Is remaining high, food inflation is 18%higher than a year ago, whilst overasall inflation is 8.7%. Mortgage rates in the UK typify the capitalist approach with thousands of products and rapid changes in rates, unfortuanately wages do not respond. France, Netherlands and Belgium all have a steadier morthahe market with 30 year deals common – banks are forced not tolend above a set rate. Thus they are not having the turmoil faced by many in te UK. The downside in these countries is less choice and the banks being squeezed so fewer mortgages. With 1/4 households coming tothe end of fixed year deals, they face an average yearly hike of £2700 with the figure much higher in the South-East (£5200 estimate) in Johnsons old constituency. Capitalism needs regulation!
So a £60 food shop now costs £70 – approx £40 extra per week for a family of 4 = £160 per month, the rest of inflation is down but still above zero – so everything is costing more. 13 years of Tory rule and Sunak tries to claim that the last 12 years if Conservative mistakes did not happen! He will also claim at every opportunity that Labour would make things worse! He will be hoping that the 70% of homeowners with no mortgage vote tory next year.
Honours list – Mordaunt said Johnson had presided over a debasement of the honours system – Sunak claims to have no knowledge of this comment – a respnse he uses regularly.
Covid Inquiry – It is difficult to apportion too much blame on the lack of preparedness for the pandemic prior to 2019. It was an unprecedented event that the governments austerity campaign had made the NHS more vulnerable, but one which was not being flagged up by opposition parties or health experts in a big way. What will be crucial is the examination of the events of late 2019 and early 2020 when we had expert advice of what the consequences of the pandemic could be. It seemed at the time that tjhe government was purely reactive rather than proactive. George Osborne a true tory and propogator of austerity economocs failed to accept any approtionment of blame, in fact claiming that his economic policy had enabled Sunak to introduce the furlough scheme (and its corruption?), in contrast Oliver Letwin showed that some tories have humility – when he accepted that he would have done just about everything differently. That was not a show of incompetence (well maybe a bit) but of humility.