In Hinterland this week, cash point under pressure, covid vulnerable communities under pressure, coastal communities under pressure, wood burning homes under pressure, housebuilding bodies under pressure and the potent effect of the sounds of rural Britain…

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Free access to cash ‘should be set in law’ for rural communities

Whilst a story with Scottish roots this article is deeply relevant to rural communities where a lot of people still want to use cash as well as e-payment methods. It tells us:

Chancellor Rishi Sunak is under pressure to legally enshrine free access to cash in rural areas, after more than a fifth of ATMs closed in one north-east constituency.

A change in the law was first raised in the March 2020 budget but was delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Now, Conservative MP Andrew Bowie is calling for the Chancellor to push this to the top of the agenda at the state opening of parliament on May 10.

His West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine constituency saw 22% of its free-to-use ATMs close between August 2018 and December 2021.

The proposals would introduce new laws to make sure people only need to travel a “reasonable distance” to pay in or take out cash.

The MP has been contacted by hundreds of constituents calling for the legislation to be introduced as part of the government’s next programme.

It comes after the Banchory branch of Virgin Money closed earlier this year – one of 12 closed across Scotland.

https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/politics/scottish-politics/4124150/free-access-to-cash-should-be-set-in-law-for-rural-communities/

End of free Covid testing could put vulnerable at risk, say UK experts

I worry about the implications of this story for those rural communities with high populations of vulnerable people who are also distant from secondary and some case primary health care. It says:

Come the end of March, the lights will dim on the UK’s Covid epidemic. Despite infection levels rising, cases will plummet, as free lateral flow and PCR tests are stopped for the majority of people in England, with other countries in the UK also set to reduce free testing in the coming weeks and months.

But while the government has argued it is time to manage Covid as we do other infectious diseases such as flu, scientists have warned ending community testing could put vulnerable people at risk and undermine efforts to understand the virus.

From 1 April, symptomatic testing will be free only for certain groups, such as hospital patients and social care staff. However, the Department of Health and Social Care has yet to give details on which other groups will be eligible.

After a winter of “flow before you go”, the change in policy seems dramatic.

Tackling Covid has undoubtedly been expensive: free testing, contact tracing and research studies do not come cheap. And, as the government points out, there is a high level of immunity across the country and the Omicron variant is less severe – the threat to most people is very different now to what it was at the start of the pandemic.

However, the end of free community testing means most individuals will be in the dark as to whether they have the virus, unless they are able to pay for a test, meaning they may go into public places while infected, passing the virus on to those they would otherwise have tried to protect. The situation is likely to be worse in more deprived communities.

While the success of vaccines and other approaches in tackling the severity of Covid, as well as less severe variants, may suggest that is not the problem it once was, rising infections have once again put significant pressure on the NHS. Experts warn even hospitalisations with Covid, rather than because of it, can cause logistical difficulties, exacerbate existing health problems and put vulnerable people at risk.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/28/end-of-free-covid-testing-could-put-vulnerable-at-risk-say-uk-experts

East Yorkshire and North Norfolk to get £36m to tackle coastal erosion

If you got to Spurn Point (island) or Happisburgh you’ll see in some detail why this cash is needed. I have worked with both local authorities featured here and I think they will drive out some very innovative solutions with this cash. The article explains:

Two councils will be given £36m to tackle coastal erosion.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said the cash would help those living by the coast "to prepare and plan".

Some of the measures include replacing damaged buildings and access roads, as well as repurposing land into wildlife habitats or temporary car parks.

The cash will be split between East Riding of Yorkshire Council and North Norfolk District Council.

Defra hopes the money will be used to "help deliver and test innovative adaptation projects" such as replacing public or community owned buildings in at-risk areas with "removable, modular or other innovative buildings".

The Environment Agency will run the scheme until March 2027.

"These two locations are already living with the challenges of coastal erosion and between them include 84% of the properties at risk of coastal erosion in England over the next 20 years," a Defra spokesperson said.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-60885861

Home wood burning in UK causes £1bn of health costs a year, report says

If you burn a shovel full of coal on a multi-fuel burner you’ll get a sense of why this is a relative, albeit still very serious issue:

The air pollution from wood burning in homes is responsible for more than £1bn a year in health-related damages in the UK and €10bn (£8.5bn) across the EU, according to a report.

