not a point that can be argued. Certainly, we now spend more than we previously have, and this rises every year. But it is not rising in line with the historic trend. Our government is constantly tightening what is spent on health services.

Thankfully, historically we have invested in health services more than other countries. This has meant that because of a higher starting point even though we have faced similar or greater cuts due to austerity our health service is still amongst the best in the world. And you get it for free – at the time of writing this. We haven’t yet been dragged down to the level of care that the government appears to be heading towards over the last 11 years. 

Additionally, one thing that the NHS did very quickly that other countries hadn't gotten right was to immediately limit the scope of all other services provided. In particular "elective" procedures. To give an example of an elective procedure, these include knee and hip replacements, removal of cataracts or fitting of leg-braces. I am not a clinician, and these decisions must be led by what is needed. What can be mentioned is that this decision has one other helpful effect. The government hasn't met it's target for elective procedures for the last 8 years (having previously met it or been close since the introduction). At least this time next year they have a reasonable explanation for it. Is it too much to expect that this will be the end of that measure?

In addition, the government was able to, at very short notice, set up additional centres to help deal with any overspill by utilising NHS and military (along with civilian contractor) resources. The speed at which these were made ready and operational is a testament to the excellence of our armed forces and the NHS. Thankfully the planning for this sort of threat had been done well in advance. In 2016 there was a 3-day exercise on how the UK would cope with a flu pandemic. The findings from that exercise were stark. And unfortunately, many were not listened to. We have known for a number of years that we needed a stockpile of ventilators and PPE. But the government never spent the money to acquire them.

We did have the plans drawn up to increase the number of available beds. In fact, these plans were immediately put in place. The army and NHS managed to set up the Nightingale centre in an unbelievable amount of time due to their hard work. It has so far treated 51 patients in it’s 4000 beds. It wasn’t needed in the end, because the NHS in London worked brilliantly to manage the surge in numbers. Time may yet tell, and this may be a prescient decision. We may face a second surge in cases. Or we may face a double crisis when the flu season starts if we haven’t gotten a vaccine. As a much wiser man than I said “I would rather be looking at it, than looking for it”.

In addition, it made excellent news when it was opened, and really, isn’t that all that matters? Again, what was needed, much more than the beds themselves, was a good media story to placate the media. When this is over, hopefully there will be an enquiry – one aim should be to understand how the NHS pulled off the seemingly impossible, and another should be to work out why the hell we didn’t implement the learnings of our disaster planning exercise.

That doesn’t finish this blog – in fact this is only halfway. In part 2 I want to cover PPE, testing and media management. Because it seems that a lot more time has been spent considering media management than any other aspect.

Pick a side - will you continue to press the button?

There is a big red button on your phone. If you don’t press it, nothing happens. That is how buttons work generally. But if you do press it, it might tell somebody else to kill someone. How often would you press the button?

So yet another attack has taken place by a hate-filled extremist on people going about their daily business. This time around it took place in New Zealand. A right-wing Australian with guns and hate massacred unarmed unsuspecting people going about their regular business. A few days later an attack on a tram in Utrecht appears to be people being shot by a suspected Muslim terrorist with guns and hate. Just this week we hear that devices have been placed on railway lines by Brexiters.

We can add these to the list of atrocities committed by many different individuals. Manchester concert bombings, the Pittsburgh synagogue attack, London Bridge, Finsbury Park. When you start to research these atrocities often a motive is given for the attack – Anti-Semitism or Racism or Right-wing Terror. I think it is a lot simpler than that.

Often when I write I compare events or opinions or arguments and look at them side by side and explore the differences. Lots has been written about the New Zealand attack – how it was out of the ordinary, how it has driven an immediate response in New Zealand, profiles of the attacker asking what went wrong to bring him here, how the attack was carried out.

What saddens me is how obviously similar it is to all of the other attacks mentioned above. And that we will face many more of these. The script, the background story always seems to be the same. Lone individual, possibly some contact with hate groups, obtained weaponry and attacked at a time / in a way designed to create maximum outrage and fear.

What brings these individuals or small groups to this point? A point where they decide that the only way to make an impact to further their views, to achieve success is to go out and kill people they have never met and have no connection to, on the basis of whatever motivation they wish to give? Some of these attackers have left their thoughts – either in the form of videos or manifestos or even Facebook posts. So we can state their ideologies and way of thinking with a bit of certainty.

Firstly, they all seem to believe in absolute groups. Us and them. Whoever the “them” are doesn’t seem to matter in the grand scheme of things. They could be Muslims, Immigrants, Jews, Non-Muslims. It is still very fresh in the memory that Jo Cox was murdered by one of these attackers. Her “them”? She was a remainer. Just imagine that. The line that separated people who should live and have rights and people it was acceptable to kill was which way they voted in a referendum.

