We’re all tired of lockdown news, of the government’s shilly-shallying, of the reign of SAGE, of being made to live in fear and discomfort. So today we’ll talk about money: our, the taxpayers’ money. Of course this has something to do with covid, of course this has something to do with politicians. Their ability to virtue-signal at the drop of a hat, on any issue, is outstanding. More on that below.

Let’s get the latest covid news out of the way first. Whitty reportedly said that returning to ‘normal’ will take a long time, that the currently promised ‘sort-of end of lockdown’ will lead to more covid cases in winter, risking a ‘sharp rise’ in people with ‘long covid’. The interesting point about that isn’t that he was spreading gloom again but that he said this at a ‘conference of local government officials’ (link, paywalled).

Far be it from me to suggest that this sharp rise will be observed in those who have no fear of losing their jobs or income … Keep in mind that we, the taxpayers, are paying these ‘local government officials’.

Then there’s the shilly-shallying about mask-wearing: to muzzle or not to muzzle, that is the question. This is now being turned into a ‘moral issue’ with one of the covid professors saying he won’t muzzle up:

“In solidarity with various groups including “people with communication difficulties, whether auditory and unable to lip-read” and “all the small children whose education has been disrupted by the lack of visual clues, especially in language development”.” (paywalled link)

The DT labels this as a ‘new culture war’ as the groups of muzzled and non-muzzled are set to claim the moral high ground. Gawd, yes, we need another battle field for virtue-signallers! I would humbly suggest that all those pro-muzzle experts, politicians and SAGEs, keep wearing face nappies because nothing makes them look more ridiculous than that

And then there’s the T&T-induced quarantine. This is the best warning sign that the covid empire isn’t prepared to give us back all our civic liberties. The T&T quarantine regime will be kept going until the middle of August, despite the huge concerns for the economy. Even then the restrictions won’t be dropped: double-jabbed people pinged by T&T will be ‘offered’ to take a test rather than self-isolate for ten days. 

Amazing, isn’t it, how the covid faithful in government are clinging to that T&T regime, as if they didn’t trust the vaccines they are promoting. Even more amazing is that the covid government, from Javid down, is disregarding this outcry:

“Business and health chiefs warned yesterday that England faced workplace chaos, with about two million people a week at risk of contracting Covid-19 or being asked to self-isolate.” (link, paywalled)

Note well that this means staff shortages in the NHS. It means that Javid’s virtue-signalling remarks about caring for all patients, especially those 7 million who’ve not seen a doctor since lockdown began, is piffle.

The covid dictators are doing this because of modelling showing that the current casedemic will have peaked by mid-August. Models again beat real life. In fact, it’s the perfect solution: “we” don’t have universal, national lockdown, “we” simply tell more and more people to lockdown themselves. The result is the same: no freedom.

And thus we come to money, our, the taxpayers’ money. We pay for the NHS, we pay for Whitehall and local government but we’re prevented from working and earning because we still won’t be free after that Freedom Day. We know that this government has racked up a mountain of debt to deal with lockdowns and covid. Thus the warning from the OBR:

“Rishi Sunak has been warned by the fiscal watchdog that soaring Covid costs threaten to make Britain’s debts “unsustainable” if interest rates rise to curb inflation. In an assessment of the triple threat facing the Chancellor as he battles to steady the public finances, the Office for Budget Responsibility said that borrowing costs could surge if persistently higher prices force the Bank of England to act […] It added that the Government’s carbon net-zero agenda will also push up borrowing by £469bn over the next 30 years.” (paywalled link)

Leaving aside the debt which the Carrie-green policies will cause – on their website the OBR says that the economic effects of climate change would be worse than ‘green debt’ – here’s what’s coming down the line. It’s not just about rising inflation which financial experts, e.g. the director of the Bank of England, now dare to mention. It’s about more spending, for example:

 “unfunded Covid-19 legacy spending of £10bn a year on health, education and transport presents a “material risk” to the public finances.” (paywalled link)

You don’t say! Even so, the first claimants are already in the starting blocks. The HoC Public accounts committee said:

“Taxpayers will have to prop-up Britain’s loss-making railway for years because of the lack of a “convincing and timely plan” to get passengers back, MPs said.” (link, paywalled)

Have those MPs not noticed that the ongoing T&T quarantine rules mean more people will have to stay at home and thus won’t use trains? Don’t they realise that train passengers won’t come back when WFH is still being condoned? Here’s the earth-shattering conclusion those MPs reached:

“Additionally the majority of financial risk “will remain with government”, it said, “leaving the taxpayer exposed to fund a currently unquantified bill”.” (link, paywalled)

You don’t say! The OBR’s report has more details regarding the tax pain we taxpaying peasants are going to be exposed to in the coming years, forecasting:

“an extra £7bn a year in health spending alone to deal with catching up on lost treatments and revaccinations, as well as billions more on education spending and transport to make up lost fare revenues.” (paywalled link)

The political pundits in the MSM are already discerning a conflict brewing between ‘free spender BJ’ and ‘cautious Sunak’: yay, more excitement! There’s also ammunition for all who love screaming about ‘Toree cuts’. But – what choice does Sunak have? He’ll have to raise taxes which will come out of everybody’s wallets if he wants to balance the books sometime during this decade. Next, the OBR observes that

“current plans take no account of pandemic spending beyond the end of the financial year, while departmental spending has been cut by £14.5bn a year from 2022-3 relative to pre-virus plans.” (paywalled link)

Never mind that even the Treasury mandarins cannot know how much more will have to be shelled out for ‘pandemic spending’ when the covid dictators are hinting at more lockdowns to come. Still, the OBR helpfully points out yet more risks, racking up the numbers:

“Other risks include the estimated £29bn cost of Covid loan defaults – almost a third of the total – as well as the impact of the pandemic on existing commitments.The ‘triple lock’ on pensions raises them annually by the highest of average earnings, inflation or 2.5pc: but average earnings will be artificially boosted this year by the effect of the furlough last year.  The OBR says that could cost £3bn a year extra relative to its March forecasts.” (paywalled link)

The triple lock might cost £3bn – what a huge sum compared to the estimated £29bn covid loan defaults, the £7bn ‘extra health spending’, the ‘unfunded’ £10bn spending on ‘covid legacy spending’. Yes, we’re all in it together, and why should the elderly receive more money to deal with inflation in grocery prices and home fuel costs! “We” must instead beware of what The Times labels a ‘culture war’ in their editorial, describing:

“the “mystery” of young people being “left wing” but wanting lower taxes. It is because successive (particularly Tory) governments have created a tax and benefit system that favours older voters. […] young people do worse out of this system than any post war cohort. Of course they don’t want to pay more for less.” (link, paywalled)

Of course they don’t! Surely the elderly, cocooned in splendid self-isolation, having being given preferential treatment in the double-jab regime, will be happy to tighten their belts for ‘the young’ who have sacrificed more than a year of their young lives. They’ll never get that year back. Never mind that the eldery also don’t get that year back and they, unlike the young, don’t have future decades to make up for this loss.

The virtue-signallers will be out in force, claiming that it’s only fair that the elderly, the despised ‘baby boomers’, be punished fiscally because they had it so good in previous decades. The elderly will simply have to accept that their time is over, that they will have to sacrifice for the greater good.

Perhaps the ‘young’ the under 70s, will have something to wail about when Sunak raises Inheritance Tax – that would only be fair, innit! Why should the “riches” so unfairly accumulated by the detested elderly fall into their greedy hands. aren’t they ‘in it together’ with the rest of us?  

But what do I know … let’s simply blame the elderly, the Torees and Sunak for the coming financial misery rather than covid, the casedemic and the covid emperors.

 

KBO!

 

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