Diagnosis & Fear

Humans have the capacity to communicate through spoken language. We also give clues as to how we feel through facial expression & body language. We are unique. We also have the brain capacity to be able to think & understand all of these & more.

What has that to do with Diagnosis? 

I am beginning to think that our need to have a name, a diagnosis of a medical condition, might occasionally not be advantageous. I wonder if it is too simplistic. Obviously if you have a cancer it is important to know what type & hopefully get it early when it is treatable. That must be true of many conditions. In order to treat successfully medics need to know what they are dealing with.

I think I am concerned more about "neurodivergence" & "mental health" issues. I do wonder if we are given a label we live up to that label. If I have a physical diagnosis there is usually strong scientific evidence for that diagnosis. Hopefully if the diagnosis is correct the treatment will help, if not cure. 

Empiric evidence - which is based on experience, without precise knowledge of the cause or nature of the disorder is less reliable & is dependent on the skill & experience of the practitioner. We have devised question & answer tests for neurodivergence, but is that reliable? Divergence & difference is actually normal.

I think my point is that human beings are incredibly complex systems which include physiology & psychology. What we are at birth, our genes, can be modified by experiences - Nature & Nurture. The thing that troubles me today is that we have become very risk averse. Parents are more afraid for their children than in my childhood. Children don't have the freedom & life experience that I did & actually my daughter did too. 

We have also become more culturally afraid. I actually think that the public is being kept in a state of permanenet fear by politics worldwide. We are afraid of the international situation, (wars, rogue leaders...), climate change, food, water & energy security, privatised services not working, the list is endless. We are made to feel powerless. Cynically I believe that this is deliberate at some level, so that the powerful can retain that power by convincing us we need them to solve everyhting. 

All of this is perpetuated by the press & media that constantly bombarding us with the current news reason to be afraid. There is endless diagnosis of whatever that is, with "experts" being hauled in to give their views, which are mostly pure speculation. It might happen, but the chances are it won't. How much postitive news do we hear?

I do think my parents generation & my generation were more resiliant. Shit happens, we understood that & we got on with it. We didn't expect or get a diagnosis or a label to put on it. We knew we just had to deal with it. 

 

  

 

Unintended Consequences

My house was completely re-designed, gutted & refurbished. I am delighted with it. I had an expensive quartz worktop installed in the kitchen. In order to protect it I put a clear plastic tray where I stack the dirty dishes. Over time I discovered a discolouration in the quartz underneath. Not a spillage or stain, something within the very light coloured quartz. Uncleanable. Apparently it's due to UV light from the south facing window. A known issue, but not on the website of the company supplying the quartz & not known to me. A completely unintended consequence. Very annoying.

Yesterday, driving home, I listened to "Toxic" on Radio 4. All about "forever chemicals" like PFAS. These have been man made since the 1940's and are grease, water & heat resistant. Really useful, we all thought. Widely used & present in almost everything - non-stick pans, waterproof clothing, food packaging, cosmetics, the list is endless. Also prevalent now in drinking water, the environment & us. They are extremely persistent & bioaccumulate. Unfortunately they are also linked to serious health risks - cancer, immune system disruption, fertility & developmental issues. Who knew that something so useful could be so dangerous? 

There have been three types over the years - PFOA, PFOS & the latest PFAS. There are over 10,000 different types. They all persist in the environment & our bodies for decades. We have only just woken up to the harm of these forever chemicals & governments are finally going to monitor their presence & do something about their use. It's a bit late though. They are already literally everywhere.

What long term effect will the presence of these chemicals have on both the environment & us? How long have people been aware of the dangers posed to everything? Did manufacturers of these chemicals do enough research into side effects? Or were they simply focussed on their profitability? Did they hide the issues, as has happened so many times before? For example as the petrochemical industry & the drug industry did?

Our fixation with growth & profitability. Our fixation with making life easier because we are so busy & are so time poor. Our heedless march into the future & the unknown. Our lack of interrogation of the possibilities, good & bad, attached to change. Our lack of money & incentive to research & do due diligence. All of these are coming home to roost.

It's a perfect storm leading to disastrous unintended consequences. We need to stop & really think. 

Nationalisation versus Privatisation

Nationalisation is public ownership of private assets, industries or companies. It's often done to manage monopolies, market failures or secure infrastructure. The aim is to prioritise public interest over private profit & ensure service quality & efficiency.  

Privatisation is the transfer of ownership of assets, services or industries to the private sector. The aim is to increase efficiency, reduce government debt & foster competition.