These lines don’t exist. These separating lines that split us into definite groups are not real. But we do it all the time. We align ourselves to others of the same religion, the same political party, family, country, football team and use that alignment to see Them as somehow different. We have far more in common with other people, no matter how little we think we do, than we have that is different.

Secondly, They have either done some unfairness or injustice to us, or are going to and we should do something about it – because nobody else is. This is the deep-rooted belief that the threat / unfairness is obvious, that everybody sees it, but that the authorities are ignoring it OR are powerless OR weak. This is either that immigrants are taking over our country, that Jews are pulling the strings to control government, trying to steal Brexit from us, invading our countries to steal our oil / power / influence. Whatever It is that They have done or will do, It is obvious from the messages / communications / inputs the attacker sees. They are all equally guilty of It too, because they are one group solely defined by one characteristic.

Again, we have to call bullshit on this thinking. And we see it all the time. Not all Muslims are terrorists or paedophiles who trade young girls. Not all Westerners supported various invasions. Not all immigrants are trying to steal your culture and your land. What I find really scary is that often when talking to otherwise sensible people they have been conned into looking at one example and extrapolating that risk across the whole They, and unless you can refute that single example that is proof They are all like that. We have to be better than that.

Thirdly, that they are acting on behalf of the rest of the Us. They are doing it in Our name or Their name. Depending on which side of their invented line you sit. This might be the act that wakes Us up, shows Us what to do, and scares Them into stopping / giving up. It will ignite / unite Us in taking action – because we are all just waiting.

How do they get to this point? Where do these ideas come from? That they have support for their actions, some sort of reward awaits them? They’ll be seen as some sort of hero? Whilst their worldviews may be coloured by the mainstream media, or religion, or groups, and this is where their “motivation” comes from, this belief that they are supported and believed seems in almost all cases to come from social media interactions. This seems to be the only place they could possibly take the belief that there is a legion of support for what they are about to do.

There is a big red button on your phone. If you don’t press it, nothing happens. But if you do press it, it might tell somebody else to kill someone. How often would you press the button?

We know from the writings of Anders Brevik he took most of his motivation and ideas from other people writing on forums and social media. ISIS regularly use facebook, twitter and youtube to get their message across because they know these lone wolf individuals take succour from it. During the recent attack in New Zealand the perpetrator live streamed it on Facebook. Over and over these vile individuals take their comfort, their support, their motivation from posts of other people on social media.

It’s also important to remember – the people who do this – they think differently from us. For the vast majority of us the idea of getting so angry that we decide to attack, injure and kill people is abhorrent. More so in cold blood. But none of them are picked up in advance. They suddenly follow up on their decision making. Often family and friends are aware of their views – but not that they are dangerous or genuinely considering this action. Until somebody is dead. I am not a psychologist – I have no training to say who will behave like this. Maybe we are all capable. But I don’t know which of my friends, family, readers of this blog, and colleagues are capable of turning. Neither do you.

There is a big red button on your phone. If you don’t press it, nothing happens. But if you do press it, it might tell somebody else to kill someone. How often would you press the button?

We have to choose a side. Are we the person who presses this button or not? This week as an example videos emerged of British Army soldiers shooting as an image of Jeremy Corbyn. If you support this – can you be certain that won’t be seen as a message to someone to take out his old service revolver and do it? After all Darren Osborne (who attacked Finsbury Park) was looking for a way to kill Jeremy Corbyn. That post decrying Tony Blair as a war criminal who got away with it? Posting videos calling remain supporting MPs traitors? Linking Leave supporting MPs to violent racism? Do you really know the impact of the language of hate on people around you? Perhaps you do. Strangely I reckon the families and friends of the people mentioned as carrying out these attacks felt comfortable sharing hate, and bile, and anger. I wonder if they do now.

There is a big red button on your phone. If you don’t press it, nothing happens. But if you do press it, it might tell somebody else to kill someone. How often would you press the button?

The importance of appearing in control and how not to do it (when in opposition)

I started out this particular blog post to try and suggest some answers as to why we have ended up in such a mess over the Brexit process (because the road to the decision is a strange and dark one, and I have talked about it enough. In particular to look at the behaviours of the two main political party leaders in the UK. They have, in my opinion, both shown a lack of leadership and this is at the heart of the situation we currently find ourselves in.

