From my Twitter account this morning, I admit overlapping with comments already made here:
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Here we go again. Having announced a month long extension of furlough with just a few hours notice – far to late to save the jobs of people laid off at the end of October – Sunak is about to announce an extension to March 2021 (which it my current best guess for when the coronavirus second peak might ease off sufficiently to significantly reduce social distancing restrictions). Conveniently over the Brexit cliff-edge period too.
While welcome, of course, it would be good to have some coherence in policy, rather than repeatedly chopping and changing within a matter of days.
Compare Germany, which (a) has up to 12 months of Kurzarbeit as a permanent feature in their employment law, and (b) already increased the payments and extended it to 21 months.
Furlough randomly increases inequality – and that is no longer acceptable
As an emergency measure in March, furlough made sense.
Frankly it was a miracle that the locked down civil service (working from home) got it away so quickly and so successfully. It compares very favourably with the private sector debacle of PPE procurement and Serco test and trace.
But that was eight months ago. It has known flaws and omissions. We should be aiming to do better.
Depressing that there is no sign of any mainstream debate about an investment bond etc… QE just blowing up asset prices on and on since 2009, adding to wealth inequality.
Whole lists of investments desperately needed on climate change etc etc simply not being made. Can’t someone – Richard? form some kind of pressure group / think group dedicated to this alone? Cross – party? Multi disciplinary?
I have just been expelled from one think tank for proposing QE
As someone who works in the public sector, I see my colleagues and I producing miracles every day,
See my long post this morning
I hope I imply I agree