COVID-19: MASS SIMULTANEOUS SELF-ISOLATION

Outside Parliament

Four words, Mass Simultaneous Self-Isolation, to get the economy open.  In full.

Mass Simultaneous Self-Isolation.  Four words that got a right slating from a variety of people when I tweeted them without explanation to BBC Politics earlier this week.  Without anyone understanding what those words might actually mean.  See my twitter feed.  To be fair, a couple of real issues were highlighted that need to be addressed, as discussed below.

Mass Simultaneous Self-Isolation.  Four words designed to make life difficult for news readers. So let's call it a short, sharp, massive Mass-sim Self-Isolation.

Mass-sim Self-Isolation. Four words that would mean theatres, concert venues, sports and even potentially night clubs could re-open.  Musicians, actors and pantomime stars able to work, earn a living and contribute to the economy instead of claiming benefits.  Get these parts of the economy open, and the whole economy would be open.

How, while we wait for a vaccine?

 

LET'S SET THE SCENE

In the last few days, for the hospitality, night-time and entertainment industries:

• Cineworld closed with the loss of thousands of jobs

• Pubs and hospitality are completely closed in parts of Scotland, and that is threatened for parts of England as infection rates climb through the roof.

• Every pantomime season cancelled
  

• Musicians playing Mars from Holst's The Planets outside the House of Commons to highlight the plight of musicians.  (As it happens, conducted by David Hill, with whom I played this very piece as students.)

• Music venues across the country boarded up

• Oxford and Oxfordshire having infection rates high enough to put us into "Red Alert"
  

 And on the political scene this week:

• Sir Keir Starmer saying at Prime Minister's Questions that "local communities are angry and frustrated" as infection rates continue to rise despite the local restrictions.  "This is getting ridiculous."

• PM Johnson addressed the virtual Conservative Party conference by opening with "this disease that attacks not only human beings but so many of the greatest things about our country: our pubs, our clubs, our football, our theatre and all the gossipy gregariousness and love of human contact that drives the creativity of our economy".  But he went on to announce absolutely nothing relevant to bring those any of those back.

• The day before, the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak addressed the same conference by saying there would be "hard choices" in managing the country's finances "Over the medium term getting our borrowing and debt back under control." and "I have always said I couldn’t protect every job or every business. No chancellor could."  "
  

• As a result, the support from the Exchequer is being reduced substantially from November, to a point that is as good as useless

As a result the night-time industries and everyone who works in them are being thrown to the wolves, despite those industries being viable if there was no virus and no lockdown. 

Furthermore Sunak said the following on ITV:  

The Musicians' Union reacted angrily as follows:

• "We know that our members’ jobs are entirely viable jobs – the only reason they are currently unable to work is because of the Government’s Coronavirus restrictions."
• "... we desperately need the Chancellor to expand the SEISS to cover more than 20% of monthly profits and plug the gaps that mean that 38% of musicians are ineligible for the wage support schemes"

Here's the NME taking a broader look at the creative industries:

• "Every week the arts feel ignored and unimportant is one more week where the collective anger rises"

 

SO IS THERE REALLY NO ALTERNATIVE?

The Government is saying that what they are doing is all they can do.  Having worked in business for many years solving really difficult problems, I believe there is an alternative worthy of debate.

At this stage this is a draft proposal, whilst I bounce the idea off people to establish if there are any red-flag show-stoppers.  There are several 'dark orange' issues, but every issue has a potential solution, I believe.

So what is the idea?  Could a short, sharp Mass-Sim Self-Isolation be a serious proposal?

WHAT IS "MASS SIMULTANEOUS SELF-ISOLATION"?

When NHS Test and Trace contact someone to self-isolate, that is an instruction to self-isolate for 14 days.  This is because it takes up to 14 days to develop symptoms, though now known to be up to 17 days.  

Everybody should therefore have enough food, medicines and any other essentials for them and their family to last 14 days without leaving the house.  After which time they will either:

• Have developed symptoms, and may need to self-isolate for a short while longer, or
  
• Have not developed symptoms, so can be assumed not to be infectious

If every body was to do this simultaneously, after 14 days or a little longer everybody would be in that position.  The virus effectively eliminated from the country.  Short and sharp action.

The infection rate may not then be absolutely zero, but near enough #NearZero that everything could re-open.  That could include all hospitality, night-time, sports and entertainment.

 

 

HOW ABOUT SUPPORT?

 

Businesses and individuals will need to be given two weeks' notice and provided with financial support.

 

But as one of the benefits of #NearZero is a far lower requirement for testing, the money saved would help in that support cost.

 

The recovery in the economy would then more than pay for that investment.  From the Exchequer's position:

• Improved VAT receipts
• Improved PAYE, NIC and personal tax receipts
• Reduced social security payments
• Reduced health and testing costs
  
• Reduced interest cost on borrowings
  

WHAT EXEMPTIONS?

Clearly hospitals, care homes, prisons and a number of specific industries such as steel furnaces would need to remain open.  But only the vital, less than were previously regarded as "essential".  Supermarkets closed, for example. 

Everybody on a two-week curfew, except those people who have a specific vital reason to be out of their home or at their workplace.

FOR HOW LONG THOUGH?

For how long could new infections be kept down to very low levels is the big question, so the economy can remain open?:

• New Zealand has shown how difficult it is to keep infection out of their country, even though they are far more remote from other countries than the UK. 
  
• Clearly entry of people and goods into the UK needs to be controlled far better than hitherto, with any outbreak immediately identified and resolved
  

What if another Mass Simultaneous Self-Isolation (MSSI) was needed every three months?  Maybe more often, maybe less.  Wouldn't it be better than carrying on as we are?

That's the point.  Do we really want to carry on as we are?  Do we want to see the hospitality, night-time and sports industries destroyed, and everyone involved struggling to survive?

Or do we want to reopen the economy for an investment of two weeks?  Who knows what the result would be.  The only way to find out is to give it a go.  Isn't it worth giving it a go?  

Give everybody two weeks' notice to self-isolate for just two weeks or at most three.

What would the Chancellor think about the prospect of an enhanced economy without killing off the hospitality and entertainment industries?

What do you think?   Worth a try?