As with everything there are pros & cons for both. 

Pros - Nationalisation is supposed to increase investment in infrastructure, lower prices for consumers, ensure better working conditions for workers & improve strategic control. Cons - Lower efficiency, lack of innovation, political interference & high costs.

Pros - Privatisation is supposed to increase efficiency, reduce public spending, reduce political interference & improve innovation. Cons - Higher consumer prices, job losses, prioritisation of profit over public service, environmental damage & loss of public accountability.

Since the Thatcher government of 1979 the UK has undergone extensive privatisation of major state owned utilities & industries - energy, telecommunications, water, transport, Royal Mail, steel, shipbuilding, aerospace, parts of the NHS, the Private Finance Initiative, justice, education, probation & social care. In other words a huge number of areas that directly affect the lives of every UK citizen. The tragedy is that has meant our services are worse, everything is a lot more expensive & jobs & working conditions have been adversely affected. Its a really dismal picture. 

 

At the same time salaries & bonuses for the people at the top who run these privatised areas have gone through the roof reaching record levels in 2024 -2025. For many, following consecutive years of increase above inflation & workers wages. Bonuses too reached record levels despite very poor performance in some areas. Shareholders, who are presumably doing well too, voted for these bonuses & pay levels. Hardly an independent voice. It's not edifying to see the bosses & shareholders doing so well when the people who work for them are struggling to provide for their families. 

Sadly privatisation has been a failed experiment because of it's adverse impact on people, the environment & what has been privatised. There are things that are so fundamental to a society being able to function well, that they need to be managed for the benfit of that society by those with a vested interest in them. They need to have effective oversight. Water companies have been a catastrophic example of privatisation failure. 

I can apply similar arguments for the selling off of major infrastructure to foreign, not always benign actors. This has followed on from privatisation. So now a significant portion of the UK's critical national infrastructure is owned by foreign governments or companies & sovereign wealth funds - water, energy & power, airports & ports, transport, digital infrastructure. 

What on earth were our government thinking? Well obviously they wern't "risk assessing" or considering possible & probable outcomes in the face of changing circumstances in the future. What they were doing was two things - raising money so that they could keep taxes low & create wealth, thus retaining power. But not only wealth for the country, but for themselves & their network of business friends & acquaintances.

It all started with Mrs Thatcher, but her party has continued the rot for years. So now we are in real trouble & it is debatable whether we can extract ourselves from the mire. We need effective long term planning, but our political system is not set up to do that. Decisions are made in order to keep power in local elections & ensure a second or third term in government. 

We really need highly intelligent, experienced & skilled people to do the evidence based 5 -10 year planning. Not politicians, who generally know nothing about their brief when they become ministers. It used to be the job of the Civil Service. But now we have lobbyists & special advisors. As of March 2025, there were 130 special advisers (SpAds) employed across the UK government, representing roughly 0.02% of the total Civil Service. While the number of registered lobbyists is not centrally capped, research indicates a significant "revolving door," with 31% of former special advisers moving into corporate lobbying or advisory roles. These are not elected & we know little about them & what they do. 

It all needs to be a lot more efficient & transparent.  

 

 

Vetting Process

Vetting is a comprehensive, multi-step investigation of an individual's background, qualifications, and integrity before employment or partnership, particularly for roles requiring security clearance. Developed Vetting is used for government or police roles. National Security Vetting is used for government roles. A security & risk assessment is part of the process & includes financial checks (credit, bankruptcy), social media reviews, and, in some cases, interviews with security officers regarding personal life, associates, and family. For high-level vetting, inspectors investigate potential vulnerabilities, such as financial debt, relationships, or past behavior that could lead to coercion or corruption.

Honestry is mandatory & dishonesty shows a lack of integrity & should result in failure.

The Propriety and Ethics team in the Cabinet Office undertake the due diligence process. Mandleson was supposedly subjected to Developed Vetting. After his ambassadorial appointment he was apparently National Security vetted by UK Security Vetting. 

The question is why, in view of all this, he was ever appointed to such an important role? He obviously lied, but why was he believed? Or was this simply a bad political decision for expediency reasons? Questions were supposedly put about Mandlesons ongoing relationship with Epstein. But wern't  his answers thoroughly checked?

 

The Met is conducting a criminal investigation into the leaking of sensitive information to Epstein & the relationship with him, so we won't get full discolsure until that is finished. But there are serious questions about PM Starmer & chief of staff McSweeny, (who was a protege of Mandleson & pushed for his ambassadorial appointment). 