            I have already spent a lot of time on the first part of this blog considering how Theresa May has fared against a relatively common set of leadership characteristics:

• ·      Integrity – not just being honest, but being seen to be honest, and doing the right thing even when you can get away with doing the wrong thing
• ·      Courage – in making decisions, even unpopular ones, with limited information, and willing to address difficult points
• ·      Impartiality and fairness – not pandering to special or favourite causes, identifying the fairest outcome for everyone from a situation
• ·      Good communication – in both directions, able to explain their message so others get it with clarity and conviction, and able to listen to others and hear their points
• ·      Flexibility and responsiveness – able to alter not only their plans and direction, but their style to achieve their outcome, and able to listen to other people’s ideas and use the best one, not simply their own

Against which time and again she has been found wanting, and badly ( https://unexpectedsocialist.blogspot.com/2019/01/the-importance-of-appearing-in-control.html ). But surely it is only fair to consider Jeremy Corbyn by the same yardstick? The great man of principle who is very much beloved of party members (if not entirely by his parliamentary labour party) must hold these qualities in spades?

Its much harder to cover the entire process for the opposition leader. Firstly he has had very little (i.e. nothing) to do with the formal process. I will therefore focus on a few key points in the process where he had opportunity to show leadership. Specifically: in the immediate aftermath of the referendum result; the vote on Theresa May’s deal and calling and holding the vote of no confidence.

I remember after the vote itself being completely shocked, saddened and well, scared the following few days. This was a fundamental shift for our country. I had always been European as well as British and English, with family, friends and work colleagues across Europe and here from Europe. I’ve worked as an accountant and seen the millions of pounds of EU money coming in to areas of the North East desperate for regeneration. I’ve studied Economics and understood the absolute logic of being part of trade blocs.

This was a body blow to me and many others. We were dismayed and confused. What we needed was calm, a chance to re-group and get used to this. Instead we got a Prime Minister running away from the problem he had created and a leader of the opposition calling for an immediate invocation of article 50. There were two massive problems with this immediate approach.

Firstly, Corbyn had a long history of concerns over being members of the EU and expressing a desire to leave. He belatedly became an advocate for staying. Throughout the campaign he had stayed away from the main campaign to avoid standing with David Cameron (his reason). Calling for this so quickly immediately left his integrity open to question. It doesn’t matter whether he was being genuinely honest or not. Its whether people see you as being honest. This approach damaged his integrity. Coupled with repeated questions on which way he voted that he refused to answer, he was opened up by his detractors and across the press as lacking integrity.

Secondly, what we needed was calm and a chance to come back together as a nation after a referendum campaign that had been divisive and nasty. But it appeared that this opportunity to make political capital, and to put pressure on the conservative party was more important. It is really hard to see the fairness in that – putting party politics ahead of doing the right thing. Both of these issues stemmed from a man who was no longer listening to the pulse of the country, and a man who had failed to get out his message.

Of course many Corbyn supporters (and I class myself as a supporter) will point out that it is hard to communicate when you have large parts of the press against you. This hasn’t happened over night. There has always been an image of him portrayed by his detractors. It didn’t suddenly appear. The narrative he has been wrapped in is made to measure. But the reason it fits so well is that decisions he makes and how he communicates absolutely lend themselves to it. It sometimes feels like there is a conspiracy to ruin his credentials – and that conspiracy is made up of the Conservative party, right wing media interests and Jeremy Corbyn.

I absolutely get that Jeremy has painted his life as a man of integrity, and a man of principle. There can be no question that he has made difficult and unpopular decisions based on a strong moral sense of right and wrong. Once he has decided what he feels is the morally right thing then he sees it through.*

I absolutely get that Jeremy Corbyn is unwilling to change. He’s made a career out of purposefully choosing the other view – almost for fun. He makes a snap decision on evidence at the time and sticks with it come hell or high water. This “man of principle” is so addicted to being morally right that he can’t accept when he is wrong or things change.*

(*Delete as appropriate)

And therein lay the problem. Because his behaviour and the way he acts and delivers his message can be played both of those ways. In order to be an effective leader you must be able to communicate and be flexible. You have to be responsive and aware. Sometimes sticking to your guns and your tried and trusted methods because you have always been that person is actually the counter to integrity – not the embodiment of it. Jumping into the trap laid for you over and over again shows a lack of flexibility, responsiveness and communication skills.

We’ve seen this behaviour in the House of Commons over the last few weeks. In fact both Corbyn and May have been guilty of the title of this blog – wanting to appear in control rather than wanting to be in control.

When Theresa May lost, as she knew she must, the vote on her badly-won, self-serving, ill-communicated, cowardly deal she immediately challenged Corbyn to bring forward a motion of no confidence in the government. Everyone knew he had to. But to her mind this was her showing the world she was still in charge. If anybody other than May and Hammond believe she is still in control of events then please send them my way – I have a second-hand bridge over the Thames I would like to sell them. However it gave her a chance to remove the initiative from him.

