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Hinterland - 21 February 2022
This week, the end of restrictions, a woke push back, the risks of a tightening benefit system, energy policy hindsight, basic income experiments and recognition for back yards – bring it on!!!
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‘We’re in a different world’: PM defends end of Covid rules in England
I wonder with our higher proportion , in rural settings, of older people and by consequence more vulnerable and frail people will fare as a consequence of this policy position. This story tells us:
The country is “in a different world” from when the Covid pandemic started, Boris Johnson has said, meaning the last remaining restrictions can begin to be lifted from next week.
Ahead of an announcement on Monday about the government’s “living with Covid” strategy, the prime minister signalled free mass testing would end imminently and told people to return to the office and “get their confidence back”.
“We’ve reached a stage where we think you can shift the balance away from state mandation – away from banning certain courses of action, compelling certain courses of action – in favour of encouraging personal responsibility,” he said on Sunday.
Concerns have been raised by some scientists and health experts about the mooted plans to drop the legal requirement for people to self-isolate, scrap the majority of free lateral flow tests and end most contact tracing.
Johnson did not rule out restrictions being re-imposed. He said: “I don’t want to go back to that kind of non-pharmaceutical intervention. I want to be able to address the problems of the pandemic with a vaccine-led approach … but I’m afraid you’ve got to be humble in the face of nature.”
Wes Streeting, Labour’s shadow health secretary, told the same programme that the move “seems very premature” and used the analogy of a football team being one goal ahead and then taking off their best defender in the closing minutes of the game.
Attack on ‘woke’ charities has backfired, campaigners say
Many of the big name charities featured here have strong rural roots such as the national Trust – this article gives very interesting food for thought. It tells us:
A wave of attacks on “woke” charities by rightwing politicians has “backfired”, generating an outpouring of public support for the targeted charities and helping drive a surge in social justice activism, say campaigners.
An annual survey of social campaigning suggests many charities feel increasingly emboldened to speak out on contested issues, including race, immigration and the environment, despite attacks they feel are designed to intimidate them into silence.
The findings of the Sheila McKechnie Foundation survey come as charities report huge concern over the “chilling” impact on civil society of a raft of proposed legislation designed to restrict public protest and legal challenge.
Campaigners said they have faced an increasingly hostile political environment – 78% said they felt politicians were hostile to civil society campaigning, up from 63% the previous year. A majority said attacks by politicians and the media were a threat to charities’ right to speak out and campaign.
Benefits changes could have serious consequences on mental health, warns UK psychologists’ body
I think a rural proofing approach to this issue would make it clear that there are additional challenges to employability for people in rural settings, yet this policy approach seems “place blind”.
The planned tightening of the benefits system is “deeply concerning” and could have “serious negative consequences” on claimants’ mental health, according to a leading body representing psychologists in the UK.
The warning from the British Psychological Society (BPS) comes after work and pensions secretary Therese Coffey last month hailed a new government target to get 500,000 jobseekers back into work by June.
Under the existing benefits rules, individuals claiming universal credit while looking for work are given three months to find a job in their preferred sector – or face the possibility of sanctions.
But under changes expected to be ushered in next month, claimants will have to apply for roles outside their area after just four weeks. They risk having their benefits cut if they are deemed not to be making “reasonable efforts” to secure a job in any sector.
Ms Coffey said the move would ensure people can get “any job now” while critics warned it would force some skilled workers to accept insecure, short-term employment.
Nearly £400 a year ‘could have been saved on bills during energy crisis’ with scrapped green policy
This statement and report needs a rural lens, there are a number of key challenges like the availability of appropriate power supply infrastructure which mean that in rural settings policies like this need much more careful and analysis than this article suggest. It tells us:
Households could have saved nearly £400 a year in bills during the energy crisis if the government had not scrapped a green policy on homes, according to new analysis.
Data from the Liberal Democrats, seen by The Independent, increased this figure from previous estimates to reflect the rising cost of living.
It found plans to make all new homes achieve net zero emissions would have shaved hundreds of pounds off household bills when another price cap increase will see them soar in spring.
“This is yet another example of how acting sooner on climate change can save consumers money on their bills,” Chris Venables, head of politics at the Green Alliance think tank, told The Independent.
The scrapped environmental rules would have prevented new houses from releasing a net amount of carbon into the atmosphere during day-to-day running. Among other factors, this would have been achieved through good energy efficiency – considered key to keeping bills, as well as emissions, down.
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/bills-energy-crisis-houses-emissions-b2016735.html
Basic income pilot scheme for care leavers to be trialled in Wales
I love this idea and as with many good approaches in Wales it will impact equally on rural and non-rural people who are eligible to exactly the same degree.
All young people leaving care in Wales at the age of 18 are to be offered the chance to take part in a basic income pilot scheme under which they will receive £1,600 a month for up to two years.
The money will be given unconditionally and participants will be able to earn from paid jobs on top of the basic income with ministers hoping it will help give some of the most vulnerable in society a better chance of thriving.
Officials, who investigated basic income schemes from California to Finland before designing the Welsh pilot, will study whether those who take part do better in the long term, financially, physically and emotionally, than young people who do not.
The scheme, set to launch in the summer, is believed to be one of the most generous of its kind in the world and will cost the Welsh government £20m over three years.
Those taking part will be taxed and will not be able to claim all benefits they would be entitled to if they were not given the money after the UK government refused to allow this. Benefits are not a devolved area.
The move was welcomed by UBI Lab Wales, which campaigns on the concept of universal basic income, under which every citizen, regardless of their means, receives regular sums of money for life to cover the basic cost of living.
And Finally
Not just castles: Historic England offers grants to ‘ordinary’ places like pubs and terraced houses
Any nominations? Mine is the Spread Eagle on Walmgate in York which from 1983-85 was a fast breeder reactor of 18-21 year of beer fuelled ambition and bravado on a scale not seen in the UK since. This article tells us:
Historic England is launching a scheme to find overlooked, ordinary places that celebrate England’s working-class heritage.
The public body, which manages the official register of historic listed buildings and nationally protected sites in England, is looking for council estates, factories, mines and other “overlooked historic places” that tell an important story about England’s past.
On Wednesday, it will invite community and heritage organisations to apply for a new Everyday Heritage Grant scheme. Grants of up to £25,000 will be awarded to projects that highlight the hidden histories of local places and buildings, with a particular emphasis on those where “ordinary people” have worked, lived or socialised, such as terraced houses, pubs, clubs, farms, shipyards and railways.
About the author:
Hinterland is written for the Rural Services Network by Ivan Annibal, of rural economic practitioners Rose Regeneration. |
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