This is serious enough to bring down not only the prime minister but the government itself. If it were an isolated error of judgement it might not be so bad, but it is only one of several policy reversals, "U-turns," and political misjudgements, since labour came to power in July 2024;- 

• Freebies Scandal 
• Winter Fuel
• 2 Child benefit 
• Tractor Tax
• Universal Credit 
• Employment Rights
• Worker Status Reform
• House of Lords Reform  

I've probably missed some. But you get the picture. 

I'm prepared to believe that Starmer does have the right purpose, attitude, morals & values. But his great fault is perceived lack of good judgement. Parliament is a hornets nest. The hornets will attack weakness. 

Labour were out of power for 14 years. You would think that during that time, as well as being an effective opposition, they would have prepared for government. Especially as it became more & more obvious what a complete mess the consevatives had made of their time in government. The public were more than ready for change. We also wanted a clean government, without all the sleaze & entitled arrogance that typified particularly the Johnson years. We wanted a government that actually represented the people's needs & wishes. 

Now we have chaos & a real possibility of a Reform government. Things couldn't be much worse at such a critical time internationally as well as here in the UK. 

 

 

Unlordly Lords.

Reform of the UK House of Lords has been discussed seemingly for all of my adult life. The House of Lords Reform Act 2014, allowed for the removal of peers who are convicted of serious offences and sentenced to imprisonment. But there are also questions about the fact that they are unelected & about the sheer numbers, currently 846! It is the largest upper house in the world and, as of late 2024, was roughly 25% larger than the House of Commons. The majority are life peers, alongside 26 archbishops and bishops (Lords Spiritual) and a remaining number of hereditary peers. In other words most of them are political appointees - 740 approx. 282 were conservative, 230 are Labour, 177 are crossbench. In addition  there are some lords who are ineligible to attend.

I am not impartial on this issue. I do think that a second chamber is beneficial. However members should be there because of their qualifications, experience & expertise. I also expect them to show evidence of ethics & service to others. They definitely should not be political appointees or generous donors to one party or another. They should be appointed by an independent committee representing the British people. Nor should, as was customary historically, top-level officials, such as Permanent Secretaries, Cabinet Secretaries, and Heads of the Diplomatic Service be given peerages for doing their job. I also think there should be parity between the upper & lower houses. Why on earth is it acceptable for the unelected Lords to be so much bigger than the commons? The current fillibustering of the assisted dying bill by a small number of lords is unacceptable, when it has beeen passed by the commons & the majority of the public support it. 

Then we get to the question of ethics as currently being discussed regarding Peter Mandelson who has had to resign twice from the cabinet, once as Ambassador to the USA & currently from the labour party. He is the grandson of Herbert Morrison, a labour statesman in the 2nd world war & postwar period, who would no doubt be shocked at the current scandal.

 

I haven't met Mandleson, frankly I wouldn't want to. I can only judge him by his actions & he seems to me to be very smug & self serving. Shady dealings with the rich & powerful seem to have followed his political rise to prominence. He seems to value wealth & power above all things & be prepared to do almost anything to move in those circles. At the very least his judgement seems to be extremely questionable. It's a pattern we see all too often in prominent men. He is not alone. Several lords have criminal records;- 

Lord Ahmed of Rotherham, convicted in 2021/2022 of serious sexual offences and attempted rape. 

Lord Brocket, served time in prison for insurance fraud involving valuable cars. 

Lord Sewel, resigned from the House of Lords in 2015 following a scandal involving alleged drug use and improper conduct, which led to a police investigation.  

Lord Archer, convicted in 2001 of perjury and perverting the course of justice. 

Lord Black of Crossharbour, convicted in the United States in 2007 of fraud and obstruction of justice.  

Lord Watson of Invergowrie, convicted of wilful fire-raising. 

Lord Taylor of Warwick, jailed in 2011 for false accounting. Lord Hanningfield, also convicted of false accounting.

Jonathan Aitken, former MP and minister who served a custodial sentence for perjury and perverting the course of justice. 

Mandleson is not alone & those are only the ones who have faced the full force of the law. 

Instead of talking about reform & setting up committees our politicians need to act & reform our government institutions. They are disfunctional. They do not serve us. We should not tolerate this abuse of power in the name of democracy. Politics & democracy have become dirty words.  

Wages, Salary, Inflation & Devaluation

Salary is a fixed, consistent amount of pay, (usually annual), regardless of hours worked, often featuring benefits and no overtime pay

. Wages are paid based on an hourly rate, fluctuating with hours worked, often including overtime, and common in retail or manufacturing roles.

