Does this Government suffer from inertia?

OK so the government has replaced the Stay Home slogan, with Stay Alert.

Can anyone explain to me exactly how that is supposed to work?

It is meaningless, and in fact allows each one of us to act as we wish.

I think it’s for those who will be going back to work or buying from garden centres etc. Seems fair enough to me, reminding people to watch out for their own health?

It's a case of 'I'm alright Jack' for many.

The UK has the oldest housing stock in Europe and the state of average living conditions is a national disgrace - for the fifth richest world economy.

It's a disaster from social, healthcare and environmental points of view - but never mind, let's ignore it and victim blame, shall we?

www.theccc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/UK-housing-Fit-for-the-future-CCC-2019.pdf

Great! So lerts will just use it as an excuse to do what they want (it's all a conspiracy to control us, I won't get it …).

Oh well! It's one way of culling stupidity.

Let's face facts its not inertia it's government policy. They called it austerity and insisted it was necessary for the economy but basically it is the usual Tory policy of as little state support as possible. It's done to keep tax rates down for their rich mates and supporters. They have cut money to local councils so they can't provide proper services. They have seperated health and social care so there isn't a joined up system. As for the housing issue. Dreadful as many of the properties may be they are at least a roof over your head. The real tragedy is the number of people who are homeless, especially families.

There was (maybe still is) a very limited council fund to finance loans for essential repairs. They would be paid back upon the sale of the house or death of the owner.

A major problem with the scheme, though, was a government-imposed formula that worked out (from a person's income) how much they could personally borrow and contribute. Of course, for most people who applied, borrowing such an amount was impossible!

Thanks for the constructive comments and other thought processes such as MayBee 70 . What few have picked up on is the high cost to the NHS of poor housing and the strains it creates, the cost and misery created by 49,000 deaths why have few mentioned it? The low cost of repairs avge £3,000 per home. 20% of nearly 4 + million substandard homes are owed by landlords! The morality of greed completely ignored, why I ask myself, sorry but lack of compassion by a high % of my Peer Group gets to me, perhaps its my many years of trying to improving health of the Nation rather than leaving people in unhealthy conditions?. Why don’t we look at ways of effectively improving the quality of life it’s incredibly cheaper than the cost of leaving people in poor health? Final thought creating a sensible Low cost accessible housing repair of over 4 million homes would really kick start our economy creating jobs in the constructive industry and supply chains.
We could learn a great deal from the way we tackled the new build and war damage home repair projects post war and the economic benefits it achieved.

Just one final thought the low cost to the nation of getting rid of poor substandard houses, would on an impact assessment be fantastically financially beneficial, even by adding to our fit for living housing stock for at least 30 years, easing problems on homelessness. I would ask can we try to look on the positive side of good investment rather than negatives? Saving to a Nation by ridding us of poverty and homelessness are far greater in economic and health terms.

Rather than inertia I think this government is suffering from complete daft ness!

Jenrick on Marr. Asked what on earth does stay alert mean.

Reply stay alert, stay home

Words fail

Farther to above apparently Jenrick also hot footed it to the Sophie Ridge show there his message was

stay alert start work

Time this government resigned en masse

GrandadBrian the cost to the NHS doesn't matter when you are still planning to flog it off to the highest bidder or do a trade deal with it. If anyone doesn't realise the NHS remains on the table in the UK /US trade deals currently being negotiated.

Jane 10 I make no apologies as a retired Ward Sister on Intensive Care and Critical Care wards for waking up your sub conscience from your smug attitude to more vulnerable people. Read the comments and facts behind the original message. Nearly 50,000 deaths occurred in the 2017/18 cold winter, many of which due to the poor health of people living in substandard housing, nothing to do with choice other that accept the other option of being homeless. Yes, a few would by choice remain living in horrible conditions rather than accept what they consider charity or benefits, which is not good logic it's more about being too proud to seek or accept help.

The utter selfish "I am all right Jack" attitudes on these pages disgust me.

This last week I spoke to a local Councillor I have known for 28 years, who told me her two sons have lost their jobs & her husbands carpet shop is struggling. She actually said it was her Councillor income that was keeping their heads above water. This was a family that a few months ago was well off and never had any financial problems, then ovenight are nearly in poverty. None of us can afford to be so smug, we never know what life holds for us around the corner. That is why compassion for others is so important, as the up & down problems of life can strike us all.

Please tone the anger down, I am concerned about the way aggro is becoming the norm in the UK today, the devise behaviour of our politicians in the last decade has a great deal to answer for as it is rubbing off on our once decent compassionate society. The extreme political dogma along with Brexit is making us intolerable citizens in the eyes of this great granddad.

So a policeman on tv has just said that the new slogan is going to make the polices job difficult and that he doesn’t know what it means.

