good morning. Well, that was embarrassing to everyone involved. The government is approaching danger in losing votes on yesterday’s Commons welfare bill. (It’s embarrassing for me, as I thought it had made enough concessions.)
By lunch yesterday it was clear that the government could really lose its vote.
Chief Whip Alan Campbell warned that the Cabinet could lose its vote at noon, making it extremely difficult to ignore Chief Whip on the issue. Therefore, during the afternoon of Shambolic, the government essentially waived all the major spending cuts of the bill. This means that all of the £5 billion “savings” identified have been restored. A total of 49 Labour lawmakers voted against the bill, along with 100 Tories, 70 liberal Democrats and 12 independents.
The big picture problem here is that it is impossible to pass measurements without real intellectual justification. The government was not seriously involved with the policy sector or related stakeholders (particularly Labour MPs). The outcome is a disaster, and the echoes are much more felt in the future.
One of the ignored aspects is how “NHS reforms and how it works” and “welfare costs and reforms” are linked. Jonathan Ailey writes for us in today’s note. And I’m sure there will be more to come about this tomorrow at 1pm on our live Q&A of Labour. Pop your questions in the comments here, Robert Schlimsley, Miranda Green and I will tackle them.
Missing Link
Yesterday, MPS voted for a package of measures aimed at reducing the surge in disability-related profits. Tomorrow they will hear about a 10-year plan to save the NHS. One of the most surprising aspects of the welfare discussion for me was the relative lack of connection between these two issues.
Based on my family’s experience with chronic illnesses and the growing disability over the past 20 years, that link is both direct and important. Millions of people are benefiting from health-related benefits as UK health services make them sick.
In part, this, of course, depends on the challenges of funding and staffing. But that’s also because of the way the NHS is structured and managed, and without major changes here, costs elsewhere will continue to accumulate.
The NHS is not a citizen, and it is not a health service. It is primarily organized to provide acute care for individual events and conditions. So, if you break your leg, have a stroke or heart attack, develop cancer, or have a baby, it generally responds very well.
With a few exceptions, it is relatively indifferent to prevention. And that approach to chronic disease is to ignore it or wait until it appears in a certain sharp way that is more appropriate for the NHS scale technique.
My wife suffers from several overlapping chronic autoimmune conditions. They are almost incurable, under-studied, and episodes. This means that there are occasional good days. But there are many more bad days, where pain and fatigue mean that she barely works. If a good day could be scheduled to match part-time work, it’s great for patients and officially useful. But of course they can’t.
Many chronic symptoms such as multiple sclerosis, ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, thyroid problems, arthritis, and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome are more frequent in women than men, giving the opportunity for symptoms to be rejected in various ways as anxiety, hormones, or menopause. Due to rare conditions, the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE) does not often provide guidelines for treatment. In reality, it is usually: no treatment.
Many of them were not reopened as clauses administering such terms were closed overnight in March 2020. For example, there is only one pain management center in the NHS area. They are not accepting new patients. The NHS does not prescribe alternative therapies, such as acupuncture, and does not approve some of the alternative therapies that are effectively used in other countries (often off-labeled).
This leaves patients to support the collection of Dr. Google, his family and Facebook groups, avoiding the horror and harassing different bits until they actually talk to each other, navigating the NHS’ suffocating bureaucracy and hair-scattering boundaries.
Chronic illness ultimately led my wife’s three-year career to an early and miserable end. Tuesday’s vote is unlikely to change that, and Thursday’s announcement will likely be too late.
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Stephen again. I had a great afternoon at Kings Place this weekend, listening to music from Poulenc, Copland and Bernstein as part of the “Classic Pride” festival. You can listen to all the music here on the Kings Place website, but tickets are still available for the rest of the festival events here.
Today’s top stories
How will you be paid? |Rachel Reeves was a harsh reminder of the financial fragility when the UK’s fiscal watchdog admitted yesterday that its forecasts were repeatedly too optimistic. A cut in OBR forecasts ahead of Reeves’ fall budget would add to her financial and political predicament. The FT will look into whether the Prime Minister will consider bending fiscal rules to fund spending through public investment and higher borrowing.
Sending the wrong signal | “Arguably more importantly, what this may mean for the government’s so-called “fiscal headroom” is a potential impact on how this government’s financial reliability is perceived,” the Institute for Financial Studies said. As IFS’ Ben Zaranko pointed out last week in Bluesky, “if the market believes future spending plans are non-integrable and the government will be spending more and priced through higher gold leaf yields.”
The Eve Morning | Minister Pat McFadden in today’s breakfast media round said the government would “stick to the tax promises we made in our manifesto,” excluding increases in national insurance, income tax or VAT. “It’s still there to make sure people with disabilities get the support they need,” he said, “We have to do this at a slower pace.”
Also, the Minister from ifs | should abandon the pension “triple lock” as part of the broader overhaul required to prevent millions of private sector workers from experiencing a sharp decline in living standards, according to a survey found by IFS and Aberdeen.
“Frustration” by Brussels | The EU is blocking UK attempts to join the Pan-European trade zone to reduce the challenges of both European exporters post-Brexit supply chains, officials on both sides said.
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