The Bank of England did a great job with the Treasury in creating plenty of money and offering substantial stimulus to the economy to offset the worst effects of the anti virus policies introduced in March 2020.Ā It was right to continue those into 2021, but it failed to rein them in as the recovery accelerated last year. It has been driving whilst looking in the rear view mirror. A year ago they did not see the big inflation coming evenĀ though their extra loose monetary policies in the second half of 2021 were bound to fuel it. Now they can see the inflation in full flood they wish to do something about it. We haveĀ Ā had the third interest rate rise in quick succession.
The policies we followed in the EU of encouraging us to sacrifice national capacity in a wide range of areas from energy, through energy consuming industry to food and fishing on the grounds we could buy all that from the continent has left us very vulnerable to the supply chain and trade disruptions world politics is creating. Instead of having our own lower domestic gas price like the USA by producing enough of our own we are hitched to ultra high spot European gas prices. Instead of having enough of our own aluminium, steel, ceramics, glass and the rest we need to import ever dearer product at high marginal prices. Instead of growing most of our own temperate and glasshouse food we are over dependent on what can become stretched supply chains with rising prices.
The Bank of England needs to be careful in its new found ardour to control inflation. The big impact of rising domestic heating bills, fuel bills at the pumps, food costs in the supermarkets and rising mortgage rates is going to take a lot of spending power out of the economy. It looks likely as if the Treasury will make the hit worse with its tax rises. The Bank should pause to see what impact the cruelties of April have on growth and activity as many people struggle with their bills. The Bank needs to keep an eye looking ahead out of the windscreen at what comes next as well as checking the rear view mirror. They cannot stop the current inflation they helped create with tooĀ much money and credit. They need to worry about the balance between growth and price rises going forward where there areĀ now bigĀ headwinds against growth.
March 18, 2022
Good morning.
I did a quick calculation (well I cheated and did it online) for someone owing Ā£100K over 25 years. It came to a monthly increase of Ā£21. Does not sound much but, as our kind host points out, when you start to add it to all the other increases, that is another substantial chunk from someones wage packet. Still, at least we will have somewhere to put all those illegal immigrants, Ukrainians, Afghans, and HK Chinese as Brit’s will no longer be able to afford but these over priced flats and live in their own country.
It is not the BoE that will get the blame for this, it is your Leader and Party. They have failed to control him just as he has failed to control spending. And the impact will be felt by the Conservative Party come May.
I was minded a long time ago by Dr. Richard North of an old saying :
“If you do not take an interest in politics, politics will take an interest in you !” And at 0.25% and rising that’s some interest.
March 18, 2022
It would appear that the EU has been using net zero as a means to hasten European integration and interdependence.
March 18, 2022
+1
Agree.
That was said a long time ago by an anti EU membership politician.
He said that wind power was regarded as an integrating mechanism.
When the wind donāt blow in France it might be blowing elsewhere in the EU and we could all be FAIR and SHARE.
Yuk!
Anyway! Lol. It didnāt blow, did it?š
March 18, 2022
A global grid is perfectly feasible and the long term answer.
The sun never sets, and the wind is never still.
March 18, 2022
You just need every nation on Earth to
co-operate with each other permanently.
Best of luck with that NHL
March 18, 2022
We can’t even keep Britain together.. let alone the former USSR.
March 19, 2022
The long term is quite some time.
No one even foresaw the iPhone in the 1960s.
Globally, despite recent events, war is steadily diminishing, and markedly.
March 18, 2022
Yes but only net zero for the plebs not france or Germany.
Germany is opening lignite fired power stations and recommissioning nuclear.
Germany and France won’t lose their industry on the altar of net zero but will be there to replace our lost products.
Until we start fracking and open up the North Sea we are going to suffer. Soon with Bozo there will be no Aluminium, steel, fertiliser, diesel or any energy consuming business. Where will the money come from to import there products.
March 18, 2022
Ian
A sad but true comment, let us hope Boris soon sees sense, or the Public and Conservative Mp’s will.
March 18, 2022
Mark,
+1000
Absolutely, it is Not the BOE. It is JRās party and govt.! How dare he try to spin away the blame to someone else, he even tried blaming the Treasury!
Who is and has been in charge of the Treasury! Sunak, Javid, Hammond, Osborne.
Unbelievable. Who wanted all the extra cash to spend governor of the BOE or one waster Johnson. He got rid of a Javid to have greater control to do so. JR and his party have the solution- get rid of Johnson we cannot afford him! I said it a long time ago and will say it again we cannot afford Johnson. His chaotic misfit private life and finances is bringing the country to its knees.
Shameless party loyalty blog JR.
Who is has the grand title of first lord etc!
Reply Of course where I say the Treasury I am accepting Chancellors followed bad advice and forecasts and will be held accountable. Where the Bank of E claims to be working independently there is more occasion to blame them. See however my latest lecture on the limits of CB independence. If you were less keen to always shout at me falsely alleging I am wrong we could have a more civilised discussion and learn something. I’m thinking I am too tolerant of people who rush off hostile pieces every day without considering the facts or even wanting to understand what I have written. I will bin more.
March 18, 2022
Oh JR I am not falsely accusing you of anything. You are very intelligent and know your stuff. Most here would welcome you as Chancellor, including me. This is not what you blogged. If the govt wished the BOE to be more or less involved, it could change whatever role it wanted from the BOE. Twelve years and 80 seat majority give your party total control. Your party and govt has resoundingly failed the country economically. Fact. If there was anything remotely conservative about your party it would have carried out two completely different budgets, other former conservative ministers quite rightly said they were socialist budgets!
It is your gift to bin or ban me. It appears this is the Tory way with dissent. Only the view of the govt allowed.
March 18, 2022
+1 Mark B.
As for Bozo’s spending, he and his Government (if you can call it that) must be the most profligate and incontinent spenders in the history of this country.
March 18, 2022
Indeed Mark, just wait until Bank rates go up to what were historically near normal levels of 4-5%..
The housing boom of the last decade and all that goes with it, (spending on Home Improvements), will slow and shrink dramatically.
Given all other direct living costs are rising dramatically as well, and at the same time (other than wages) I see serious trouble ahead.
People will have real problems paying the mortgage, let alone spending Ā£15,000 plus on a heat pump !
March 18, 2022
But is is not just base rates that are rising bank margins have increased hugely, I used to borrow at about base+1% now more like base +3% or often more with far higher fees too. All the bank seem to be about the same and even charging 40% on personal overdraft thanks to the Governor of the BoE it seems, while the dope was at the FCA! Effectively banning them for sensible people.