The analysis from the European Public Health Alliance found the total costs of early deaths, illness and lost work resulting from outdoor air pollution produced by all home heating was €29bn a year.

Wood burning was the biggest single cause of these costs, accounting for 54% of the total in the UK and 40% in the EU. This is despite wood stoves producing only 11% of heat in UK homes and 14% in the EU. The report combines burning wood in stoves and on open fires: in the UK two-thirds of people use stoves.

The researchers said their cost estimates were conservative because lack of data prevented them from including the impact of indoor air pollution from heating.

Compared with transport, regulators have largely neglected heating and cooking as sources of air pollution, the EPHA said. The report found that heat pumps and solar water heaters produced no air pollution at homes using them.

“It is clearer than ever that burning biomass and fossil fuels at home is not only an environmental problem, but also a major health problem,” said Milka Sokolovi?, the EPHA director general. “The solution, obviously, lies in ensuring that homes are powered by clean renewables. As people are grappling with high energy prices, we must avoid quick and dirty solutions.”

Air pollution is the single biggest environmental risk to health, causing millions of early deaths a year globally. In the EU, just one of pollutants, small particles under 2.5 microns in size (PM2.5), is blamed for 300,000 deaths a year. A comprehensive global review in 2019 found that air pollution may be damaging every organ in the human body.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/mar/30/home-wood-burning-in-uk-causes-1bn-of-health-costs-a-year-report-says

Body set up to police UK housebuilding not representative, say critics

We now live in an era of relentless scrutiny of who is entitled to speak on issues rather than what the individuals say. I am sure there is some validity to these comments nonetheless. This story tells us:

A new government-backed body set up to police the building industry faces claims that it lacks representation from architects, ordinary homeowners and BAME communities whose Covid-19 death rates have been linked to poor housing standards.

Labour had claimed the New Home Quality Board [NHQB] lacked independence as it was chaired by a Tory MP and Conservative-linked developers sit on the board alongside her. On Friday it announced a new CEO and chair as it moved to what it described as its “full operational stage”.

The body has published a code of practice for the housebuilding industry and is working to oversee the creation of the New Homes Ombudsman Service, due to launch in the Summer, with the stated aim of providing “robust independent redress” for new-build buyers who have “issues with their new home or developer”.

However, the NHQB was criticised by Ben Derbyshire, a former president of the Royal Institute of British Architects, who questioned what he described as an “inexplicable absence of anyone with a design background or training on the board”.

“Design in British housing, especially speculative mass housing, is generally very poor. The exceptions to this represent the minority of housebuilding and renovation but these exceptions should become the rule. Good housing architects are notably absent from housebuilding and that is never going to change so long the profession is not represented on the New Homes Quality Board,” he said.

He expressed concern about the extent of representation of people from BAME communities on the board after the pandemic had showed up the correlation between poor housing standards, overcrowding, disadvantage and death from Covid among ethnic minorities.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/apr/04/body-set-up-to-police-uk-housebuilding-not-representative-say-critics

And Finally

Research finds nature sounds 'benefit mental health'

I have no doubt whatsoever about the truth of what this article has discovered. It tells us:

Research has found the sounds of nature could help people's mental health.

Data was collected from more than 7,500 people as part of the BBC series Forest 404 - a podcast that depicts a world without nature.

Participants reported sounds of birdsong provided relief from stress and mental fatigue, the study found.

The University of Exeter's leading researcher, Alex Smalley, said lockdown helped people rediscover "the natural sounds around them".

"Our findings suggest that protecting these experiences could be beneficial for both mental health and conservation behaviour, but they also provide a stark warning that, when it comes to nature, memories matter.

"If we hope to harness nature's health benefits in the future, we need to ensure everyone has opportunities to foster positive experiences with the natural world today," he said.

Participants listened to a range of environments, from English coasts and woodlands to the tropical rainforests in Papa New Guinea.

Therapeutic effects were reported from listening to landscape sounds such as breaking waves or falling rain.

When no wildlife sounds were played, the positive psychological benefits reduced, with participants showing motivation to protect the world's ecosystems.

The study was a collaboration between the BBC Natural History Unit, BBC Radio 4, Exeter University, Bristol University and the Open University.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-60840759