When that motion failed, as he knew it must, Jeremy Corbyn immediately rebuffed May’s offer of talks without his pre-conditions were met. Again, this was an attempt to show he was now in control and would only meet on his terms. Whilst this has now proven to be correct, and that the talks were merely Mrs. May trying to sell her original deal, only in smaller groups and with coffee and biscuits, this was immediately played in the press as Mr. Corbyn refusing the outstretched hand. It could not have been more clearly a trap if the prime minister had read it from a card marked ACME on the back. Because it is how he is expected to react and unfortunately no flexibility or learning is allowed.

I do worry for Brexit and our immediate future. We have days left now until we crash out without a deal. The leaders of our political parties, whilst having very different policies, views and desired outcomes, appear very similar in their approaches. Once the referendum result came in, any opportunity for coming together as a country was lost. Both leaders have allowed their own personal views and animosity along with political calculations to stop them from doing what we need most. Which is actually lead.

The importance of appearing in control and how not to do it

In the space of less than 24 hours we had 2 of the most unique, important and interesting votes that the House of Commons will ever give us. Most would argue that we have had enough drama of the sort we have seen to last us for a long time. Unfortunately, those votes and the debates and issues supporting them appear to really only be at the end of the beginning, not even close to the beginning of the end. The ongoing saga of Brexit has now dragged on for over two and a half years since the referendum itself. Legally speaking, as it stands, we only have around 10 weeks left to organise a withdrawal deal, or we crash out with No Deal.

            Nobody knows how this is going to turn out. Nobody knows, with absolute certainty, what is the best result for the UK and the EU. We can all choose to believe whichever experts, anti-experts or shaman most suits our views. Generally, that is what the overwhelming majority of use have been doing. My view, and one I want to explain, is that the biggest gap we have faced throughout the process has been the gap in genuine leadership – none more so than from the party leaders themselves.

            There are hundreds of lists of leadership qualities, and books have been written about the subject since we started recording history. I want to focus on a few of those qualities that appear across a wide range of them – it’s impossible to find some that appear in all of them. The most regularly repeating qualities for effective achieving leaders appear to be:

• ·      Integrity – not just being honest, but being seen to be honest, and doing the right thing even when you can get away with doing the wrong thing
• ·      Courage – in making decisions, even unpopular ones, with limited information, and willing to address difficult points
• ·      Impartiality and fairness – not pandering to special or favourite causes, identifying the fairest outcome for everyone from a situation
• ·      Good communication – in both directions, able to explain their message so others get it with clarity and conviction, and able to listen to others and hear their points
• ·      Flexibility and responsiveness – able to alter not only their plans and direction, but their style to achieve their outcome, and able to listen to other people’s ideas and use the best one, not simply their own

If we start by looking at how the negotiations process has been operated by Theresa May, and the strategy taken to those negotiations, it becomes very clear very quickly why she is not the right leader for the country. And most certainly not at this point in our history. Look at the strategy she has taken and it crumbles very quickly.

First of all, from the outset the decisions and approach have been her decisions and approach. She ignored every opportunity to reach out to other parties. She refused to listen to ideas from anyone outside her immediate circle. Throughout her career there are countless examples that point to her need to be completely in control. It is a unifying thread that runs like iron through it. How can you be impartial and fair if you are always right? Where is the space for responding to other ideas if you wont even hear them? This political change was the biggest we faced for at least 40 years – and arguably since the Second World War. Why not put in place a specialist commission? A government of unity? Citizen’s panels? No – Theresa knows what is best. Much better for her to go away, decide and then come and tell US what is right.

Of course she realised very early on in the process that in order for her to get away with that as Prime Minister, she needed to have as much personal power and mandate as possible. So whilst we had a backdrop of a clock running down, she called a General Election. Not for the good of the country, not for the good of the negotiations, not even for the good of her party. For her own benefit. And all after explicitly ruling out the idea. Because she believed she would win a landslide. Where is the integrity in that decision? Where is the impartiality and fairness of putting her wants in front of our country’s needs?

During the election itself, she showed herself again and again to have no communication skills. Strong and stable can not be the answer to every question. I imagine during that period if asked her how she took her coffee she would answer “strong and stable”. She ran scared of taking part in debates – sending other people to do them. Because she has all the communication skills and warmth of Buck Rogers friend Twiki, but without the warmth. Or communication skills. Where is the courage in being afraid to stand up without all of your lines safely locked down – taking no risks.

