What has the last twelve months taught us about who we are as a country?

[Derek Hardballs]

This pandemic has seen the country face arguably the biggest universal struggle / change in how we live since WW2. What does it tell us about the U.K.? 

For me the following: 

In times of hardship the country relies on the state for help. There is no other mechanism to protect and this should but won’t be a reminder to the small state types who would have kicked the ladder away from the most vulnerable long before the pandemic. We must not allow ideologically driven small state ideas to leave the country so ill prepared again. Cuts and Brexit left the NHS understaffed where it mattered on the frontline, lack of protective clothes and equipment, reports ignored because they were inconvenient to other priorities exasperated the problems in the U.K. 

We have some fantastic and undervalued front line staff in health, care, police, education and retail. Our priorities as a country on who is rewarded most for their work is illogical, ethically poor and shows little respect for what is ultimately important in life. Some have actively tried to undermine these people’s efforts from the comfort of a tv and radio studio or desk at a newspaper. They should be embarrassed by their comments and actions but they won’t be.

We have some big hearted people who have volunteered their time to help others get through the pandemic. Delivering food, raising money for charity offering a friendly voice to the isolated. The best of the U.K. on display. 

Some have acted like stroppy teenagers / toddlers through the pandemic. Whining that they can’t do this or that, demanding that things go back to normal when it was obvious that couldn’t happen without thousands more vulnerable people suffering / dying. The government refusal to do the unpopular quickly or hard enough has led to months more lockdown measures. If they hadn’t have listened to those who shouted liberty loudest then ironically liberty may well have been restored a lot quicker. Popularism in a pandemic is not a great mix. 

We have some truly selfish xxxx’s in this country who have gone out of their way to put others at risk, ignore simple rules, tried their best to discredit the science, denied the undeniable and shown just how selfish, stupid and manipulative or manipulated many in the U.K. can be. Our death figures are testament to their actions.

The government have had a game of two halves. They got a lot of things wrong with regards to how to handle a pandemic. They have been slow to react, they were far too eager to take the easier options with opening back up in the summer, their procurement looks like cronyism and should be scrutinised, they were too ideologically wedded to the private sector having the answers and our death rates are truly ‘world beatingly’ appalling! The flip of this is the furlough scheme has saved jobs despite its unavoidable imo flaws. The vaccine rollout has been ‘world beating’ and it’s testament to those who have been instrumental in putting the process in place.  

Anyway these are my onions..

[baggy1]

Agree with most of that Dekka, I would add that there are another group of people that have fallen between the cracks of the furlough and self employment schemes which, as far as I have seen, haven't been addressed. There were are number of people with legitimate claims about lockdown crippling them financially but not getting any help / support from the government. On the flip side to that there have been a number of people using those genuine cases to argue for more freedoms when they themselves weren't as impacted.

There is also the lack of a coherent plan around education which appears to still be pretty chaotic for the teachers and students on the ground and 10 months in still unclear as to what to do.

I have the same view on the lockdowns that if they had been implemented at the right time then they would have been shorter, and, as Rich highlighted last night, the country is suffering from real lockdown fatigue after the lack of balls when it came to making decisions.

[bradesbaggie]

"The links between COVID contracts and Conservative Party donors has been a concern of public bodies and MPs for months. Indeed, just last week, Byline Times revealed that Conservative donors have won contracts worth £881 million during the pandemic so far."

https://bylinetimes.com/2021/02/10/frien...-contract/

[Ossian]

Taught? Not sure, I might need a bit longer for that. These last twelve months have reaffirmed plenty, though - some of it with a vengeance!

We live in a democracy, of sorts, but it's hopelessly flawed and way beyond its 'fit for purpose' expiry date. Two principal parties, neither of them particularly adept at conveying any real clarity of vision; which might be because there is none, or - equally likely - they would prefer it to be delivered by stealth. One of the two has a near monopoly on those elements of the press and broadcasters which are prepared to act as client media.

