It's The Plan!

The shortage of workers occasioned in the main by the departure of EU citizens is now being spun as the positive move toward having controlled immigration, as opposed to uncontrolled Freedom of Movement, as if this was part of the plan all along.

When you have a plan, the usual practise is to minimise the disruption occasioned by any transition. This has not happened and we have shortages of workers across almost all sectors. The truth is that there was no plan - there never has been a plan. We left the EU, post haste, without the government performing a risk analysis, asking industry experts what problems they foresaw or giving any consideration to the consequences. The plan, had there been one, would never be to cripple the economy and leave vast swathes of varying sectors struggling to survive a manpower crisis.

Of course, it's not the government's fault, says the Cabinet - it's the fault of industry for not paying enough. However, when there's a shortage of people, paying more to attract staff will merely result in employers chasing the the ones already employed elsewhere, churning the same staff, and inflation raising its ugly head as employers strive to outbid each other.

The spin on whatever problem that happens is that it's part of The Great Plan and that rising prices and wages will transform the low wage economy into high skill high and wage economy. How, exactly, does this chime with the initial 1% pay rise offered to NHS staff when they're certainly highly skilled? Their employer is the government, so is the government accusing itself of not paying NHS staff enough? The messages are becoming contradictory and confusing - but there's no surprise there. High wage and high skilled makes a lie of the Brexit promise of consumer goods becoming cheaper.

Who, exactly, is going to do the unskilled work then, and at what hourly rate? I'm sure the unions will be interested in the government's plan for higher wages, as will the Tories' industrial donors, who are not noted for supporting increases in wages - or higher taxes, which are necessary to fill government coffers and will immediately offset any wage increases and certainly the increased 3% offer to NHS staff. 

Sounds to me yet another example of a post hoc rationalisation of problems that are observed reality into a convenient, yet implausible plan that didn't exist before the problem occurred. A plan is invented to accommodate every problem such that it's not a problem at all, but part of The Plan. The corollary of it all being part of The Plan, of course, is that the government is responsible for all the problems - I wonder if they realise that.

A Dorset MP, Chris Loder, told a fringe meeting at the Conservative Party conference that the destruction of the logistics chain is to be welcomed, as it will rejuvenate local buying of milk from the farm. I guess he doesn't realise that the overwhelming majority of people live in cities and will never come into contact with a farm. Added to that, the bloke is 40 and certainly won't remember buying milk in this manner.

Similarly, we're now being led to believe, by the government that avoided any scrutiny of the Withdrawal Agreement, having pushed it through Parliament at break-neck speed, lied to HMQ, and lauded it as the best deal ever, is that they were forced into signing the deal under duress and that it has to be renegotiated. Only a bona fide mental incompetent would even start to believe this nonsense.

Despite the recent prosecution of a serving Metropolitan police officer for murder and another being investigated for rape, I still have infinitely more faith in the police than I could ever have in this government. Rather than working on ensuring the public regains its trust in the police service, they need to focus on the public regaining its trust in the government.