Creeping NHS privatisation is hampering our Covid-19 response

We will not let this government shock doctrine our NHS with further sell-offs, write campaigning organisations including Keep our NHS Public. Plus letters from Dr Sylvia Berney, Mary Pimm and Nik Wood, and John Vincent

In the past few weeks, the government has ramped up outsourcing (UK government ‘using pandemic to transfer NHS duties to private sector’, 4 May), repeatedly handing over contracts to companies to run operations that the NHS should be leading.

The private sector has proven itself to be ineffective, with profits and cost-cutting consistently put before care. Testing centres are being run by Deloitte, KPMG, Serco, Sodexo, Mitie, Boots and the US data mining group Palantir, funded by our money.

Even before this crisis, the government was helping private companies to creep into our NHS. We will not let this government shock doctrine our NHS with further privatisation. This experience has taught us that we are all in this together, and that our NHS is a vital, lifesaving organ, there for us all. NHS funding is not there for governments to prop up private companies, it is there to keep us safe.

Caroline Molloy Editor, OurNHS openDemocracy, John Lister Editor, Health Campaigns Together, Dr Ameen Kamlana, GP, Anthony Johnson Lead organiser, Nurses United UK, Cat Hobbs Director, We Own It, Alan Taman Doctors for the NHS, Tony O Sullivan Co-chair, Keep our NHS Public, Brian Fisher Socialist Health Association, Diarmaid McDonald Lead organiser, Just Treatment

• The future threat of privatisation of the NHS from the UK/US deal is distracting us from the fact that privatisation is going on under our noses during this pandemic.

As a pathologist working for the NHS, I could not understand why accredited laboratories in the NHS and laboratory facilities such as the Crick Institute were not fully utilised for testing of Covid-19.

The deputy chief medical officer has admitted that lack of testing altered the approach to management of the pandemic, which may have increased the number of deaths.

Now we learn that a private company is coordinating three new test centres. So the government has not been following its mantra to “protect the NHS”. Rather it is continuing its unrelenting use of the private sector, even when it risks the lives of its citizens.
Dr Sylvia Berney
London

• For over 40 years, our political representatives have pursued polices that have undermined the capability of our national health service.

The so-called market created business units in silos, each in competition with the other while procurement was fragmented. Mountains of private debt built up. And then austerity funding enforced a concept of efficiency that sees any capacity held as insurance as slack. All this has conspired to see social care effectively privatised, GP surgeries becoming virtual and our capacity to cope with an epidemic undermined.

Before 1948 there was no accountability at all. Healthcare relied on private, profit-driven firms and self-selected charities and philanthropists. To revert to that because of the failures of our political class, as David McCoy fears (Coronavirus has exposed the dangerous failings of NHS marketisation, 5 May), must be fought tooth and nail.
Mary Pimm and Nik Wood
London

• David McCoy underestimates how the dogma of privatisation has undermined Britain’s ability to mount a coordinated response to Covid-19. Privatisation of residential care for older people in the Thatcher era was a precursor of the longstanding crisis in provision, including so-called “bed blocking”. Not being a saleable asset, public health moved from the NHS to local government with the 2012 NHS reorganisation. The two manifestly weakest areas in the response so far – the safety of care home staff and residents on the one hand, and contact tracing and testing on the other, come within its remit.
John Vincent
Tedburn St Mary, Devon

Jane 10, you just don’t understand how selfish and pathetic your views sounds when they lead to undesirable deaths from lack of compassion & help for the most vulnerable in society.

grandadbrian and wiltshiregran- its a pity you can't grasp my point. However, you never were going see an alternative way of looking at the situation. Please carry on venting if it helps you.

Jane and Eccles we are not talking about people accepting that their unmodernised house is ok It is about substandard not fit for human habitation housing and not enough houses being built that is a very real problem and needs the government to build more social housing that's the problem people are facing in this country.

Who are these "older people" that Jane10 thinks are happy to put up with the "standards of yesteryear" ? I'm 73 and would certainly not put up with poor living conditions. The one and only time that I lived in sub-standard housing was in the sixties when I shared flats. Geysers that exploded when attempting to light them, windows painted shut so that they could not be opened and condensation leading to mould on the walls. That was fairly common then. but no one should live in poor conditions now.

Thank you Grany for the valuable information you have provided in your constructive comments. My niece is a medic in Staffordshire and she is deeply concerned about what she calls deceit and propaganda about PPE, she says the first five weeks of the crisis were a nightmare & she and her fellow doctors were really scared. She hated the deceit and sheer bungling that was going on and that the public were not given the truth. She told me her politics change overnight having been a strong blue at Uni and until She started working in the NHS then it was a real wake up call for her.
.

Tired of interviewers,political commentators and celebrities criticising whilst smirking from the sidelines.Im sure all those involved are doing their very best in these unpredictable times.If I have praise for anyone it’s the mums and dads who are not paid their salaries doing the best they can.

Thanks for all the constructive comments , and even the Irony ones Jane 10, it has at least got us thinking outside our own little world.