Simon Jenkins's Blog, page 17

Sunak says he can’t afford public sector pay rises – but look at the white elephants he’s happy to fund | Simon Jenkins

Spending priorities sum up all that is rotten in government. Where is the money for education and the NHS?

Rishi Sunak has now conceded public sector workers the sum he was told to pay them by their independent review boards last year, an average rise of 6%. Had he done so then, we might have avoided six months of debilitating strikes in education, health and other public services. Last year he said he could not afford it. He still says that, demanding that the shortfall of £5bn over two years mu...

Scottish politicians have the courage to decriminalise drugs, but Westminster is too timid to let them | Simon Jenkins

Objecting to capital punishment was once taboo too. Real change comes from politicians brave enough to speak up

The Scottish government declared last week that it wanted to decriminalise the possession of drugs for personal use. Possession of drugs in Scotland remains under the pre-devolution Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and, as the Scottish drugs policy minister Elena Whitham says, the current approach has “failed”. Scotland has the highest drug mortality rate in Europe. Drug use is polluting every ...

What’s the cure for an ailing NHS? You won't find it in birthday soundbites from politicians | Simon Jenkins

Serious debate about reform is dead in the water because political dogma and point-scoring are the order of the day

Everyone agrees that Britain’s 75-year-old NHS needs rescue and overhaul. But what does this mean? Surgery, therapy, the oxygen of cash, a slap in the face or just a hip replacement? And how is this to be decided? At that point agreement ends. There is silence.

This week the former health secretary Sajid Javid said the service’s current structure was “unsustainable” and in need of a ...

A plan to cut carers when the NHS is on its knees – do ‘red wall’ Tory MPs really think this will save them? | Simon Jenkins

The UK’s care sector needs workers from abroad, but rightwing MPs want to slash immigration to save face – whatever the cost

Britain’s national health service is, by any definition, facing a turning point. It needs help, not hindrance. Of the many stress points, the inability to move mostly older patients between hospitals and care homes is perhaps the most extreme. The principal reason has been the shortage of 165,000 workers in the care sector, or about 11% of its labour force. Crucial to this ...

The Partygate probe should have stopped at Johnson, and let his tinpot army fade into obscurity | Simon Jenkins

MPs feel they have to assert their authority after his insults, but going after his friends risks looking petty and partisan

The House of Commons privileges committee is besotted with Boris Johnson. No sooner did we breathe sighs of relief as he disappeared over the horizon three weeks ago, than the committee has hauled him back for another thrashing in the headlines.

This time it is aiming at his “friends and allies”, who called it a kangaroo court and a witch-hunt. These friends stand accused fo...

Bravo to Prince William’s plan to end homelessness. Here’s where he should start | Simon Jenkins

The problems involved are complex, ranging from rough sleeping to the struggles of life on the murky fringes of the private sector

That the Prince of Wales wants to “end” homelessness cannot be a bad thing. Yes, it may have policy implications, but so does any act of charity. Yes, it risks mention of his own family’s gross over-supply of sleeping accommodation, but that is hardly the point. And yes, it may mean no more than his father’s practice of “bringing people round the table”. There is no h...

The SNP implosion could lead to a more independent Scotland. Here’s how | Simon Jenkins

Labour and the Tories are desperate for Scottish seats. What they offer to get them could be a gamechanger

British politics for the next year should be conducted not from Westminster but from Scotland. Since the Scottish National party leadership imploded this month, its once rock-solid support has collapsed. A recent poll suggests that the SNP’s cohort of MPs will plummet at a 2024 election from 45 to 21. The beneficiary could well be Labour, surging from one MP to 26.

Sceptics have begun casting...

If the UK is really moved by starvation in North Korea, demand an end to cruel sanctions | Simon Jenkins

UN bans aimed at transgressive regimes always hurt the poor and innocent, leaving rulers such as Kim Jong-un unscathed

This week, the BBC has been carrying reports from the world’s most authoritarian and impenetrable state. The headline: its people are starving. Communist North Korea is destitute, even as capitalist South Korea is one of Asia’s most prosperous nations. It starved in the 1950s, 1970s and 1990s, and was rescued by China. But the government closed the border during Covid and it has ...

Farewell, Boris Johnson: Britain will not miss your attempts to play Trump | Simon Jenkins

His era in power was marked by squalor and self-promotion. In the end, he proved himself afraid of parliament – and democracy

He’s gone. Again. Ducking and swerving, crashing and picking himself up, Boris Johnson is a political wrecker. He smashed David Cameron’s leadership with his mendacious Brexit campaign, and then retuned it to smash Theresa May. When he won and reached Downing Street, he made it a music-hall turn. The government was reduced to a shambles over Partygate, and was found to hav...

Banning ultra-processed food is not a nanny-state issue. It’s common sense | Simon Jenkins

Britain’s health is a national scandal, not just because of the state of the NHS, but because the government refuses to take action on our diets

In April 1994, the CEOs of the US’s seven biggest tobacco companies swore on oath before a Senate committee that nicotine was “not addictive”. At the time it was estimated that 3,000 American children were being induced by said companies to start smoking every day.

Last Monday, the BBC’s Panorama programme came close to repeating that scene with Britain’s...