Having refused to talk to other parties, setting out her way of doing it as the only way, and having been embarrassed in a general election because she didn’t realise that the public didn’t want one, she then found herself weakened. The hung parliament that she caused meant that she then had to sell out some of her power to the DUP. This was at the cost of £1bn+ and additional red-lines. She used public money to protect her own position. She reduced her flexibility further.

Whilst all this carried on, Brexit Secretaries and other ministers led a constant stream out of her government because she wouldn’t listen to anyone else, and she kept coming back to the UK having given away more and more negotiating strength. Because she was right, and how dare anybody question or challenge her. She had to survive – she was the only one who was right. The single most important point, throughout this process, has been the survival of Theresa May. On average we have lost a government minister every month since she became Prime Minister. Nobody knew what the current deal was, until she deigned to tell us. No communication, no flexibility.

Where did this lead us? Her own party realised this couldn’t continue – and she survived a confident vote there. 117 of her own MPs – one third of her parliamentary party – wanted her to go. Did this change her approach or make her consider her position? Not for a minute. She not only led her government to be in contempt of parliament (for the first time ever), but she ran down the clock by delaying the vote on her deal. Not for any purpose other than she didn’t want to hear the truth – that she had gotten it completely wrong but couldn’t bear to hear it. She suffered the biggest governmental defeat in history. Only one third of parliament supported her deal – not even the £1bn bung could persuade the DUP. Did this make her consider her position? Not for a moment.

On the back of this she faced a vote of no-confidence in parliament. And I want to return to that point in part 2 of this blog – because we also need to consider the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn in doing that.

And now we are all experts on Spain

Of course, that isn't true. In fact, even compared to the average, I know very little about Spain. Even my knowledge of the geography is limited to being able to point to the coast or the interior. I don't speak the language, and have visited possibly 5 times in my entire life - 4 of those to holiday resorts that had been turned into Little Britain with sun. Which makes even me wonder why the heck I would write a blog about the trouble that has notched up a level over the past few weeks. 

Whilst I can't write from an emotional level on this issue, there are some important points that do need to be considered. And they are points that have an impact on parts of the UK too. After all, we have had our own challenges with parts of the country that want away, questions of self-determination and areas that contain people who see themselves as having different ethnicities. So what do we know / understand of the situation? Are there any impacts / lessons for the UK? I would also add - that I am trying to understand the situation and write this from that perspective. The feelings around this are very real and very raw - so I ask you to choose not to take offence. 

As someone who, until very recently, knew nothing about the drive for Catalan Independence (and for most of my life the much more pressing question appeared to be around independence for the Basque country) I have tried to research some of the history and here is my very abridged version. 

Catalonia has a strong identity as a country / region with roots back to the 11th / 12th Century. From the formation of Spain in the 15th Century however it has been part of that country. But throughout it's history it still retained it's own identity within Spain - even retaining many of the trappings of statehood until much more recently. Of course whilst it had enjoyed a lot of autonomy from the 1930s onwards, this was brutally stamped on by the fascist regime of General Franco when he came to power. In fact, so afraid was Franco of Catalan resurgence that he restricted the speaking of the Catalan language.

Of course, when it comes to nationalism (in whatever form) - the more it is suppressed, the angrier its adherents become, and the stronger the feelings. Throughout history it appears that the harder you try to squash nationalism - the more you feed it. Conversely (in many cases) the more you allow it, and give further autonomy, the less the power and its sting. Scotland appears to be an example of this - given autonomy, and allowed to hold a peaceful, supported referendum. They ultimately chose to remain part of the United Kingdom.

So since then Catalan (along with other parts of Spain, and other territories across Europe) has had political will from some people and parties to seek independence - a rise of nationalism at a local level. Interestingly many of those believing that their future lies in nationalism and separatism also believe, at the same time, that their future lies in internationalism. Their own sovereignty back, so they can share that sovereignty with other countries. Perhaps this apparent contradiction goes to the very heart of ideas of self-determination - they believe they have been forced to be part of a nation state, and would prefer to make an active choice. If this is the case this is certainly incorrect in the case of Scotland - they actively chose to become part of a United Kingdom.

But what has driven the latest scenes of violence, civil disobedience and strikes? Images of police officers being held away from using sticks against civilians by fire fighters? The Spanish government attempting to remove the powers of the regionally elected government? Deadlock in the Catalan parliament? Where did it go so wrong? 

The catalyst for this appears to be that Catalan pressed ahead with a disputed referendum on independence. Once the Catalan government chose to go ahead with this, various legal challenges, and ultimately police action followed. This culminated in the horrible scenes most people have seen of firefighters being attacked by police officers because they were trying to protect civilians attempting to vote in the referendum. 

