Mend the gap
COVID has made the rich richer and the poor poorer. Rishi Sunak must do nothing to worsen that divide.
He should be itching instead to cut taxes for low earners, not raising them on fuel, nor on firms which will inevitably pass them down to consumers.
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White Van Men and the self-employed, many, many Sun readers among them, have been hit hardest financially by the pandemic.
They are far more likely than others to have had hours and pay cut — especially in this new lockdown. More and more are borrowing to stay afloat.
Some higher earners are suffering too, their jobs lost and companies ruined. But many middle-class workers-from-home — their commutes a distant memory — have banked substantial savings.
The petrol and the rail fares they never needed. The coffees they never bought. The pricey holidays they postponed.
This national economic divide is stark. And many of the worst hit are those who turned to the Tories in 2019. The Chancellor must help support them as long as restrictions on their work go on.
And for those now without jobs at all he must rapidly develop a post-Covid strategy which incentivises firms to create hundreds of thousands more.
There simply is no alternative.
Party poopers
IMAGINE being told a year ago that a Boris Johnson Government would one day fine partygoers £800 — to general approval.
Such is the surreal world we inhabit.
But yesterday’s smart analogy by London NHS chief Dr Vin Diwakar, that partying during this pandemic is like turning your lights on during a blackout in the Blitz, will hopefully hit home.
With daily deaths in four figures, it really is that dangerous and that selfish.
Beeb’s let-off
WHAT a loss of bottle by the Government over the BBC.
It knows the mandatory licence fee is an absurd imposition in this era of vast choice and voluntary subscriptions.
But it has formally abandoned decriminalising non-payment, opting to do nothing except talk further with the Beeb.
So the bloated corporation remains free to crush rivals using public money.
You risk a fine or jail if you don’t help it.
Brussels doubt
BRUSSELS should get its story straight.
Either the EU is just a club of nations which never threatened our sovereignty, or it’s evolving into one giant country.
And since it’s insisting — so far in vain — on its ambassador having diplomatic immunity from UK laws, we must conclude that while pretending to be the former it really considers itself the latter.
At least we now know.
Once it’s all made formal, we must grant that request.