March 18, 2022
Why is ‘creating plenty of money’ an achievement? Building a business from scratch like Dyson or Apple is an achievement. Peeing money down the sink is NOT an achievement but an act of Socialist evil.
Let the private sector rein in prices while politicians and governments can stand on platforms and pump out their verbiage achieving the square root of nowt except more debt and less freedom.
I give up with Tory Neo-Marxists. The party’s in a world of its own and an even bigger threat than Marxist Labour and the odious SNP
March 18, 2022
Well said Dom. Cut regulation, encourage innovation and reduce tax. The private sector will always be the solution to economic growth not increased government spending.
March 18, 2022
Ā£2.1 trillion of debt over two and half times worse when they came to office. Structural deficit never balanced but abandoned. This was JRs party central economic plank! This was not BOE but consocialists. JR spinning otherwise today.
March 18, 2022
“government spending”…of other peoples money
March 18, 2022
+many
I can never understand how something that was once a capital crime ( under some circs women were not hanged but burned for counterfeiting!) can suddenly become a jolly good thing to do! Is it yet another satanic inversion?
World turned upside down?
Playing fast and loose with our hard-earned!
March 18, 2022
+1 Almost as bad certainly.
March 18, 2022
ācreating plenty of moneyā is not the same as creating wealth. Creating money from thin air is like theft, if ordinary members of the public did it they would be criminals, but the government does it’s virtuous. This is why I don’t trust the government, whether on the economy, the climate, healthcare or geopolitics in general. They just lie all the time.
March 18, 2022
DOM
The average person may be too stupid to see it but they will feel it. By the next general election.
March 20, 2022
When the aggregate of average people voted Leave you said how wise the electorate were.
Curious.
March 18, 2022
Perhaps there should be more training and understanding regarding cause and effect when setting out the way forward.
Surely one of the most cost effective ways to help balance the accounts is cut out or heavily reduce the areas that are costing the most, unnecessarily.
The answers are already in the control of the government but they don’t implement them.
Instead of talking the financial numbers on dingy invaders, HS2, NHS , energy and prepping for Net Zero let us see something actually being done to decrease the millions being thrown at these areas of heavy expenditure.
With a majority of 80, rocket science it is not. We cannot afford it, we are living above our needs, put this country first.
March 18, 2022
Living beyond our means perhaps, Turbo. But I fully agree with your comment.
March 18, 2022
Regarding energy and inflation affecting jobs and manufacturing. There is no point looking to the future when ministers haven’t learnt from the past. If Joe Public is capable of seeing what’s going to happen when prices are too high then it begs the question why can’t government? We are walking head long into a disaster begging the Middle East for oil. The solution is on our doorstep but this government is too stupid to take advantage of it. The Saudis must be laughing their heads off. Why is a country who could be energy secure having to beg? Answer, because we are run by idiots. I think you’ll find Sir John, people are beginning to get the message. The government is not working for this country. There will be trouble ahead for Boris and co.
March 18, 2022
“Governments generally tend to be good things at first, and bad things the longer they last. But Governments gradually employ more and more ambitious elites who capture a greater and greater share of society’s income by interfering more and more in people’s lives as they give themselves more and more rules to enforce, until they kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. Because it is a monopoly, government brings inefficiency and stagnation to most things it runs; government agencies pursue the inflation of their budgets rather than the service of their customers; pressure groups form an unholy alliance with agencies to extract more money from taxpayers for their members.
Yet despite all this, most clever people still call for government to run more things and assume that if it did so, it would somehow be more perfect, more selfless, next time.”
[from The Rational Optimist, by Matt Ridley, published 2010, page 182]
March 18, 2022
Idiotocracy – government by idiots. An appropriate name for our ruling elites.
March 18, 2022
Kakocracy is an even better one.
March 18, 2022
+1 the Conservatives have allowed BoJo to drive them out of power I predict.
March 18, 2022
F U S
Beginning to get the message.
If all is fair in love and war then hopefully it will be the electorate giving out a clear message come the May elections.
March 18, 2022
Indeed they are. No excuses can be offered regarding fracking our own gas or oil and gas extraction from the North sea. Importing fracked gas from Qatar and the USA. Woodchips from America for our power station. Coal imported from Russia is not acceptable. The net zero agenda by the Westminster crowd is madness. Invariably when they agree on something, they are wrong e.g. 1. mass immigration, equality laws to stop free speech about 1., 2. the EU, 3. net zero, 4. HS2 etc
March 18, 2022
It makes you wonder who is the government working for because it does not seem to be this country. Is the government being controlled by aliens or perhaps some organisations with lots of money?
March 18, 2022
March 18, 2022
Of course not. It’s a turn of phrase. Nothing more, nothing less. Anything else would be repugnant and I’m sure Sir John wouldn’t have printed it if he thought I was joking in bad taste.
Reply I do not endorse peoples phrases or views. I delete the most offensive or potentially libellous
March 18, 2022
The outlook is grim. Commodity shortages look set to continue. Some farmers are asking themselves if it is worth the risk of buying fertilizer at current inflated prices to support planting for the coming season. The Russia-Ukraine conflict looks set to ensure severe shortages of many commodities. It is evident that businesses in many other industries will be wary given the many uncertainties. Stagflation beckons while an obtuse government blocks the use of key resources beneath our feet.
March 18, 2022
Not just fertiliser but feed for sheep/lambs at the moment. You might recall JR and his party were going to help farmers once out of the CAP. Unfortunately the message has not reached Useless Eustice or his remainer dept.
March 18, 2022
And then what is grown or reared doesn’t necessarily get eaten by the those of the country that produced it. There are plenty of food producing nations with starving populations. The food gets eaten by the highest bidder in a global market – elsewhere.
This is why I sometimes wonder what Sir John is on about. Food independence.
The only way to be food independent is to be rich enough to afford the food… even that produced here.
March 18, 2022
Our own fuel would mitigate much of the inflation.
There is no allowance for the low consumption covid years – can we not set back green taxes by two years ?
March 18, 2022
Did I read that the energy-begging PM was somewhat snubbed abroad and came back to the āSaudi Arabia of wind power ā oil less?
Better get digging Boris!
March 18, 2022
But the idiot imports what he could produce here!! All to appease his wife and her green appointments in and around cabinet! Time for Goldsmith to go. Public rejected him.
March 19, 2022
Goldsmith (and Carrie) are just wrong on climate alarmism and energy policy and are complete dopes. That is why Goldsmith should go. Net zero must go too.
March 18, 2022
Everhopeful. Boris thinks the Iranians look friendly at the moment. Biden is getting closer to them so it must be right. Sarc.