Lots of politicians have come out either in support of the people of Catalan (particularly within the Labour party and the left wing) or in opposition to the EU's handling of a national crisis (Nigel Farage MEP - I don't get it either). Whilst it is easy to lay blame on the basis of gaining short-term political capital, does this hold up?

Well, generally I would always argue that whenever you see images of police, military or paramilitary forces sanctioned by the government to beat civilians it becomes quite clear cut. But in this case, whilst we can deplore those actions there is blame a-plenty on every side. 

We should remember what this is about at it's most basic level - and that is self determination of a nation state. But this itself is difficult. We tend towards the view that nation states are a defined area, with commonality of culture/history/tradition/language and a government. Unfortunately, there are precious few examples of nation states being born through peaceful, democratic means - even in modern Europe, beyond the unification of Germany and the split of Czechoslovakia. So there is always the risk of violence when pursuing this agenda. In fact it was within living memory for many people that Scottish Nationalist terrorists tried to blow up the Edinburgh Tattoo.

Additionally, the proposed referendum was illegal under not only Spanish law, but also under Catalan law. This would require any change in the constitution in Catalan (and there would be no bigger than this) to be supported by 2/3rds of the parliament. However, the Catalan nationalists knew they would not be able to achieve this, and attempted to carry out an illegal referendum to circumvent their own democratic rules.

At the same time, the political desire for a referendum has been growing for a number of years. The Spanish government could have chosen to work with the regional government to allow a legal referendum - and then fought their case. Instead they have actively avoided any engagement on the question - hoping to bottle the pressure. We have seen what happens when you do this. 

So a Catalan independence movement pushing ahead with an illegal referendum and a federal government unwilling to listen to it's people. Neither of those are particularly positive images. Of course, Spain may have been concerned that once a referendum was allowed it would be re-run ad infinitum until Catalan nationalists got the "right" answer. Certainly that looked a risk after the Scottish Referendum - although Nicola Sturgeon, much to her credit, has delayed any future vote ( a-heartfelt-letter-to-nicola-sturgeon.html ) even if temporarily.

Putting aside the fact that it was illegal - can we take the outcome of the referendum in Catalan as being a legitimate expression of the wish of the people of that area? After all, irrespective of vagaries of governmental rules and regulations this must be the most important test. This has to be the most important question when it comes to self-determination. What do the people want?

Again, the immediate response from the nationalist Catalan government was that the vote was overwhelmingly in support of independence. 90% of those who voted, voted for independence. But this was based upon votes from less than 50% of voters (the turnout was 43%). In context, this means that approximately 39% of the people of the region were able to vote for independence. Does this seem a clear message of support for forming a new nation state? Of course there appear to be several reasons for this. Not least that the spanish government did their best to disrupt the vote by closing polling stations, stopping people from voting and intimidation and violence. But it must also be noted anti-cessationist parties refused to take part in the referendum and advised their supporters not to vote. Do we believe if all points of view had taken part, the vote would be for a separate government?

At the last Catalan elections in 2015, 75% of the electorate turned out to vote. At that election strongly pro-independence parties took 45% of the vote. Based on this vote - in which all sides took part - there is appetite for independence from some voters, but not overwhelmingly. As we are currently seeing in the UK, nationalist tendencies amongst even a small majority can be enough to sway a vote - with disastrous effects. But there is no evidence of this being the case here. Indeed, even within the Catalan parliament there is no full-blooded majority push for complete independence (at the time of writing).

So we have a disputed, unfought, purposefully sabotaged, illegal referendum where we can not take a clear answer that the determination of the people would be for independence. We have clear evidence from the parliamentary elections and machinations that it is anything but a clear cut case. There is obvious evidence of the Spanish state behaving in a heavy-handed and appalling manner. But this in itself is not evidence that the people of Catalonia desire independence - it is evidence that Spain don't want it to happen. Of course we should berate the behaviour of the Spanish state. But this should not equate to support for independence.

You can't trust Labour on the economy (Part 2)

One of the most often repeated claims you will hear from Conservative party supporters is that you can't trust Labour on the economy. It is a message that has been repeatedly pushed by large parts of the media for many years. In fact, it has been heard so often it sometimes seems like it as is obvious as gravity, Liverpool football club struggling against smaller teams or that you can't get a decent cup of tea in a coffee bar. If you missed the first half of this blog, it might be worth visiting ( http://unexpectedsocialist.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/you-cant-trust-labour-on-economy.html ) - although I am not guaranteeing it is worth visiting. In that I set out 3 major tests of whether an economy is working - a good economy would be one where: 

1. any growth in the economy benefits those who work for it;
2. it provides opportunities for everyone to participate and add to the economy whilst;
3. providing a reasonable level of protection from external shocks to the national economy and individual shocks through changes in circumstance

I also asked how we could know if we could trust a party to deliver either of those. To be as fair as possible, I have split this down into 3 governments we can compare - that of the previous New Labour administration, that of the current coalition & Tory government, and a future potential Corbyn government.

