Retired Professor of Political Economy
(Lancaster University, UK - retired 2021)
(also #ProfDJ across the Lune Valley)
Contributor: North West Bylines #NoBridge
I'd take Allison Kirkby (CEO/BT) more seriously in her complaints that the regulatory environment of the UK (contrasted with Scandinavia) has led to a lack of world-class broadband infrastructure if I hadn't had for ten years world class broadband delivered via a community broadband project (one of many in rural England).
Its not the regulatory environment that's the problem its BT's quasi monopoly position & its hatred of its customers that is the problem!
Given the Met Police's own inability to deal with violence against women from within its ranks, its a bit ironic that Mark Rowley (Commissioner of the Met) has now suggested around 4 million (mostly) men are a risk to women & girls.
He may be right that this is a problem that goes beyond policing, but even if that is true, for some time the police have been effectively downplaying the problem.
As a society we need to recognise this as the problem it is!
One of the big debates around the forthcoming election is the adoption of tactical voting & its use to 'punish' the Tories.
There's lots of media commentary about this, but as always @sjwrenlewis offers an interesting take on the issue.
In the end he concludes one of the key democratic aspirations of this election must be to deny the Tories the post-election position of remaining the 'official' opposition.... & tactical voting may/can achieve that end!
Unsurprisingly the move by employers to rein in extensive working from home, is not only breeding resentment among workers who have grown to like hybrid working but looks likely to lead to more cases centred on remote working going to employment tribunals.
As I've noted so often, universities have extensive knowledge & experience of the pros & cons of hybrid work (academics have done it for decades) yet no-one seems to want to learn from that experience?
More evidence the water companies have been getting away with rubbish service as the regulator(s) that oversee water provision are either asleep at the wheel or have been 'captured' by the sector.
Now, the Drinking Water Inspectorate would (alongside OfWAT) seem to be rather reluctant to use their powers to prosecute.
If they thought a softly softly, engaging with the firms approach was a better bet, the state of England's water supply demonstrate it isn't!
The UK has not invested enough in public infrastructure, but attempts towards rectifying this lack in investment look likely to confront skilled labour shortages in construction.
Not only did Brexit reduce the number of migrant workers entering the sector, a lack of investment (interest) in skills training (i.e. via FE colleges) compounded by health-related retirements of older workers means there are too few UK-national with skills to fill the gap(s).
Hmm.... I think it may show more the centralisation of construction investment in London.... the figures for skills shortage are for all sectors, not just private or public work.... but my guess is many of those coming in from Essex are responding to better pay on offer in London as big projects struggle to find workers - perhaps Essex projects are not getting started, or cannot offer such high wages?
The number of people with private health insurance has risen to nearly 6m in the UK (the highest since the 2008 financial crisis) and the number of paid-for hospital admissions continues to rise (by 7% last year).
As we always like say... 'follow the money'.
If you want to see the aim of Tory defunding of the NHS & the crisis in public healthcare they have engineered in the last decade... all you need to do is look at who (which companies) are benefitting!
'A Conservative minister whose family farms beef & lamb signed off on a £5m advertising campaign encouraging people to eat more red meat – despite government advice that doing so can pose health risks'.... nothing to see here.
No corruption, no skewed govt. spending to hep out Minister's families, no manipulation of health advice.... nope, noting to see here at all.
UK politics has a number of problems with accessibility for non-majority groups... we're familiar with issues around ethnicity & gender, but are less clear about how ableism has effectively barred disabled people from our political institutions;
the disproportionally low number of disabled people in politics, is not only a crisis of representation, it also means policy is shaped by the prejudices & incomplete knowledge of the able.
Parents are increasingly taking their children out of school & home schooling them, with the most reported reason being the mental health of their children.
To some extent, the pandemic normalised the idea of children learning from home, so we might wonder whether the threshold for concern prompting a turn to home schooling has lowered.
But, it also suggests the impact on children of the myriad crisis that have engulfed school in recent years.
Meanwhile in social care the exploitation of migrant workers continues, with some experiencing debt bondage & treatment that is looking like 'modern slavery'.
The underfunding & understaffing of social care have come together to produce a toxic environment for workers which the state seems to have little (real) interest in addressing.
Another study suggests that your ethnicity has an impact on the healthcare you receive & the likelihood of recovery (this time from heart problems).
Given the continuing racial inequalities in the UK while troubling is not surprising, but the Q. is can the NHS in its currently strained crisis state respond & address these problems.
Where they're attitudinal the costs should be minimal, but equally any system under stars will malfunction in diverse ways!
Research by both Deloitte & the EIB (quoted by Pilita Clark, FT) suggests young entrants to the workforce are increasingly guided in their choice of prospective employers by employers' environmental stance.... with 20% saying they've changed jobs due to employers' green record.
As Clark concludes:
'Companies do not have to take climate action seriously. But if they don’t, they might find it increasingly hard to hire — and keep — all the younger workers they need'!
Torsten Bell sums up the problem with the Tories trying to bribe older voters with a tax cut (reversing their own tax-grab conducted via fiscal drag)...
'Trying to bribe baby boomers with small tax cuts completely misses the point that they’d like something else. A functioning NHS'!
The Lib Dems have secured a wealthy backer, from a global corporation to help them try to win Sheffield Hallam back from the Labour... and who is this backer you might ask?
Well, its Nick Clegg, whose seat it once was, before he decided to join Meta/Facebook to help them deal with governments (like the one he had just helped push austerity on the UK).
So now the LibDems are led by a Tory Coalition cabinet member & are funded by an architect of that coalition... nothing to see here.