March 18, 2022
Well, would you do a deal with Bunter? Outside of the PCP, Bunter is seen for what he is; an overgrown schoolboy with a distant relationship with the truth, honesty and reality. His word is, like his appearance, a joke.
One has to hope he loses his parliamentary seat in the next election, if we’re still here by then.
March 18, 2022
Making us a particular enemy of Putin.. who WILL survive in office longer than Boris and who will exact revenge on us in various ways and through his new bestie… President Xi.
March 19, 2022
I feel honoured to be an enemy of Putin, but suit yourself.
March 20, 2022
Courage demands that sometimes you speak the truth whatever the consequences.
Courage is an amazing thing. Putin failed to factor in the courage of the Ukranian people (he thought he would waltz into Ukraine, and take it over, within a few days).
Because of the courage of the Ukranian people, Putin could actually fail overall.
And it when people show courage overall, that dictatorships fall. Maybe not as soon as we would like – but eventually.
So courage is powerful. Don’t be overly cautious.
March 20, 2022
Also, please to exaggerate the power of evil.
Look at how Joan of Arc – 17 year old peasant girl – booted out the enemies of France,
Look at the hubris of Phillip II and the Armada
Look at the hubris of the Nazis attacking Russia and failing to conquer Britain at the beginning of WW2. Etc
Sure, we have to be cautious but not at the cost of courage. And even when courageous we might say or do something ill-advised. But better to be courageous overall – than not. Not just for its own sake. But because it’s POWERFUL in bringing down evil regimes.
March 20, 2022
‘Also, please to exaggerate the power of evil’
– I meant please don’t exaggerate the power of evil (and dangerous evil can be).
March 18, 2022
+1 Everhopeful.
He’s in a hole, but he keeps on digging!
March 18, 2022
+1
March 18, 2022
OT
I must praise mp’s for voicing their disgust at the way P&O ferries have treated their employees. The government must do more to establish laws to stop behaviour like this , but we’ll done anyway.
March 18, 2022
+1
March 18, 2022
There are laws to stop this. In fact, some laws are in the criminal domain, but seeing as P&O is owned by the government of Dubai UK law enforcement won’t be able to make any prosecutions. Still, these are unfair dismissals, not redundancies and the sacked employees will be in line for substantial damages.
March 18, 2022
Substantial damages but no job. That’s the way it usually works.
March 18, 2022
I agree. It was interesting to see P&O Ferries mention ‘redundancy’ when the roles are clearly NOT redundant. I would be interested to know if P&O Ferries was profitable BEFORE the pandemic. The company may well have lost Ā£100 million over the past two years but if it was profitable beforehand it shouldn’t be allowed to get away with an egregious action like this to fix a short-term problem. Further, we should now consider whether DP Ports has too much ownership of our infrastructure.
March 18, 2022
And allow the RMT to hold them to ransom. I think not. They are helping bankrupting TFL through weak politicians constantly crumbling to their demands. A world class city reduced to 20th century working practices.
Well done to P and O. If only our public sector had such cojones.
March 18, 2022
Except ferry companies are not known for union disruptions and militancy.
March 18, 2022
Yet there are regular calls for “easier hire and fire” on these pages by certain contributors. Presumably those individuals are completely supportive of how Dubai-owned P&O treated UK workers.
March 18, 2022
There are calls, but exactly what legislation has this government repealed which has led to the P and O situation?
March 19, 2022
We already have easy hire and fire. For the first 2 years of employment the employer can do virtually what it likes. If it can’t decide an employee is worth having after 2 years, they deserve all they get.
March 18, 2022
The Tories have been foremost of all UK parties in repealing the very laws which protect employees from exactly this sort of thing, or allow them to defend themselves against such.
Have you been asleep for the past forty years?
What ever is the matter with you?
March 18, 2022
The only real protection for employees is lots of good, well paid, available jobs. Government rules and red tape, restrictive employments laws, other protections and over taxation just kills well paid jobs and this harms good employees as much as it harms businesses.
It also means they often have to carry the bad, lazy and incompetent ones who are in the wrong jobs and who cannot then easily be fired. Good for largely parasitic jobs in law, HR, tribunals thoughā¦
March 18, 2022
See my post to Peter NHL
Have you got any specific examples?
March 18, 2022
Are you really unaware of Tory anti-trade union law and restrictions on access to legal aid and to tribunals?
And the law permitting “variation” i.e. the tearing up of contracts by employers?
March 18, 2022
Stop your ranting for a moment and just answer this straightforward question NHL.
What legislation has been repealed by this government which actually allows P and O to treat their employees as they have?
March 19, 2022
I was making a general not a particular point.
It seems to me that the objective of Tory rule above all, has always been to teach the employed person To Know Their Place, and not to engender the best industrial relations needed for high productivity as in e.g. Germany.
The P&O case is not a good example, because it appears that the law of which they have perhaps fallen foul is a retained European Union one – one the few relating to employment – and which they might have assumed no longer applied because of brexit.
March 19, 2022
You were trying to claim changes in Conservatives employment legislation had caused the P and O dreadful sacking, as was young Andy.
Which isn’t correct.
Now you back track and say you were just making a general point.
At least you accept the decision was probably a result of legislation applying to the company being registered outside the UK
March 18, 2022
The same happened 13 years ago with a large telco manufacturer with lots of sites in Maidenhead.
MPs and even the PM (Gordon Brown) voiced their disgust but actually did nothing while the administrator broke employment law 6 repeatedly. This was over a period when both Labour then Tories were in power.
The politicians achieved precisely nothing then and it will be exactly the same again.
March 18, 2022
Rules employers must follow when making staff redundant – consultations, notice periods, compulsory and non-compulsory redundancy and redundancy pay. gov.uk. Now for government action.
There are laws in the UK: There’s no time limit for how long the period of consultation should be, but the minimum is: 20 to 99 redundancies – the consultation must start at least 30 days before any dismissals take effect. 100 or more redundancies – the consultation must start at least 45 days before any dismissals take effect.
March 18, 2022
I love this term “consultation”.
It means little more than announcing what is going to happen, and then saying “because…” when those affected ask “why?”
March 21, 2022
Acas – take it up with Acas – https://www.acas.org.uk/manage-staff-redundancies/redundancy-consultations take a look. People need to be given notice plus redundancy in order to find other work when they are made redundant, that is the main purpose of consulting so that people don’t get smacked in the face with the decision on the same day they leave. This is going to cost P&O a lot of money and now a failed reputation, quickly followed by a name change no doubt and it has also affect P&O cruises who I’ve been told don’t have the same owners. I bet they’re fuming.
“You must consult with your employees before finalising any redundancies.
If you do not hold genuine and meaningful consultation before making redundancies, employees could claim to an employment tribunal for unfair dismissal.
