@flowerycurtain - here is the link to the Estates Gazette (reputable "go to" publisher for property industry) article on June rent collection - www.egi.co.uk/news/landlords-collect-18-of-june-quarter-rent. Hope that works. I don't know if there is a paywall (I'm a subscriber).
@sirfredfredgeorge I really can't see anything good about the rent statistic. The fact that the majority of commercial tenants didn't pay their rent is because they couldn't afford to - these are businesses which felt comfortable enough to sign up to financial commitments based on their financial projections which through no fault of their own got blown out of the water. I don't think that looming tenant insolvency is a good thing. And a significant minority of tenants who haven't paid rent have done so not because they can't afford to but because they are cynically exploiting the business support measures introduced to target business forced to close. It is no different to Tesco, Sainsbury's, Asda and Morrison between them claiming rates relief of £1.6 (which thankfully they have repaid following shareholder pressure) - I don't see what is good about that either. And I don't understand what you mean by "Equity" should pay. Do you mean corporates should pay? Leaving aside the fact that there are actually private owners of commercial property, the institutional investors are the companies our pensions, insurers etc invest in. I personally could do without them going bust. And I don't think most people want boarded up empty premises in their neighbourhoods. But perhaps we just need to agree to disagree.
@boys3 Completely agree that the answer is not rushing back to "normal" where "normal" wasn't working. But a lot of business who have gone bust / will go bust / are struggling were perfectly viable before the pandemic - the commercial office market wasn't under threat, dry cleaners were doing well with everyone dropping off their suits and work shirts every week, hospitality and leisure were doing well etc. Given that for most businesses rent is their biggest expense and landlords are not allowed to take enforcement action until March 2022, I don't think we've yet seen the extent of the economic carnage to come. I also think change which happens slowly is more easily dealt with than sudden shocks - for example the charge to online retail was inevitable but we haven't yet got to grips with how to replace tax traditional retailers paid - the big online players aren't paying much by way of rates and certainly some of them are hardly paying any corporation tax. But change is exciting if sometimes a bit daunting and no doubt there will be opportunities for those able to respond. Also completely agree that climate change is an economic crisis waiting to happen - that and the growing gap between rich and poor will no doubt be our biggest challenges as a society.
Sorry to slightly derail the science thread - for me it is just really obvious that for a strong economy you need a healthy population. And for a healthy population you need a strong economy. I don't see how they can be separated.