Peter Rhodes on vanishing classic cars, how to cut inflation and the simplest way to fix the care crisis
"In a sane world, the pay for carers would start at about £30,000 a year to reflect their importance in an ageing society." This column, September 2015.
"A starting salary for qualified carers of, say, £30,000 a year would not only solve the staffing problem but show the world that Britain has got its priorities right." This column, February 2019.
"Give care workers parity with nurses (average salary £33,000)." Damian Green MP, chairman of Commons group on adult social care, last week. It's always good to be leading a national debate. Pity the politicians are so far behind.
I suggested that climate change is as likely to produce a cold summer of 2023 as a hot one. A reader insists: "You'll be frying eggs on the pavement again this summer.” Well, maybe so. But better a portion of oeufs grillé sur le trottoir than typing this column in a perishing cold room while wearing gloves. And I'm not alone. We humans are a tropical species. It's not heat that scares us but cold.
Funny thing, inflation. It is almost impossible to stop yet dead easy to predict, because it ebbs and flows in waves. Smart forecasters in the City have known for ages that today's 10 per cent-plus inflation will drop to about three per cent by the end of 2023. This takes some of the gloss off Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's five solemn promises beginning: “We will halve inflation.” Why not go for a sixth promise? “We will fix it for next Christmas to fall on December 25.”
Have you noticed a sudden shortage of classic old cars on our motorways? The explanation may be that some drivers, terrified of breaking down on “smart” (i.e. lethal) motorways in their ageing machines, are making long detours to avoid them. “At least a hard shoulder gives drivers the option of getting to relative safety,” 80-year-old Jaguar driver Alan Hames told the Daily Mail. He admits to adding 26 miles to one journey to avoid “smart” sections and knows of many other classic drivers who do the same.
For them it is a matter of life and death. The rest of us, using smart motorways, are deprived of seeing great old classic cars. We face a lack of Lagondas, a dearth of Daimlers, an absence of Alvises. Lyrical today, innit?