Are the Tories sufficiently lacking in self-awareness that they believe a decade in office and counting is a refection of their competence and general levels of approval? Actually, I think some of them - including quite a few of those occupying front-bench positions - might well be; intellectually engaging isn't exactly a term that springs to mind very often.

Of course, there are other parties striving for a foothold which is almost impossible to secure: the lack of exposure (whether by indifference or design), the iniquities of how politics is funded and - most of all - an undemocratic electoral system. This obviously excludes the SNP who are operating against a different background and with an agenda which has no equivalence south of the border.

The last twelve months - vaccine rollout aside - has been shambolic: slow and inadequate responses; off-the-cuff promises used as a device for wriggling away from scrutiny; those same promises discredited and retracted within days; ministerial foul-ups that would have been career-ending in any other era. I suppose if the last months has taught me anything it's just how completely inept a set of politicians can be - collectively and individually - and still remain entrenched, almost to the point where I'd have to question whether democracy is functional at all with such an absence of accountability. And of course that an under-resourced and frequently undervalued public sector will always be the first port of call in a crisis.

Our political classes, our media, our electoral system, our attitudes as a society to where 'value' really lies. What a fucking shambles we've allowed ourselves to become.

Edit: Outstanding OP, Dekka...

[Tom Joad]

Good post DH. And Oss's final paragraph too.
FWIW, Merkel or some other leading German politician said way back last March, that they must never rely on other countries for their PPE. I would like to see that policy applied and broadened to many other things. Let's build up to a quality and not down to a price.

I hope the minimum wage earners that have kept the country going are remembered for this. In the same way I'll remember the banks and many others that have used "working from home" to their own advantage at the expense of those that needed them.

I hope the WHO is reformed, or scrapped, for something more equitably funded and less subservient. This thing is out of the bottle now and there will be others.

I hope those that have been awarded contracts without tendering are held up to scrutiny.

And last, I hope for our politicians (of all parties),to pull together for those they serve and not compete in a short term race to please the few. No more tug o'war between the I'm all right Jacks and the Islington Popular Front. Bridge the divide or do something else.

[Protheroe]

What's it taught us? How fucking useless government is and that there should be much less of it once this is over.

Absoutely no chance of that. Pay your tax drones.

[baggy1]

What's it taught us? How fucking useless government is and that there should be much less of it once this is over.

Absoutely no chance of that. Pay your tax drones.

You reckon that we'd have faired better without any national services to help the general population. The likes of you and I would have been ok in the short term as we could probably have afforded the private healthcare, but I wouldn't fancy the chances of the poorer in society.

Drones   you are a fucking nugget at times.

[Protheroe]

without any national services to help the general population

It's always the same isn't it?

Proth "I'd like to reform the funding model of the NHS"
WBAUnoffcial "So you're saying you want to sell the NHS to Trump and force us all to have private healthcare"

Proth "I'd like a proper debate on funding social care for the elderly using the assets they've built up in their lifetime, and by taxing working pensioners properly"
WBAUnoffiicial "So you're saying you'd steal the family home from those that owned one and every other poorly pensioner would be worked to death in B&Q anyway - and you'd make them pay National Insurance? - Fucking Nazi"

Forever, and ever. Ad nauseum.

[Ossian]

It's always the same isn't it?

Proth "I'd like to reform the funding model of the NHS"
WBAUnoffcial "So you're saying you want to sell the NHS to Trump and force us all to have private healthcare"

Proth "I'd like a proper debate on funding social care for the elderly using the assets they've built up in their lifetime, and by taxing working pensioners properly"
WBAUnoffiicial "So you're saying you'd steal the family home from those that owned one and every other poorly pensioner would be worked to death in B&Q anyway - and you'd make them pay National Insurance? - Fucking Nazi"

Forever, and ever. Ad nauseum.

You probably need to find a way of separating the voices in your head from the things people actually post.

[baggy1]

It might also help if he didn't consider us all to be 'drones' for just paying our taxes. The sense of superiority is painful and cringeworthy.

He seems to forget the muppets that he helped to get to the position of power have had over a decade to sort the mess out and failed miserably.