What should be on our world list of “Great Evils” or Social Ills that need fixing after the COVID 19 Pandemic?

Five “Great Evils” for repair were identified in the UK after the “pandemic” of World War Two with corresponding thoughts in some other countries.

And although there have been horrible regional disasters since WW2, that conflict was arguably one of those that proved to be a catalyst for other types of social reform in some parts of the globe and not just my country.

Immediately after WW2 in the UK, Liberal MP William Beveridge, in a report that laid the foundations for our acclaimed National Health Service (NHS) listed five ‘great evils’ (Want, Disease, Ignorance, Squalor and Idleness). These evils were addressed with energy and robust determination by the post-war Labour government, in what was effectively a new social contract between government and people. Ministers in that government and their advisers were giants compared to the dangerous and miserable people we see in political office today.

Before the virus and in an update since WW2, it’s likely that the modern equivalents of the ‘great evils’ for repair on any world list would in different shapes still be poverty, poor health, lack of education and training, homelessness and unemployment. These societal ills were in existence before the current pandemic and should not be allowed to continue after it. Just as after WW2 there was a national mood expecting change for the better, so a similar mood seems to be arising now. Must we stick to only five ills, because Beveridge did? Should there be a sixth and possibly more? If so, what should be on our global list for action and repair:-

1.     Loneliness?

2.     Social Care?

3.     Climate Change?

4.     Democracy?

Loneliness?

What about loneliness as a sixth evil? A recent British survey revealed there are over 9 million adults who are either always or often lonely . See (“Trapped in a Bubble” by the Loneliness Action Group led by the British Red Cross and the Co-op). Loneliness can make a person feel tired, stressed, and anxious so they have difficulties with daily routines, engaging socially with others and can make mental and physical problems worse. Haven’t we either witnessed or experienced this for ourselves since lockdown or quarantine? The huge profile given now to the Health, Safety and WELLBEING at Work Act in the UK and the risk assessments needed before lockdown surely point to the potential for a much more tangible approach to mental health at work as well on physical detriments. Not just a tick box exercise.

https://www.co-operative.coop/campaigning/loneliness

 Social Care?

An ageing population since the demographics of the 1940’s here in the UK points to another social ill -the lack of social care. Year in year out we have known social care is problematic. Spending on adult social care in the UK has fallen by 9.9% between 2009/10 and 2016/2017. Fewer people were eligible for publicly-funded social care in 2018/19 than were in 2010/11, as local authorities have had to prioritise funding for people with the most severe care needs The social care system was set up at the same time as the NHS but unlike health care, which is free at the point of use, social care is means-tested and is a huge source of inequity and unfairness. The Care Act 2015 about which I train/teach people is both a post code lottery and/or a tick box operation in cash starved local authorities.

Climate Change?

Climate change is probably too broad to label just as a social ill. We now know we must address the problems of the climate change emergency as one of the major modern global ills. The climate change emergency is not a social ill, it is a world disaster predicted to happen, and the UK must play its part in averting this disaster.

Democracy?

Representative democracy based on a “first past the post system” has given way to some types of proportional representation in some parts of the UK’s machinery of government and indeed the world. That’s welcome. But many of the governors who emerge from even these fairer systems still retain the same old tricks when in office. I think for example of a slippery word over used by those elected under both first past the post and proportional systems. That slippery word is “Consultation”. Too often the result out for “consultation” is officially pre-determined before the feedback is in or it becomes a device to kick the prevailing hot potato into the long grass and over the rainbow where the unicorns live! Consult and Involve should become a mantra for those elected throughout their terms of office, not just at elections. We have seen thus far in the political management of the virus here that if there had been more active listening and a collegial and not just a consultative approach by some we might have avoided the awful elephant traps that will be exposed once bright sunlight shines through a public inquiry. Although that post virus scrutiny will probably be shackled with tight terms of reference, a low budget and red tape designed to delay. So, what is to be done? Not a referendum! But some new thinking about community decision making in a global village. Easy to say -harder to do!

What do you think? What would be on your list for action and repair?