Consultation is when you talk and listen to affected employees. In collective consultation you also consult with their representatives.
You should use consultation to try and agree actions wherever possible, for example the selection criteria.
During consultation, you should discuss:
the changes that are needed, what you plan to do, and why
ways to avoid or make fewer redundancies
the skills and experience needed for the future
the criteria for selecting employees for redundancy
any concerns employees may have
how you can support and arrange time off for affected employees, for example to update their CVs and get training”
March 19, 2022
Not giving minimum notice to employees is a breach of employment regulations. It was also the case in 2009 that not giving the minimum notice to government was a breach of criminal law.
None of these measures were used in the 2009 example despite the employer culpability and I don’t know if government has ever had the stones to use it against a big multinational nor if it is still the case.
I learned three clear lessons from the experience;
– you can never depend on government to protect or defend anything
– depending on the law to protect the lawful is an utter waste of time
– politicians are ineffectual against a corrupt public sector.
March 18, 2022
The Indignation of the minister telling the house yesterday about the sacking of 800 P&O staff but failed to tell about the planned 1,100 staff to be made redundant by the Department of Works & Pensions with 42 sites to be closed by June 2022
March 18, 2022
Empty words from MPs. I am always surpised that in this country, unlke in France, retaliatory action is never taken against these company managers.
March 18, 2022
This is the stupidity of handing over inflation control to the Bank with just interest rates as control. Like so many jumped up officials they have taken their remit of 2% inflation rate and decided they will seek to control the economy in its wider sense and deliver sermons as excuses for failing to attain the 2% rate which is their only official remit.
Politicians find this suitable for their own purposes so the car weaves along at great pace, out of control, with no one caring. Thank you Gordon!
March 18, 2022
^
Not posted by this Peter
March 18, 2022
None of this was necessary. Sweden didn’t wreck the economy; ruin millions of lives and end up with 6 million waiting for medical treatment because their health system was effectively shut down. And Sweden’s outcome from the Low Consequence Infectious Disease (the Government’s pro-Lockdown assessment) called Covid was better than ours ……. using OUR pandemic preparation plan which SAGE and Johnson/Handcock ditched.
If the Treasury had tried to create the conditions it predicted in the Brexit Referendum propaganda campaign it couldn’t have done a better job. It feels suspiciously like revenge: recreate the 1970s, when we got dragged into the benighted organisation in the first place.
It was noticeable that the banks, gifted a rise in base rate, were very quick to announce that their “customers” with savings in their banks shouldn’t expect to have it passed on to them in full! Just like the petrol and energy companies when the oil and gas prices fall.
March 18, 2022
+1
March 18, 2022
Nor Japan. Nor South Dakota, Florida, Texas and other states that refused lockdown. Their economies working very well. They protected the vulnerable and carried on. Johnson caved to Macron and SAGE. Ferguson and Handcock had little regard for what they preached or imposed.
March 19, 2022
New Zealand’s economy and social life was hardly affected at all, and they only had a few dozen deaths most importantly.
Now, they were truly brilliant.
March 19, 2022
There has been a huge impact to the economy in New Zealand.
To say “it was hardly affected at all” is totally ridiculous.
March 19, 2022
Well there was a sharp drop for one quarter but a very rapid recovery.
However, New Zealandās response to the coronavirus pandemic has been the best in the world and is the country that gives business leaders the most confidence for future investment, according to a Bloomberg Media survey.
New Zealand ranked strongly for political stability, the economic recovery, virus control and social resilience in Bloombergās market crisis management index.
The index scores New Zealand at 238, above second-placed Japan at 204 and Taiwan in third on 198. Australia was sixth with 151, while the UK and US ā despite their high case numbers and fatalities from Covid-19 ā were ninth and 10th.
So not total embarrassment for this country by that measure then.
March 19, 2022
There are many articles on line about the severe retraction in the economy of New Zealand.
I suggest you read some of them NHL.
March 18, 2022
Sir J, as I have noted before historic records show a 0.75% interest rate is an extreme, at the low end. Move Bank base rates rapidly up to the 2-3% range. There should be a cost for borrowing and this drives financial discipline. If such a rate causes individuals and businesses stress then they are over-borrowed.
And perhaps the solution during the pandemic wasn’t throwing stimulus billions at closed business but was to maintain an open society and apply a focused protection model to those at higher risk of serious illness. We shouldn’t have spent that money in the first place. Will Baroness Hallett’s enquiry consider this area? It must.
March 18, 2022
@PeteB
Move base rate up to 2 to 3%? Have you lost your marbles? Our economy floats on debt. Anyone who has bought a house in the last 10 years has a massive mortgage at interest rates that make their debt just about manageable. Mortgage interest rates of, say, 4% would lead to the sort of house price crash and recession the Tories created in the mid to late 1980s – which led to hundreds of thousands of home repossessions, high unemployment and a stagnant economy until the mid 1990s. Raising base rate above 1% is now unthinkable.
Doncha just love Tory governments. Debt, debt and more debt and a useless public sector. I hear today of an undercover investigation of the DVLA. Staff working from home found to be doing no work at all. Nobody notices. No checks are made. There is no accountability. Hey, itās public money – why should we have to work. Governments generally, but this one in particular, are completely useless. Itās a gravy train. All of it.
March 18, 2022
Mike. Unbelievable but I’m sure it’s true. I can’t get over how many new people were turning up for walks with their new dogs during lockdown. Most we’d never seen before and now they’ve suddenly disappeared. Were they all ‘working from home’? Are they actually working now that they are nowhere to be seen?
March 18, 2022
“The policies we followed in the EU of encouraging us to sacrifice national capacity in a wide range of areas from energy, through energy consuming industry to food and fishing on the grounds we could buy all that from the continent has left us very vulnerable to the supply chain and trade disruptions world politics is creating. ”
It’s called a captive market and is a deliberate EU strategy to make members reliant upon the EU. I see the end result of this policy in the ‘Hunger Games’, where each ‘country’ is allocated a specific task, eg. manufacturing, agriculture, etc. for the benefit of the ‘elite’ and no longer able to operate as an independent country. Unfortunately, Boris still follows the same pattern, making us more reliant on the EU instead of less reliant.
March 18, 2022
And on R5L this morning there was a fruit-farmer complaining about wages. She didn’t just have the new National Living Wage to contend with, and the impact of war in Ukraine. The Home Office had also pushed the wages she has to pay, for unskilled labour, up to Ā£10.10/hour. So, her wage bill had gone up by 25% in a single year. Here, and in America, politicians have been profligate with both the government’s money, derived from tax-payers, and that of businesses. And I see that yesterday the Commons was debating granting an additional type of leave for employees. Here’s an idea: the government commits to adding no new costs on businesses for the remainder of this parliament.
