Covid

Wednesday

Ross Clark

What will happen to your savings after coronavirus?

What joy it has been to have some cash over the past two months. For gamblers, to be sure, there have been opportunities to take advantage of a volatile stock market (and even more opportunities to get it wrong and lose a packet). But cash is cash – it just sits there holding its value, without having to watch the markets with dread every day. Well, certainly over the short term. But history teaches us a painful lesson in these circumstances: while investing in stock markets is full of sorrows, investing in cash offers few pleasures. It is ordinary savers ultimately who were made to pay for the economic crisis of 2008/09, and doubtless it will be they who are made to pay for this crisis, too. Cash hasn’t been all that steady over the past two months, in any case.

Saturday

Patrick O’Flynn

What the country needs most is Boris Johnson back at his desk

Boris Johnson has been out of action for almost a fortnight. His last meaningful act before going into hospital was to force frazzled Health Secretary Matt Hancock to ditch a threat to ban outdoor exercise that he’d made live on TV in response to some tweeted pictures of people sunbathing in a park. In place of that threat, Johnson’s Downing Street changed the tone by sending out a message telling the British public 'thank you, thank you, thank you' for their efforts. Though the Government initially claimed Mr Johnson would work on his red boxes and receive briefings while in hospital, this did not actually happen (no doubt due to his rapid deterioration). Downing Street confirmed on April 13: “He didn’t receive any papers while in hospital.