 In simple terms professional roles tend to be salaried while manual roles are waged.

Inflation is a rise in domestic prices, reducing purchasing power, while devaluation is a fall in a currency's value relative to foreign currencies. It's often triggered by market forces or deliberate policy, making exports cheaper and imports costlier. High inflation typically leads to currency devaluation

. Generally inflation erodes what money buys inside a country, whereas devaluation weakens money's worth against other countries' money. Both are deeply linked as high inflation usually causes devaluation, and devaluation itself can fuel more inflation.

So far so good, although anything to do with mathematics isn't my forte.

This leads me into thinking about the people striking because their current wage or salary is less than in previous years in real terms. UK doctors' pay claims, led by the BMA, focus on restoring wages eroded by inflation, with recent actions pushing for significant uplifts. For example doctors argue pay has fallen significantly, (over 20% in real terms for some), since 2008. This is called pay erosion & they want pay restored to 2008 levels. You can find current pay levels for all doctors on the internet, so I won't give them here. 

My point is that this position seems to be completely untenable to me. Money & commodities fluctuate according to circustances. I imagine that doctors are not alone in being able to say that what they earn today is not worth what they earned in 2008. All employed people are subject to the same market forces. In any year pay increases will depend on what those forces are & how much money is in the kitty. Especially for so called public employees, teachers or the police for example.

What also seems untenable to me is that we have expectations that wages or salary will increase every year. Not only does that depend on a countries wealth, it also depends on how well people do their job & their productivity. It is well known that the UK, as a nation, is way behind in productivity. The UK's labour productivity consistently lags behind the US, Germany, and France, with output per hour worked significantly lower, around 20-40% below the US and 20% below major EU economies. This is largely due to underinvestment in capital and skills, slower growth since the financial crisis, and weaker competition/technology adoption in key sectors like retail and finance.

Finally, I think our whole wage / salary structure is completely unbalanced & rooted in class structure & history. As with so many areas in the UK, we need a complete overhaul & re-balancing to a fairer system. The gap between the "haves & have nots" is not working for us in the 21st century. As a lifelong liberal socialist I do think that withdrawl of labour is a right, but surely not for everyone. Surely there are occupations that are so vital to health, well being & the economy that there should be another mechanism? Possibly, given that so many of our organisations depend on goodwill to operate, working to rule would be far better. 

We need to end this cycle of disruption & get our act together. Especially as we are now into the age of technology & AI which will change things drastically.

 

 

 

 

 

Think Before you Speak

Basically, pause to consider what you are going to say & avoid impulsive, emotional & regrettable comment. Whatever we say will be open to misinterpretation & misunderstanding. We all interpret comment differently. 

Humans communicate through body language, facial expression and language itself. Within spoken language there is nuance - the actual words used, the tone of voice, the speed of delivery, (pauses are important)...The listener has to decode what is being said & how it is said. It is a skill, because the listeners preconceptions & emotions colour how they hear & respond to what is said.There is uncertainty in verbal communication which can cause problems.

We all need to be careful about what we say & how we say it, whether it is written or spoken. We do need to engage our brains & try not to respond emotionally. I have posted before about how what we write can be easily misunderstood. Perceptions vary.

All of this is true for everyone, but immensely more important for people in the public eye & vital for people in power. So when we have politicians who say exactly what they think, without accurate information, or care for the impact they may have, I am very concerned. Politicians supposedly have access to information & briefings that we do not have. They have a multitude of so called "special advisors". They employ researchers. They have access to any & all of the information they need to make considered decisions in the interests of their electorate.

That means that what they say should be true, accurate, intelligent & pertinent.They should be allowed to say "I don't know" or I will find out". They should be given time to enquire & reflect. Then they should speak & we should be able to rely on the veracity of what they say.

Unfortunately this is not the case with so many people in power today. To have someone in a very powerful position who has no relationship with truth or a moral compass is extremely dangerous. There will always be people who follow whoever speaks loudest & has presence, charisma or wealth. There will always be people who follow the herd & don't enquire into the truth. There will always be people who think their own self interest is more important than anyone else's. History has proved that time after time.

Eventually all regimes end. That is no consolation to the people who have paid the price for mismanagement & corruption. Sadly if you get rid of one dictator there is usually another waiting in the wings who could be even worse. 

We are at a crossroads worldwide. We cannot afford to let the dictators win. We all need to think & use our collective power.