March 18, 2022
People across the world are having to contend with the impact of the sanctions war on Russia, SW. This will hit the third world particularly badly, as food prices rocket and starvation looms (not that that bothers the pro-war Left). Fuel to transport goods is getting more expensive, which is pushing up prices across the board for all of us. If the situation deteriorates further, Russia could cut off gas to Europe, with even more dramatic effects on prices than what we’ve seen so far. How much better it would have been for Ukraine months ago to have accepted the security guarantees it will have to accept anyway from Russia. Unfortunately it will get a far worse deal now. Whether at that point the sanctions regime decimating the world economy will be lifted is unlikely, if NATO pursues its current objectives. So an end to this war won’t mean an end to inflation and economic destruction, I’m afraid. I see no way out of this bind unless governments change their net zero stance. Whatever the ecological arguments, the sanctions-provoked economic turbulence around the world is surely the wrong time to impose further tax pain on citizens.
March 18, 2022
So what’s your alternative to the minimum wage? That we go back to letting employers pay whatever poverty wages they want to while being subsidised by taxpayers through top ups via the social security system.
To quote Sir Winston Churchill from his speech on the Trades Board Act 1909:
“It is a serious national evil that any class of His Majesty’s subjects should receive less than a living wage in return for their utmost exertions. It was formerly supposed that the working of the laws of supply and demand would naturally regulate or eliminate that evil. The first clear division which we make on the question to-day is between healthy and unhealthy conditions of bargaining. That is the first broad division which we make in the general statement that the laws of supply and demand will ultimately produce a fair price. Where in the great staple trades in the country you have a powerful organisation on both sides, where you have responsible leaders able to bind their constituents to their decision, where that organisation is conjoint with an automatic scale of wages or arrangements for avoiding a deadlock by means of arbitration, there you have a healthy bargaining which increases the competitive power of the industry, enforces a progressive standard of life and the productive scale, and continually weaves capital and labour more closely together. But where you have what we call sweated trades, you have no organisation, no parity of bargaining, the good employer is undercut by the bad, and the bad employer is undercut by the worst; the worker, whose whole livelihood depends upon the industry, is undersold by the worker who only takes the trade up as a second string, his feebleness and ignorance generally renders the worker an easy prey to the tyranny; of the masters and middle-men, only a step higher up the ladder than the worker, and held in the same relentless grip of forcesāwhere those conditions prevail you have not a condition of progress, but a condition of progressive degeneration.”
Those words are as relevant today as they were over 100 years ago and a reason why a minimum wage is a necessity in a decent, civilised country.
March 18, 2022
Yes, and effective worker representation, recognised unions if you like, along with access to tribunals.
The easier the second the less you need the first.
March 18, 2022
The UK has copious amounts of legislation which give employees contacts of employment rights to redundancy payments, lay off pay rights to stop unfair dismissal access to employment tribunals and rights to belong to a Trades Union.
Where have you been for the last 40 years?
Whatever is the matter with you?
March 18, 2022
Hmm, if I may quote from Ricardo (who wrote back in 1817, ‘The principles of Political Economy and Taxation’, chapter XXV) :
“Experience however shews, that neither a state nor a bank ever have had the unrestricted power of issuing paper money, without abusing that power: in all states, therefore, the issue of paper money ought to be under some check and control; and none seems so proper for that purpose, as that of subjecting the issuers of paper money to the obligation of paying their notes, either in gold coin or bullion.”
In other words, the root cause of the problem is the abuse of fiat money.
March 18, 2022
+1
Lovely quote.
March 18, 2022
It is why August 15th., 1971 is a day that will live in infamy (as FDR might have said) and why gold window closer Richard Nixon is the most significant figure in post world war era politics.
March 18, 2022
Printing money backed up by nothing will end in tears. Wait until there’s a run on the bank and people realise that their money is nearly worthless. Spend it now whilst you can.
March 18, 2022
Agreed.
March 18, 2022
Anywayā¦they have all caused this with their ludicrous plague response.
And NOW we are all War, war, warā¦ā¦
Whatever next?
March 18, 2022
I think famine is next on the agenda.
You can interpret “famine” loosely so that as well as food shortages (which will massively impact some countries which already struggle to feed their populations) there will be shortages of all the other commodities necessary for life in a developed economy in the 21st century like the UK.
The bad news is that the Jolly Green Giant in No.10 and 646 Eco Loons in Parliament who voted for the Climate Change Act are going to make it a great deal worse with their Net Zero lunacy.
March 18, 2022
I agree. This Government has only just started on it’s Net Zero policies. Business premises are expected to achieve an “A” energy rating by 2030. Yesterday we saw the announcement of the closure of 40 DWP offices. Not to reduce staff costs but because the offices aren’t “green” enough. Near me a purpose built office for over 2000 staff which is less than 30 years old is to be demolished and rebuilt in the centre of town at a cost of over 30 million. This Government is infected by a virus and it isn’t of the Corona variety. We are at the most vulnerable we have ever been in our entire history and this from an enemy within. People need to wake up to what’s coming.
March 18, 2022
There’s a very effective treatment for the Eco Lunacy Virus and “Not Listening” which will become available on 5 May ’22. Better known as “The Local Elections,” the treatment requires you NOT to vote for the Establishment Parties who are all completely infected but to put your X next to Reform UK.
Since the virus is very persistent in the Establishment Parties, subsequent booster votes should be applied whenever the opportunity arises.
March 18, 2022
+1
March 18, 2022
Control the food supply and you control the people. Social Credits to force people to comply and remain subservient have been used throughout history. Rationing will be sold to us as a necessity whilst the so called elites live a life of luxury.
March 18, 2022
Is this an answer to obesity in the UK.
March 18, 2022
Well it worked in the Second World War. Maybe that is where they have got their inprirations ? Like many here, I thought we were on a journy Back to the 1970’s, but no, it is worse than that ! It’s pre-1940’s.
Tin hat anyone ?
March 18, 2022
+many
Very likely!
Thatāll be when they offer us the yummy mealworms perhaps?
Conspiracy has it that there is a mealworm farm under Trafalgar Sqā¦but we all know that conspiracy theories are always wrongā¦. š¤«
March 18, 2022
Spot on Donna….and no one in government has the bottle to reverse the ‘capping’ of the fracking wells
March 18, 2022
The Bank is aping the Fed and the Fed has lost control.
There is not much point to central banks that cannot control inflation, as Mervyn King once said.
