Furlough was the minimum they had to do

[Justkeepswiimming]

I hear this being touted around by Tory politicians. And with distance it's perhaps easy to forget. But furlough was the absolute minimum they HAD to do to prop up an economy they had told to stay at home. They DID NOT do this out of the kindness of their hearts like they are trying to say. Consider what would have happened to the economy had they not. And they were not unique in the decision they made, most governments had to offer something similar.

However it's important to remember how poorly the scheme was managed. Fraud was enormous under this scheme. So to use this scheme as an attempt to show how fantastic they are is so misleading. They had to do something to keep the economy moving.

I agree, it is all they keep banging on about oh and the £2000 labour tax. Very boring. They give no cares about anyone but themselves, they begrudgingly provide benefits etc, they look down on state schools and people who require help.
They are self serving and frankly embarrassing. Rant over.

What other countries offered furlough? I'm asking because I went on holiday to Kefalonia in September 2020 and the waiters etc there said they had no help at all during lockdown.

We went on holiday not long after to some places and was told the same from taxi drivers and restaurant/hotel staff. No government support in Malaysia or Croatia. And limited in parts of the US, especially for lower paid employees in some areas too.

It really wasn't,

Many many countries did far less.

www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/article/explainer/coronavirus-how-countries-supported-wages-during-pandemic

Yeah so at the time I thought that UK employees were incredibly fortunate. Some even got other jobs while being furloughed. I agree about the fraud though.

I’m not a Tory apologist by any means but on this particular topic, my understanding was that the UK furlough system was one of the most generous at the time?

I’m also not sure they can be held responsible for the number of lowlives who made fraudulent claims.

Saying that without furlough many people would have lost jobs or been on the poverty line is fair enough. That does not excuse the Tories for not going after fraudulent claims, or the fact that it would have been for much shorter periods if Boris Johnson had not been absent from meetings and made decisions at least a fortnight later than they should have been.

Hmmm. No, I think we were lucky to have it. Hindsight eh? Do you not remember the atmosphere, the scared, the paranoia.
I did furlough payroll. Came in on a Monday, all the rules had changed. I had 1 employee doing a 2nd job. Later many of the smaller accountancy firms got caught and paid it back!

"Fraud was enormous under this scheme. "
How much was the furlough fraud @Justkeepswiimming ?

No mention of the 3+ million that Sunak excluded from Covid support schemes then on entirely illogical and spurious grounds, and then where he lied about it rather than correcting the errors and anomalies he created!

Of course they can be held accountable for the fraud. They could, and should, have put in some robust checks to stop the blatant fraud. Maybe not immediately at first, but as the months passed, they could and should have made changes to deal with the pretty obvious frauds that were occurring.

No mention either of the scheme meaning people had to be not working at all, so no option if you needed only half the staff having everyone work half their normal hours.

I mean you see figures, billions, some bigger than others, but then the details:

A further £490m was lost to fraudulent or incorrect claims under the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme, while the figure was £70m for the “eat out to help out” scheme set up to encourage people to go back to restaurants last summer.

So, its losses in so many different areas. Complicated.

And that same rule caught out people like company directors themselves, who couldn't "do no work" as initially required under the rules, as they had statutory responsibilities, i.e. to prepare and submit furlough claims, to run their staff payroll, to complete/submit tax returns, etc - all that kind of thing was specifically prohibited at first meaning business owners couldn't claim furlough for themselves even when they were banned by law from trading! It was only a campaign by Martin Lewis that got the Govt to relax the rules to allow for essential admin and then a bit later for "flexible" furlough where it could be claimed for people working less than normal which had previously been impossible. It was all a fiasco, designed and implemented by people who hadn't a clue about practicalities.

Look across Europe.

Furlough I’m willing to concede was good. Eat out to help out? An insane policy. Notice he’s not raising that as a success in his speeches..

This is true. He was the true instigator if this scheme but has kept quiet.

I don't know about other countries, but whenever I hear them say it I do always think "yes but labour would have done the same so it's not actually relevant when it comes to choosing between you".

Indeed - there were schemes for job/wage retention in all countries in the EU. Not all were exactly the same, but there absolutely was a scheme in Greece too.

There was an EU-wide fund that was made available - it was mostly accessed by the poorer members of the EU. A quick Google will tell you what you need to know. The UK only did what everyone else in Europe was doing.

Eat Out to Help Out was a scandalous policy. We didn't avail ourselves of it at all, too many clinically vulnerable people around us.

Opening pubs and half price McDonalds was more of a priority than children having even one day a week in a classroom, or loved ones attending a funeral.

Where was the equivalent to EOTHO for all the other types of business and livelihood that Rishi destroyed by the crazy and illogical support schemes that left over 3 million excluded from them??

I thought the furlough was quite generous…..myDD ended up better off…..her DD was attending a council nursery so she got her pay plus no nursery fees for 17 weeks ….this was the case for many of her friends as well

It's a shame that it wasn't on some kind of "student loan" system where those who benefitted somehow had to pay it back over time. Completely unfair that everyone has ended up paying for it via taxes, inflation, etc., when many didn't benefit.

well some you win….some you lose eh 🤷‍♀️

I was furloughed and will always be grateful for that money.
I said at the time, that whoever was in power would have done it and that they should bring in a furlough tax so recipients payed it back