Rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief.

To paraphrase the well-known porcine quote: all are equal, but some are more equal than others. With that in mind, we need to talk about ‘levelling up’.

The pledge to ‘level up’ the UK was a key element of the 2019 Conservative Party manifesto. We waited a long time for further detail, but the ‘white paper’ finally appeared on 2nd February 2022 - without much of a fanfare. This must have been disappointing for the 3000 civil servants working on the policy – two thirds of whom, by the way, are based in London.

This document - ‘Levelling up the United Kingdom’ – runs to 300 pages, so it would be foolish to attempt a summary here. However, it seems that a side-effect of Covid19 is that everyone has started ‘following the science’, so let’s do the same and take a look at the ‘Gini coefficient’, which is the most commonly used measure of income inequality.

The Gini coefficient ranges from 0 to 1 (or 0% to 100%); the higher it is then the greater the gap between the incomes of a country's richest and poorest people. The diagram illustrates the concept; if we achieve a value of 0 then we fall on the ‘line of equality’ (ie. all people have the same income). The Gini Coefficient is computed by dividing the area (A) between this 45° line and the actual income distribution curve by the area (A + B) under the 45° line. A bigger ‘inequity gap’ (area A) leads to a higher value of the coefficient.

The United States has a Gini coefficient of 0.41 which means that the top 1% of earners averaged 40 times more income than the bottom 90%. Inequality is generally lower in Europe and the Gini 6 coefficient offers quantifiable proof of that fact. Sadly, with a value over 0.36, UK is at the top of the list for Europe and is 7th highest in the list of the top 30 developed economies (https://equalitytrust.org.uk/). The UK data shows a continuing rise in inequality during the last decade when the income share of the richest 1% increased from 7% to 8.3%. Inequality has been getting worse for a long time and recognition of the need for ‘levelling up’ is long overdue.

In its new white paper, the government has proposed twelve ‘missions’ to deliver levelling up. One of which promises to “boost productivity, pay, jobs and living standards … especially in those places where they are lagging”. We need to measure progress towards this, but as it stands the white paper is vague and offers us only that by 2030, pay, employment and productivity will have risen in every area of the UK and the gap between the top performing and other areas will be closing. In order to answer the question, “are we there yet”, we need information on how fast the levelling up agenda reduces the gap between the disposable income of poorer families and the wealthy. A reasonable target might be that by 2030 the Gini coefficient for UK should be no higher than the EU average (currently 0.30).

Of course, there is more to it than that – after all, there are eleven other ‘missions’, including:

• On transport, the promise is that by 2030, local public transport connectivity across the country will be significantly closer to the standards of London.

• On education, the promise is that by 2030, the number of primary school children achieving the expected standard in reading, writing and maths will have significantly increased and the percentage of children meeting the expected standard in the worst performing areas will have increased by over a third.

• On health, the promise is that by 2030, the gap in Healthy Life Expectancy (HLE) between local areas where it is highest and lowest will have narrowed.

The Curious Squirrel will look into these promises in future editions.

Author - John Gowing (Spring 2022)

Carbon Neutral? No, I’m against it.

 It is very easy to get confused. COP 26 produced a maelstrom of information, protest, passionate debate and data. It’s not difficult to understand that the world faces an urgent, existential crisis. However, it is much trickier to decide what needs to be done – and who needs to do it. Motivated by a sense of responsibility, self-preservation and long-term thrift, people are responding in many ways. Diets are changing (less meat), houses are being insulated, solar panels fitted, air/ ground source heaters are being purchased, electric cars are booming, recycling waste and goods is commonplace, and cycling is ever more popular. Is this the way forward?

More and more people doing what they can afford? The Chancellor, Rishi Sunak has promised us ‘the world’s first net-zero-aligned financial centre’ in the City of London. Financial institutions and listed companies will be required to publish their plans for transition to carbon zero operation … and consumer demand for green finance and business will do the rest. A similar idea, that consumers will demand green, responsible companies will drive a growing environmental aspect to Corporate Social Responsibility policies in UK companies. Is this the answer? Consumer demand leading to eco-friendly banks and business?

The price of power is inevitably spiralling higher and the poorest are suffering most. Is the way forward to nationalise the power (and transport) sector, introduce higher and more progressive taxes and invest state money in green industry and a revitalized NHS? There are those who argue that economic growth is unsustainable; that this basic requirement of successful capitalism is incompatible with saving the planet. Here the argument is that far from levelling up we need to start levelling down, especially in relatively rich, developed countries where our wealth is a big part of the problem.

And now it’s Christmas and we are warned that there may be shortages so to start our shopping early. To help with this, at the beginning of November, John Lewis sent me an email offering a preview of their Christmas video. The following day my daughter announced that she and her family have decided to avoid buying anything new if possible – and that included Christmas presents – and yes, they had discussed this with the children. What if we all did this? What would happen to retail? (Poor old John Lewis!) What would happen to economic growth?

Jamie Thompson (December 2021)

A Bright Future for Buses?

Transport North East have recently published their Bus Service Improvement Plan (BSIP) covering the seven North East Local Authorities. (Search “transport northeast bsip”, - it’s worth a read!) It proposes transformational changes to deliver a “truly integrated, sustainable public transport system” based on a partnership between local authorities and transport operators.