So going back to our central question - are the Conservatives any better than New Labour at getting people to participate in the economy? And would Corbyn be any better than that? 

Looking at the immediate headline statistics this seems obvious and clear cut. We are told every month now that employment figures are at a record high, unemployment at a record low. Obviously, the Tories win this hands down. But it doesn't take much scratching of the surface to get below that and see that it is not quite as it seems. 

The headline rate is shockingly good - 74.4% employment rate. This means that 74.4% of the people who could work are either employed or self employed. This is the highest since records of this sort began. Under the last Labour government, just before the global economic crash in 2008, the best they achieved was 73.0%. 

That 74.4% equates to (between 16 and 64) 30.67 million people either working or self employed. For the New Labour government, at it's highest point, this was 29.06 million. So there are 1.6 million more people employed compared to eight and a half years ago. But just being employed is not the entire picture. What is also important is how much you are earning for that employment. Because it is this - your income - that determines how much you can participate in the economy. In that case, we are doing slightly worse. In fact, average earnings (which excludes self employed people) are down by 3%. So more people are working, but earning less than before. 

What is causing this? Well, whilst it is hard to reach a really strong conclusion, there are some really good candidates for part of the explanation.

Firstly, the national minimum wage has not increased quickly enough. This had slowed down until then Chancellor George Osborne made some moves to re-dress the imbalance he had caused. Secondly, almost the entire public sector has had pay freezes or raises limited to 1% for 7 years. The public sector workers are carrying the rest of us through austerity. Third, there are more immigrants now in the country - willing to work for much lower wages - potentially around 800,000 in that period. Finally however, and this seems to have had the biggest effect, is the rise of the zero hours contract. 

Since the last Labour government 700,000 new jobs have been created where those people have no guarantee week to week, day to day, hour to hour. The number has gone from 200,000 to 900,000. What was once a flexible way for employers and employees to work where this arrangement suited both parties has become the standard operating model for hundreds of employers. The coalition and tory government have done nothing to stop this. If you aren't on one of those contracts - just imagine what that is like. You never know if you are going to eat or pay bills - and you can't work anywhere else. It is as close to modern day slavery as most of us will ever get. 

So whilst employment has gone up far fewer people are actually able to participate in the economy in a meaningful way. We all on average have less to contribute with. And the increase in employment figures can almost entirely be matched to inwards net immigration and zero hours contracts. So whilst we had increasing spending power and jobs under the Blair / Brown governments, we have not seen this under a tory government. But what would we see under a Corbyn government?

Well, that is hard to say. If we believe the promises made as part of his election campaign, there would be increases in the minimum wage, an end to zero hours contracts, pay rises for the public sector and real genuine investment by the government in major infrastructure projects - and the aim would be to increase employment rates through this. Of course the challenge for any future Corbyn government will be how to pay for these. This ties in to managing to deliver without destroying the economy and leaving it protected from shocks - but that will be part 3 of this blog.

The art of comedy? Timing

Well, unexpectedly the Prime Minister called a “snap” General Election yesterday. Unexpectedly because as recently as September 2016 she was quite clear in her refusal to do so “I am not going to be calling a snap election…we need a period of stability to be able to deal with the issues the country is facing”. So, why the sudden turnaround in that view? Has the Prime Minister decided we need less stability? Or that Brexit is actually much easier than she expected it to be? Or could there be another reason for it?

It all feels a bit strange, and for those people who are not engaged in politics, this must seem the worst possible outcome. After all we had the particularly nasty and bad tempered Scottish Independence referendum in 2014. Then a general election in 2015. Following on from that David Cameron decided he would shut up UKIP and the brexiteer side of his party by destroying them with ANOTHER referendum in 2016 (and that went so well for him) on EU membership. That was quickly followed up with wall to wall coverage of the US presidential elections (no genuinely, he actually won under their system).

Since then the Prime Minister has insisted that any referendum on Scottish Independence would be a distraction and the government must be entirely focussed on Brexit. In fact just 5 weeks ago, she said “Now is not the time. Just at this point all our energies should be focused on our negotiations with the European Union”.

So why have we had this sudden change of heart from the Prime Minister? There are a number of reasons that this may have taken place. Apparently it is to get a stronger hand for Brexit, and to do the right thing for the country. There are a number of other alternative theories too, so it seems only fair that we explore them all. And just for fun, let’s add a plausibility score out of ten – on whether it has directly impacted on the announcement at this time.  