March 18, 2022
I am no fan of the zero rate interest policies pursued by Labour and the Conservative administrations since 2008 but it seems to me that charging borrowers an increased amount for monies they have already borrowed and have budgeted to pay back at a certain rate is not an ideal way to curb inflation.
Charge a MUCH higher rate on new borrowings and prevent banks from creating more money. That is the way to stop increased money supply driving prices through excess demand.
Particularly prevent banks (including the Central Bank) creating money to lend to a government running an unnecessary deficit.
March 18, 2022
I have no debt so have no skin in this particular game other than as a victim of Government theft via inflation.
March 18, 2022
A great job? Really? Priming the economy with tons of new cash whilst almost halting production of goods. Any so called “economist” that couldn’t see huge inflation coming from that is better suited to cleaning public conveniences. It beggars belief that so many people in government are so inept at their jobs yet are immune to consequences. If any person that I employed were that useless they’d be applying for a job elsewhere- probably with the Bank of England.
March 18, 2022
All true, but we should remember the role of home-grown green crap in closing off the potential for secure and cheap energy and forcing out energy intensive industries. It wasnāt just the EU. As long as the Brexit-supporting Conservatives are also wedded to green crap / net zero there will be no change there. Indeed, given they are wedded to this foolish and expensive policy, as well as to a general direction of big govt, high tax borrow and spend, protectionism for any industry which starts to bleat at trade deals etc, one really wonders why leading Conservatives such as Boris Johnson were ever in favour of Brexit at all! I would have thought EU membership was an ideal framework for such policies.
March 19, 2022
The blackcrap addicts are now having a taste of what happens when our easy access to oil and gas stops and we become totally reliant on foreign supply – costs double, at least, and at worst supplies dry up.
And yet the addicts do everything they can not to prepare and find alternatives.
What is it they expect to happen, that someone will merely sprinkle some magic carbon dust and alternatives will magically appear instantly?
Or is it that they simply don’t care as it will be our children’s and the children’s problem.
March 18, 2022
“The policies we followed in the EU of encouraging us to sacrifice national capacity in a wide range of areas”
It wasn’t the EU that decided to hike employment taxes to increase the cost of employing people, or open up UK residential property for all the world to speculate on and price British people out of the property market. That was UK government all by itself.
And do you know what, next month they want to make it worse, and we’re out of the EU.
March 18, 2022
Taxation is the honest way. Inflation is at base simply disgraceful politicians stealing the purchasing power of the electorate, and shamefully leaving bills to be paid by future generations.
March 18, 2022
Just a reminder that ultimate control still rests with the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
The most recent remit letter that I have found was sent on October 27 2021, here:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1028597/CX_LETTER_TO_GOVENOR_MPC_REMIT_271021.pdf
“The Bank of England Act 1998 (the Act) requires that I specify the definition of price stability and the governmentās economic policy objectives at least once in every period of 12 months beginning on the anniversary of the day the Act came into force.
I hereby re-confirm the inflation target as 2 per cent as measured by the 12-month increase in the Consumer Prices Index (CPI). The inflation target of 2 per cent is symmetric and applies at all times. This reflects the primacy of price stability and the forward-looking inflation target in the UK monetary policy framework.
In accordance with the Act, I also confirm that the governmentās economic policy objective is to achieve strong, sustainable and balanced growth. Price and financial stability are essential pre-requisites to achieve this objective in all parts of the UK and sectors of the economy, providing the stability required for businesses to thrive and to help keep the cost of living low for families.”
And so forth.
If he had wanted to do so, Rishi Sunak could have told the Bank to let inflation go up a bit to reflect rising world prices, rather than just stick with the 2% target and have interest rates rising in an misplaced attempt to suppress domestic demand and slow economic growth.
March 18, 2022
Inflation currently seems to be driven largely by supply side constraints, for example on the availability of gas and fuel and microprocessors. So how does raising interest rates help to reduce it ? Presumably by taking money out of consumers’ pockets via higher personal debt costs so they spend less ? In that case won’t tax and NI rises achieve the same thing ?
March 18, 2022
@Roy Granger
The half-wits in question cannot differentiate between demand led inflation and supply side inflation. It is obvious that the forthcoming massive rises in energy prices coupled with the punitive tax rises will reduce demand considerably. Interest rate rises are precisely the opposite of what is needed so, of course, the half-wits go for them.
March 18, 2022
Mr. Redwood, Iāve asked many times – why the obsession with growth?
Growth in what, precisely? Consumption? How is it environmentally sustainable if we just keep consuming more and more? Surely, one day, we have to say āwe all have enough stuff, letās aim for zero growth or, even, (just a thought) shrinkage, not growth.
March 18, 2022
The servicing of national debt and government’s appetite for spending need growth to sustain them both.
March 19, 2022
You can have growth in wages and standards of living by increasing value, eg high value services and high value parts and product manufacture rather than simply more low value physical production – produce high value machines rather than export the raw materials.
A move to a circular economy would allow a manufacturing base to be maintained and reshored with a greatly reduced demand for raw materials though you would still need a significant and sustainable energy solution.
But unfortunately the debate is dominated by people solely focused on running their very expensive imported cars with increasingly expensive imported fuel.
March 18, 2022
O/T. Isn’t a company that wants to sack more than a 100 workers within 90 days supposed to consult with the Dept Trade and Industry? Why was P&O able to spring the surprise of all of these redundancies on their workers like they have? Can anyone explain how what they have done is legal? I notice French workers are not affected or that’s what I’ve read.
March 19, 2022
It likely isn’t legal but the government has not done anything about it in the past and likely won’t do anything now. I could give a specific example of where this has happened but my past comments have been moderated.
Rule of thumb 1 – don’t own shares in the company that employs you, ever.
Rule of thumb 2 – don’t depend on the government, law or politicians to protect you or your interests.
March 20, 2022
Yes, if you have an electorate that does not grasp that the job of Parliament, our legislature, is to pass laws that regulate every aspect of our lives – including access to the means of enforcing them – or one that does not care what laws it might pass, then you have to apply those rules.
That appears to be the position unfortunately, and it has resulted in the Tories winning the last three elections.
March 18, 2022
Is Andrew Baily up to it?
Was he the best man for the Job?
Did he leave his last job with problems?
March 18, 2022
So, acting in hindsight, after the events, is giving us sea saw economics. First a rush to print money and then a rush to control inflation. Brought about by the sheer ignorance and stupidity of locking up the healthy to protect the sick, following the crystal ball ‘science’of SAGE!
And now, surely, P&O sacking of 800 staff has nothing to do with the NI hike.
March 18, 2022
Fiddling around with interest rates is the equivalent of re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
We are heading for a disaster caused by the Civil Serviceās twin policies of the economy destroying Net Zero CO2 and social harmony destroying uncontrolled immigration.