It seems that the fragmented, deregulated approach to bus transport of the last 35 years is finally on the way out. The pandemic resulted in a sharp reduction in bus usage, and passenger numbers are still 25% lower than before Covid. The first job for the partnership will be to regain public confidence in public transport.

A bid for £804m of central government funding over three years has been made under the National Bus Strategy. If the funding is agreed and the plan succeeds, we can look forward to: -

• Integrated ticketing across bus, metro and local rail with the option for contactless payment with price cap. Bus services would work together under one North East brand.

• More frequent, reliable services extended into the evening.

• More integration and connectivity between transport systems.

• Vehicles fitted with “nextstop” AV equipment.

• Transition to zero carbon and/or low emission buses.

• Pilots of Demand Responsive Transport (DRT) in two rural areas.

• Better connections between local places to complement radial routes to cities.

Your local Labour Party recently conducted a questionnaire which was circulated to over 100 residents of the Ponteland / Heddon area. The results show support for a proposed new, circular bus route linking Ponteland, Heddon, Throckley and Westerhope with the Metro stops at Kingston Park and Airport which is now being promoted to Northumberland CC and Transport NE.

Let us know your ideas via heddonandpontzine@gmail.com

Bob Turner (December 2021

Fair Play by fair rules?

 Independent Standards Committee finds that senior MP, favourite of PM, committed serious breach of rules on “paid advocacy”. PM has big majority. Scheme devised to change rules at last moment for new, government dominated committee. Jaws drop. British sense of fair play offended. MP’s in-trays overflow. Screeching U-turn. PM apologises for crashing car. Fair play restored. Or is it?

The Elections Bill proposes to require approved photographic ID, (passport, driving licence or equivalent) at polling stations. This will disproportionately affect poorer, unemployed and disabled people (less likely to vote Conservative). Senior citizens travel passes might be accepted, but not those held by students and young people (less likely to vote Conservative). Free “election cards” may be introduced, but the application process would put off many from marginalsed groups (less likely........).

The ID scheme would cost about £180m over ten years, - yet there is no evidence of serious voter impersonation fraud in the UK! The bill does nothing to rectify the lack of automatic voter registration (eg. From tax, NI or pension records), - which means that about 17% of eligible voters are missing from the register. And yes, you’ve guessed it, those missing voters are less likely to vote Conservative!

It also seeks to make the Electoral Commission less independent of the government and stop it from bringing prosecutions for breaches of electoral law. And there’s nothing in the bill to update rules to tackle “dark” money, foreign interference and online disinformation. Surely the UK, of all countries, should have a political system based on fair play by fair rules?

Sir Gerald Mander (December 2021)

 The NHS needs Intensive Care

 I qualified as a doctor in 1981. Over the 40 years I spent working for the NHS, the most extraordinary phase of my career occurred immediately prior to my retirement in April last year. In January 2020, two patients from York was admitted to the High Consequence Infectious Disease Unit at the RVI. As we now know, these two patients were the first in the UK to be diagnosed with COVID-19. We are all aware of what happened next, but memories fade.

Before the development of vaccines, and before much was understood about the disease, hospitals were scary places to be - it was like being trapped on a cruise ship with COVID patients. I used to come home from work and immediately climb into the shower, scrub my phone, badge, keys and credit cards, and put all my clothes into a hot wash. Some went further, and lived apart from their families for long periods. All the normal rules were suspended in anticipation of an overwhelming flood of severely ill patients with a highly infectious disease nobody understood. Non-urgent services were cancelled, and although great efforts were made to keep up with cancer care, backlogs developed.

As we emerge into a world where COVID-19 is a permanent feature in the healthcare landscape, the backlogs for non-urgent care, particularly for surgery, are huge. Nearly six million people, a figure equivalent to the entire population of Denmark, were waiting for hospital treatment in England alone as of October 2021, and this figure was rising by 100,000 every month. Over 90,000 of these are waiting for treatment at Newcastle Hospitals and over 25,000 at Northumbria Trust, and these figures do not include those patients with chronic disease whose appointments were deferred and are still waiting for their follow up to resume. It will be years before the situation returns even to that which was felt to be unsatisfactory two years ago.

Michael Clarke (December 2021)

 Politicians are people too

 The world has moved on surprisingly quickly from the murder of Sir David Amess, MP first for Basildon, and then for Southend. Those of us who were around in the 1980s will think of Basildon as the Thatcherite heartland, although the seat swung between Labour and Conservative. When Amess was elected, by 1,400 votes, in 1992, John Major is said to have remarked: “If we’ve won Basildon, we’ve won the election.”

Born in a terraced house without an inside toilet, the son of a dressmaker and an electrician, Amess was a grammar school boy who was a special needs teacher before becoming an MP. Amess identified with Brexit and socially conservative positions, such as opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage, and support for the reintroduction of capital punishment. He also opposed the cut to overseas aid and supported the abolition of fox hunting.

Although never attaining ministerial office, he piloted two private members bills through Parliament: one on animal welfare, and the other requiring the government to implement measures to reduce fuel poverty, following the death of one of his constituents from hypothermia. He campaigned for better treatment for people with asthma, arthritis and endometriosis. Whatever one thinks of his politics, it is agreed that he was a caring and hardworking local MP, who championed his constituency, and he had friends on all sides of the house. Outside the polarised world of social media, in which in reality only a noisy few participate, people are complex, and their values and attitudes might not always appear consistent. But that just makes them human, not bad humans.

MIchael Clarke (December 2021)