Official explanation from the PM

Part1: The other parties and the Lords are trying to stop Brexit, and I need a larger majority to force it through.

An interesting statement really, and one that doesn’t hold up to scrutiny on any level. Firstly, the other political parties AND the Lords have had opportunities to delay and frustrate the process. These votes have been held. The opportunity to stop Brexit has been passed already. The votes are completed, and Brexit will happen. As Yvette Cooper pointed out today - 3/4 of MPs and 2/3 of Lords voted FOR Brexit when the vote was held. There is no opportunity of stopping Brexit now, unless there was a massive change in direction and views of the country. That would really require the PM herself to come back and say “we can’t achieve what we promised if we leave”. If that were really her fear she would have called a general election during the NINE MONTHS she has had before triggering Article 50.

Plausibility rating: I wouldn’t buy a used car from her.

Part 2: Negotiations will continue until just before the next General Election, and then you will be able to see what deal we have and start to feel it impacting you. The other countries will use that to drive a hard bargain.

There is probably more truth in this part of her statement. But there are some massive implicit promises in there that you are expected to miss out on. Firstly, it is an acceptance that we will not get everything we want from any negotiations. In fact, it is the first time publicly that any Conservative minister has admitted that the negotiations will be a 2-way street, and that there will be give and take depending on the political pressures the politicians feel at home. Secondly, there is an admission that ordinary people will feel the negative impacts of Brexit. Even those who voted for it and supported it will by then realise we have ended up with a potentially worse deal than we had.

Theresa May is terrified the government will be blamed for that. Perhaps, people may think, if they had spent more time negotiating the best deal and less time threatening war with Spain and coming up with catchy little phrases we wouldn’t be heading into a recession. I can understand Theresa May wanting to avoid that. After all, she was a Remain supporter, who never wanted to leave the EU. She can see closer and in much more detail how hard it will be. I wouldn’t want to be measured on the basis of how successful or painful it was in that situation.

Plausibility rating: More than a ring of truth about it.

It’s a snap annihilation of the Labour Party

Obviously, the staunch conservative voters and those who have wanted the left wing of the Labour party to fail since the election of Jeremy Corbyn are desperate to believe this is the reason for calling it now. Certainly, if you believe the polls (you know, the ones that showed us there would be no overall majority in the last election, that we would remain in the EU, and that Trump would lose) then this makes good political sense.

However, why now exactly? We have only 2 years to negotiate the exit from the EU, and this will take 7 weeks out of that timetable. Labour have been wallowing in the polls for about 18 months. Why not as soon as David Cameron resigned? Labour have said all along they will support it. So did this really make Theresa May directly contradict herself and break a promise she made publicly? Also, was the best time to launch it after Labour have had 2 weeks of announcing a number of incredibly popular policies – one a day – that have strong public support? Finally, if this IS the case, it is a clear admission that calling this election has nothing to do with the good of the country – just the good of the Tory party.

Plausibility rating: A consideration, and an expectation, but not the main reason.

Alleged Tory electoral fraud from 2015

There is still, hanging over the Tories, a police investigation into electoral fraud during the 2015 General Election. This arose because the Tories spent a lot of money in specific target seats that they claimed as central spending, when actually it directly related to the results in those seats, allegedly. A file of possible charges has been sent to the Crown Prosecution Service, and an announcement was expected THIS WEEK. Obviously, that announcement is now up for grabs.

Certainly, we can glean some clues to this – the fact that the CPS have confirmed they are still looking to continue this work suggests there is a case to at least be considered. If there is a fresh election, it means that this can be glossed over as having been solved at the Ballot Box instead of in the courts. Secondly, when the Prime Minister was asked, on the floor of the House of Commons whether she would allow anyone facing criminal or legal proceedings over this to stand, she said that she would support all Tory candidates to stand it begins to show the contempt that she feels towards free and fair elections. Obviously, this is not something that the PM would want to call an election for. But it may just be that this has been the final straw. And it is hard to argue against, given the rushed and surprise nature of it, the obvious U-turning and the fact she is now eating her own words on stability.

Plausability rating: Ticks the box for the timing aspect.

So, there we have it then. A lot of conjecture, and a lot of assumptions, and a lot of admittance on the part of the Government about how bad things are. The most likely scenario is that this is a government who are afraid of admitting the mess they are making of Brexit forced into this decision by the timing of CPS decisions. They are putting the needs of their party above your needs as citizens of this country. I would suggest you remember that, and don’t let them get away with it when you are in the polling station.