Sir Vince Cable interview: Coronavirus, the NHS, over 60s and Donald Trump

Workplace Evolution Director & Business Psychologist interviews Sir Vince Cable on the topic of the Corona Virus and the future ahead.

This podcast covers the following topics:

Sir Vince Cable on the Over 60s

"I accept I'm now well over 70...I'm probably going to be one of the last people to be released from some kind of confinement. I do feel we have been leaning over backwards as a society to protect the interests of the elderly...we have to think about young people...we have had our time...let's focus on the interests of young people"

Challenging the NHS system

"A lot of miraculous things are now happening in the NHS...an enormous number of people who were in hospital have suddenly been removed. Why wasn't this happening before? A lot of cutting across boundaries [and] brilliant collaborative working - why didn't this happen before? Why did it take an emergency to get the NHS operating at full efficiency" Rising Sentiment for the NHS: "We need to keep a cool head about it. The care system had been terribly neglected. Decisions were made 5 years ago for charging for social care that were never implemented and as a result we've got this horribly defective system of social care alongside the NHS - and you can't deal with one without the other."

Balancing Civil Liberties & the Economy

"We will have to be a lot less precious about some of the finer points of civil liberties...the best safe-guard is that we do have open media"

Loathing Donald Trump / the Relationship with the United States

"The populists have been put in their box. The reinstatement of the expert is a good thing. He [Trump] has behaved quite appallingly in this pandemic and made things much worse...one practical consequence is that the United States, who we always used to look to for leadership ever since the second world war has effectively abdicated that role...if the American leadership can't do it, someone else has to do it and step up to the plate" 

Universal Credit, Guaranteed Loan Scheme & Food Banks

"The guaranteed loan scheme for businesses isn't working sadly...it is only getting to 4% of companies [and] the banks aren't cooperating...enormous numbers of businesses are going to go under in the next few weeks unless that is made significantly more generous. Universal credit started off with good intentions but it is keeping people in appalling poverty...I see a few improvements but it is not on the scale to prevent mass destitution. There has been a massive increase in the number of people going to food banks and even the food banks do not have enough. That is a gap in the system we need to be plugging urgently."

Boris Johnson / Governments 5 Point Plan: "It doesn't show the way forward. What politicians should be doing is pushing for a route map for a strategy for moving forward above all for giving people a sense of hope. His [Boris Johnson] own instincts are optimistic and positive. I would hope that when he gets back to the leadership role he will help us to think more positively rather than a negative frame of mind"

The Lib Dems

"We took a battering in 2015. With 11 MPs you can't make a lot of noise....I think there is an appetite for progressive liberal politics and I think it will come back. Now that the Labour Party is under sensible leadership it will actually make it easier because a lot of people wanted to vote for us and liked what we had to say but were terrified of having Mr Corbyn in power."  "The Civil liberties agenda...that will be a very important and touchy issue where I would hope they are doing some original and creative thinking"

PODCAST NOTES:

- Sir Vince Cable Website: http://www.vincecable.org/

- Sir Vince Cable Charities: http://www.hctgroup.org/ & https://www.remindmecare.com/

- Sir Vince Cable Publications: http://www.vincecable.org/publication

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Website: www.workplaceevolution.co.ukTwitter: https://twitter.com/workplaceevolMichael Costello's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelcostellooccpsych1/

The Workplace Evolution podcast is brought to you by Workplace Evolution Ltd - The Natural Selection For Workplace Solutions! Michael Costello is the Managing Director of Workplace Evolution based in Lancaster, UK.