March 18, 2022
Yes, the BoE can say that high inflation is āonly temporaryā, that controlling it too rigorously would hurt the economy and come up with all sorts of other excuses. But their job is to target inflation at 2%. With inflation of 5.5% and forecast to rise, interest rates at 0.75% are not going to control it. We urgently need someone of the calibre of Paul Volcker.
March 18, 2022
Off topic, yesterday the Maidenhead Advertiser printed a letter I sent, with appended references:
https://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2022/03/13/how-can-the-ukraine-war-end/#comment-1306228
And if it had been available at the time I might have added this article as an additional reference:
https://euobserver.com/opinion/154452
“How Nato’s Bucharest summit came back to bite in Ukraine”
“… US president George W. Bush was pressing his fellow Nato delegates to give Ukraine and Georgia Nato membership … The European end of the Nato equation (then led by Angela Merkel, Gordon Brown, Nicolas Sarkozy) pushed back … Fatefully, the words that probably still echo inside Putin’s head are those in the second sentence, that, “these countries will become members of Nato.” Putin invaded Georgia later that same year. The three-day summit ended on 8 April 2008, the Russian invasion of Georgia in August.”
Now we are at war with Russia, albeit so far it is a proxy war that we will fight to the last Ukrainian.
March 18, 2022
It is extraordinary that a political party that prides itself on believing in free markets and on the ability to win elections should fall for the Civil Serviceās idea to put a price cap on energy such that the voters will get an enormous price hike in their energy bills just before the May elections.
BTW, voters need to realise that Ofgemās main remit is no longer the protection of consumers (current or future) but the delivery of Net Zero.
March 18, 2022
I see P&O Ferries have given themselves some wonderful publicity in showing the savage and shameful face of capitalism, just after receiving Ā£millions in furlough payments from the taxpayer.
Perhaps the rules have now changed, but you could only previously make people actually redundant, when the Job they were doing no longer existed, it could never be used as an excuse to substitute one worker for another (especially on lower pay), and especially and importantly whilst the job still existed.
Hope the new workers (if they are ever allowed to be used) are fully trained in all matters of safety at sea, otherwise that could be another PR disaster and may cost lives.
I would Support the unions to challenge this sort of behaviour, and hope the Courts will do so to.
Have used P&O Ferries in the past with no problem at all, the service and staff have in the past been good, but think I will be looking elsewhere in future, if another option exists.
March 19, 2022
Alan Jutson,
Agreed. I would rather see P&O go out of business than get away with this.
March 19, 2022
Do you drive a foreign car or use a foreign phone or computer?
Why didn’t you buy UK products when you still could?
As a consumer you have a share of responsibility of the loss of industry and foreign takes overs of UK businesses.
The P&O situation is simply just one of the dirty ends of the process and highlights how rubbish our governing classes are.
PS Unions are a waste of time, they exist solely to protect the interests of their chieftains and members, they don’t improve the general economic situation.
March 19, 2022
dixie
I purchase what suits my purposes, and yes I used to purchase Fords from Dagenham, also British Leyland with Metro’s, MG Montego’s and Rovers, then it was Toyota. No comparison, have purchased Toyota ever since, ran the first one for 18 years, and the second so far for 15 years, and it’s still going strong.
Second vehicle is also Japanese, run like a dream for 21 years, still going but looking to change, what British manufacturer is left ?
Purchase British food when I can out of choice.
Unions are not a waste of time at all if the members, shop stewards and leaders act sensibly, clearly it looks like you have never been a member, yes of course they represent the workers, that is the whole point of being a member, sensible unions make sure the Company Work’s efficiently, and try to work with management, after all no point in being disruptive and bleeding the company to death, because then members lose their jobs.
March 19, 2022
You are correct that I haven’t been a member but I have been one of the many victims of their many industrial actions, the ones where they use the public as hostage to force increased wages. The one time I expected them to do something generally positive in an industrial tribunal they did nothing at all to uphold employment law.
March 19, 2022
Please tell me what UK-made mobile phone I should have used. The first Blackberries were made in Canada, then Android/iOS mobile phones have been US/Japanese/S.Korean products. Why should I have bought a UK-made car when at the time I got my first one in the ā70s I could only (hardly) afford a Japanese one.
Similarly I learned about programmable desk calculators at uni on Texas Instrument and Hewlett-Packard machines, then switched at home to an Apple II then a MacIntosh computer.
Where were/are the UK-made good quality (more or less) reliable equivalent products?
Putting (as you seem to be doing) the responsibility on the UK consumer when in fact the various UK governments were sleeping at the wheel when all such products appeared on the market is rather a ādistractionā, donāt you think?
March 19, 2022
So you ignored the sentence “Why didnāt you buy UK products when you still could?”
Apple II and Mac – very expensive machines at the time – I had a Europlus Apple II then moved up to a UK built BBC micro and PC clones.
Of course consumers bare some responsibility and I am not sure what a government is supposed to do beyond ensure it’s own buying policy encourages local industry unless you suggesting a protectionist trade regime like they have in EU countries?
March 18, 2022
Off topic:
So while I passionately agree the Covid testing system needs shutting down now that Omicron is the dominant strain, and far less lethal than Delta was, and that trying to quarantine the population was now nonsense as we have all had it or will get it…
I am concerned about people scheduled to have major surgery. Say the wife is going for a big operation, and another member of the household has Flu symptoms maybe Covid, are we really sure leaving that family with no access to Covid tests is such a good idea. Especially if one member of the household catches covid close to the date of the operation. The natural incubation time for the person about to have an operation will not be expired, and getting Covid and having major surgery just dont mix, even if you are vaccinated. I really dont think this side of it has been worked out properly.
We should be doing all we can to reduce the risks of anyone going into major surgery having problems.
March 18, 2022
“Back to Basics” is the message sorely missed by the West by creeping divergence from health to wealth and the illusion that technology and PPE politicians have the answers detached from reality.
poor Ukraine shows what priorities are once again as with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Freedom, food, shelter safety etc.
Unfortunately this has been increasingly turned upside down especially when politicians like Gordon Brown thought he could rip up the economic rulebook starting with selling Gold reserves for peanuts and EU creating the paper Euro before it was backed by hard reserves in default. The recent focus on net zero carbon economy means we stand on our heads for this upside down illusion while the inflation costs rocket. Government press the economic balloon in one end and inflation results for us all at t’other.
March 18, 2022
So you want to produce more gas! How will your rich constituents react if the fracking is under Finchampstead?
Re interest rates, I think the Bank has been deluded for some time that inflation was temporary. They have ignored the lessons of the 1970s.
