SCHEER lunacy...

This week, as well as giving us a masterclass in how not to do political communication, Boris Johnson has also managed to unite most of Manchester against him.

The government has of course put Greater Manchester into tier 3 levels of controls, after an argument with the local mayor, Andy Burnham, not so much about the principle as the amount of additional financial help for the region to meet the costs of measures that other parts of the country are not facing.

The situation in Manchester is serious and deteriorating rapidly so some kind of tightening of social distancing is appropriate. However, this will come with costs, which it is fair to compensate for given that the benefits, if any, will be national. Given that talks broke down over £5 million, a miniscule sum in the context of the money the government is laying out at present, the political incompetence is remarkable.

The deeper point is this: the real failure and problem is the continued lack of an effective Track, Trace, Isolate system (TTI). Absent that measures like the ones taken or a national ‘circuit breaker' lockdown are unlikely to have much effect, certainly not on a lasting basis. They will certainly add to the economic pain though and will almost certainly have to be repeated, given the pandemic is going to last for at least 18 – 24 months.

This all highlights the ineffectuality of the British state and systems of public administration, not least the NHS which despite great efforts has not displayed the kind of nimbleness and flexibility found in Germany and which we sorely need. Moreover, the lack of clarity on the government’s part is striking – nobody knows what is happening and the suspicion grows that ministers do not either.

They need to accept that there will be no swift return to pre-Covid normality and plan for a longer, two year process.

We know that the British state is one of the most centralised anywhere in the developed world, something that has not changed with devolution or the creation of city regions by George Osborne. This was highlighted in the discussion on Live With Littlewood, that looked at the tensions between national policy and local autonomy in the light of the Welsh Government’s decision to enforce a ‘fire break lockdown’ and the imposition of Tier 3 controls on Greater Manchester. You can catch up on the show here.

Clearly with a national (or indeed global) crisis such as Covid there is a need for a national strategy and decisions being taken at the national level. However, these need to be enforced at a local level and when higher costs are imposed on some areas to bring wider benefit it is proper to assist them (In that context attracting all sorts of bad press for just £5 million is remarkable political incompetence).

We now have the worst of both worlds, as the commentators on the show pointed out, with decisions being taken nationally but carried out ineffectually and in a very confusing manner in which nobody knows what rules are or what is going on (including one fears the ministers responsible). The problem is made worse by the centralised and top-down nature of the NHS which means that, despite great efforts, it does not have the needed flexibility and nimbleness.

The contrast with Germany, with a decentralised healthcare system and properly structured federalism, is remarkable. The strategic problem is that the entire political class is desperate to find a quick solution that will mean a swift return to normality. Quite simply, this is not going to happen, as has been warned from the outset. One result has been the failure to create an effective TTI system, absent which NO policy will be effective.

The crisis has revealed for all the structural weaknesses of the British state and the need for reform.

Dr Steve Davies
Head of Education, Institute of Economic Affairs

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