…
The below chart illustrates just how bad this Parliament is for household income growth. So much for the Tories being the party of sound finances.
THE Tories are “waging war on working people,” unions warned today as Chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s Budget coincided with a massive day of strikes by hundreds of thousands of workers nationwide.
Unions slammed the ex-Tory leadership candidate’s “fiscal event” for failing to tackle pay disputes across the country, with teachers, university lecturers, civil servants, junior doctors, London Tube drivers and BBC journalists all downing tools today.
As Mr Hunt delivered his speech, thousands of workers rallied outside.
They gathered as the Office for Budget Responsibility, which the former health secretary praised for predicting Britain would now avoid a technical recession this year, warned that people still face the biggest fall in living standards on record.
…
BRITAIN’S biggest strike surge in decades was the elephant in the room, almost ignored in the Chancellor’s Budget speech.
The huge strike march winding through Whitehall wasn’t referenced by either front bench. Yet the demands for proper pay rises and investment in public services it championed speak more directly to people’s concerns than any of Jeremy Hunt’s headline announcements.
Hunt referred vaguely to inflation as the cause of industrial disputes — before dishonestly citing it as the reason the government is denying workers the pay rises they need and deserve.
His dishonesty didn’t end there. The government is doing everything it can to resolve the disputes, the Chancellor claimed.
…
Hunt’s Budget ignored pay and public services – it’s high time the Westminster bubble was burst
Raiding the NHS budget or scrapping plans to rebuild crumbling hospitals would plunge the health service into its deepest crisis in decades. This was the stark warning this weekend from Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, who said the government is “living in a fantasy land” if it believes it can cut funds to the NHS without endangering patients.
Jeremy Hunt promised spending cuts of “eye-watering difficulty” last week after becoming chancellor of the exchequer. Yet he also did not reverse his predecessor Kwasi Kwarteng’s decision to scrap the £7bn health and social levy that had been earmarked for the NHS.
Taylor, whose organisation represents hospitals, ambulance trusts, mental health care, community care and GP services, said his members were issuing the “starkest warning” about “the huge and growing gulf between what the NHS is being asked to deliver and the funding and capacity it has available”.
…
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/23/a-real-and-present-danger-nhs-cuts-will-put-lives-at-risk-health-leader-warns
Apologies for bad news Sunday, this blog doesn’t do denial of reality.
Nine out of 10 schools in England will have run out of money by the next school year as the enormous burden of increased energy and salary bills takes its toll, the Observer can reveal.
Early data from the National Association of Head Teachers – results of a survey of its members are due later this month – shows that 50% of heads say their school will be in deficit this year, with almost all expecting to be in the red by next September,when their reserve run out. This comes as Jeremy Hunt has made clear that all departments, including education, will be expected to make cuts as part of the government’s debt reduction plan, to be announced on 31 October.
Headteachers and academy leaders are warning that further spending cuts will push many schools and academy trusts over the cliff, and result in most schools having to lose essential teaching and support staff. “There are no easy fixes left,” said Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT. “Schools are cut to the bone. This will mean cutting teaching hours, teaching assistants and teachers.”
…
Apologies for bad news Sunday, this blog doesn’t do denial of reality.
The government is trying to pass a clause in the Care bill today that will allow hospitals to be closed much easier without public consultation.
Stormy scenes are likely in parliament today as the government tries to “rush through” changes that will make it far easier to close hospitals without public consultation. The changes,which OurNHS has campaigned on from the start, now face fierce opposition from doctors, 38 Degrees, the British Medical Association, NHS campaigners and charities.
On Friday Ed Miliband tabled a motion of opposition to the Bill, saying it “includes provisions which could put NHS hospitals at risk of having services reconfigured without adequate consultation and without clinical support”.
…
The hospital closure clause gives Trust Special Administrators greater powers including the power to make changes in neighbouring trusts without consultation. It was added to the Care Bill just as the government was being defeated by Lewisham Hospital campaigners, in an attempt to ensure that campaigners could not challenge such closure plans in the future. But the new Bill could be applied anywhere in the country.
Louise Irvine, Chair of the Save Lewisham Hospital campaign, said “If services need redesigning the law must ensure this is with proper and extensive consultation with local people. This process cannot be rushed. Decisions should not be based on the needs of investment banks. What happened to the government promises that in the NHS there would be ‘no decision about me, without me’?”
…
OpenDemocracy appears on the Want to make a worthwhile donation this Solstice? page
Ed Miliband commits to doubling the number of homes built each year. The move is likely to prove very popular. I think that he’s correct in recognising development and building as a racket concerned with profiteering. I would also like to see the renovation of properties and the conversion of buildings to homes or other forms of social housing.
Profiteering property developers that hoard land and councils that block developments will be swept aside in a “non-stop drive” to more than double the number of homes being built each year in England, Ed Miliband will promise on Monday.
Attacking “stick-in-the-mud councils”, the Labour leader will say he would order a national planning inspectorate to give priority to local authorities that want to expand if they are being blocked by neighbouring councils refusing to release land.
Under the Labour plans, councils would be empowered to compulsorily purchase land or charge fees if developers fail to build on land for which they have planning permission. Michael Lyons, the chair of Labour’s new independent commission on housing and a former BBC chairman, told the Guardian that Britain needed to recapture the postwar spirit when building homes was the national priority.
…
Despite MPs claiming publicly that they object to their intended pay rise, only 10 MPs back a motion to limit their pay rises to 1% to match the public sector.
Almost half a million fewer old and disabled people are receiving care and support from the public purse than would have been the case before the financial crash, according to an expert study.
The research comes as MPs vote on Monday on the coalition’s care bill, which aims to overhaul the care system in England but threatens to tighten still further the rules of eligibility for state support.
Charities and care organisations are calling on ministers to address a “black hole” in social care funding which they say has left the system short of £2.8bn a year that would be necessary to meet people’s needs assessed as “moderate”.
Bridget Warr, chief executive of the United Kingdom Homecare Association, said: “Funding good care which helps people stay in their own home is not only a moral responsibility for any civilised society, but is also cost-efficient as it extends people’s wellbeing, reducing admissions to A&E, and helps people return home from hospital quicker.”
…