Reply Try listening to my case.I have said no landowner or Council has to accept gas production, But any willing will get a good deal on royalty share.
March 18, 2022
If we now see large pay rises to match (or outdo) inflation, inflation will become endemic as it did in the 1970s. So especially in the public sector(where wage costs are most of the cost) wages need to be held down during this surge in inflation, otherwise the economic and consequent political problems with inflation will be long term. It will be painful to hold back public sector pay(and there is some case for doing so in the private sector as well) to well below inflation but disastrous not to do so during this wave of inflation (to prevent the inflation from getting worse and embedded).
March 18, 2022
As long as demand exceeds supply you will experience inflation. Witness houses to buy or rent, fuel of every description, and food. Couple this with Putin trying to rig the market and a string of operators within the market being opportunistic and inflation is stoked.
The building lobby has more influence on this government than do the electorate. Were it not so the problem would have disappeared long ago.
We sit on a vast amount of fuel, but government inertia and the green religion they prey at the altar of prevents any resolution of the current fuel crisis.
Inflation in food prices is a mixture of high fuel costs, hangovers of Covid causing a shortage of drivers, the inability of the civil service in the DVLA to do the job they are paid for, and opportunism on the part of the food industry.
Stoking the population with illegal immigration logically increases demand for everything. While I await solutions to the obvious, I would point out that the day of reconing is in 2024.
March 18, 2022
Sir John,
You carefully avoid grasping the nettle in the woodpile. The only way to stave off rapidly the coming gas crunch – and even that will not be rapidly enough – is to approve on land drilling and fracking with a tremor peak of circa 3.9. The problem then becomes how to compensate the first few areas chosen to demonstrate proof of concept.
All domestic dwellings within, say, two miles of the already drilled wells in Lancashire should be granted an initial bonus measured in tens of thousands. Should the Wells prove productive those same dwellings should be granted five years supply of energy, preferably natural gas with free conversion grants.
Or other compensation packages.
Any tremor damage should be compensated at a multiple of cost.
JF
March 19, 2022
So what happens when those wells run dry? The problem is simply being kicked down the road, not addressed in any meaningful way.
After all, the LifeLogic brigade doesn’t believe in R&D especially at any direct or indirect public expense, but is happy to sit and wait to take the rewards while someone else, everyone else makes the effort and carries the risk.
March 19, 2022
I am all in favour of sensible R&D as I have often said, just not roll out of duff, uneconomic and premature technology before it works using subsidies. That just litters up the place with duff technology.
March 19, 2022
As I said you don’t actually believe in R&D especially at any direct or indirect public expense, but is happy to sit and wait to take the rewards while someone else, everyone else makes the effort and carries the risk.
March 18, 2022
Excellent speech by Dan Hannan in the Lords on things the govt could do to cut inflation other than monetary policy. Cut tariffs, free up planning regs, and of course don’t put through the NI rise. On you tube, about 50 seconds.
March 19, 2022
This country already has some of the laxest planning and building regs in Europe.
Hence the ugliness and flood susceptibility of so many residential developments, and the existence of scores of lethal fire risk high rise blocks.
March 19, 2022
Why keep making silly statements about topics you obviously have no practical business experience of NHL?
It can take years to get planning permission for new building projects.
March 18, 2022
How about stopping all “aid” payments to both India and Pakistan?
With both dong special deals with Russia it very plain to see who’s colours they have nailed to their mast.
When is this government see things for what they really are instead of all this pie in the sky diplomacy. Let’s start really caring for the miÄŗions of our own people.
March 18, 2022
Well done to P&O Ferries for using its Brexit freedoms to remove its British workforce. After all, according to the Brexitists, the British are amongst the worst idlers in the world. P&O can now move forward with a more productive and cheaper workforce.
Exactly what Hull and Dover voted for.
March 18, 2022
Please explain what “Brexit freedoms” enabled P and O to take the actions they took.
And tell us who actually said “the British are amongst the worst idlers in the world”
I think you are making things up again young andy.
March 19, 2022
āBritannia Unchained: Global Lessons for Growth and Prosperityā, K.Kwarteng, P.Patel. D.Raab, C.Skidmore, L.Truss, 2012, Palgrave MacMillan.
āThe British are among the worst idlers in the world. We work among the lowest hours, we retire early, and our productivity is poor. Whereas Indian children aspire to be doctors or businessmen, the British are more interested in football and pop musicā.
And 150 more pages of similar uplifting words of wisdom.
Thatās was not made up P2.
But I agree with your other point: Brexit is not likely to have had anything to do with the P&O recent event: What happened at P&O might have broken UK redundancy laws because of its failure to give sufficient notice (90 days?) for such a large-scale redundancies.
March 19, 2022
P&O may have wrongly assumed that the directive relating to redundancy now no longer applied. It is one of the few pieces of employment law set by the European Union rather than nationally.
March 19, 2022
Thanks for your information.
I must say I’m amazed at the quote and where it came from.
March 19, 2022
Why on earth are you still living in England? During the whole of your adult life you could have moved somewhere in the EU. You still could apply for work there. Go -with our blessing.
March 19, 2022
And presently gaining momentum in the EU and elsewhere is the thrust for a 4 day working week with reduced hours proposed by some. May happen sooner there rather than here ? Jacinda seems to agree too. Just a thought.
March 18, 2022
Just been notified my Council Tax just gone up by Ā£100, guess I should be happy it’s only that amount when I look at other costs rising fast.
Heat, light, power, and vehicle fuel all up by about 50% or more, food who knows by how much it’s so variable now, my guess would be 20% more than last year, it has certainly gone up, but difficult to keep a real track given we do not purchase the same goods week on week.
March 18, 2022
My Council Tax is up by a similar amount Alan.
My gas and electric up from Ā£165 to Ā£320 a month starting in April
And today Ā£100 to fill up my car.
March 18, 2022
Is that with or without the Ā£150 present
March 19, 2022
Without.
We do not qualify as our house is not in bands A to D.
March 18, 2022
Dear Sir John, I read much of your post as a timely reminder to the powers-that-be that we depend on smooth commerce with the rest of the world at prices we can afford. If only they would listen. Throwing our trading relations into chaos by cutting a major raw materials and foodstuff provider out of the global economy was surely the very last thing the government should have done. That’s assuming a government’s first duty is to care for its people (the moral mantra justifying Johnson’s Covid measures).
The direction of travel doesn’t look good. No doubt the ‘online safety’ bill you have been debating in Parliament will be used to stifle public outcry online, when the austerity really starts to bite. And perhaps the P&O episode has told us what will happen to staff wanting higher wages to offset rising prices.