Every cloud has a silver lining

SIMON BROUDER LOOKS AT A FEW OF THE ‘POSITIVES’ EMERGING FROM THE CRISIS

IN the midst of the Coronavirus outbreak and lockdown it’s often difficult to see much to be positive about.

Indeed in recent weeks the very word ‘positive’ has taken on an opposite and deeply unsettling meaning for most of us.

However, when the lockdown finally ends – however long that may take – there will be some positives we can take from the experience.

A new-found respect for the health and emergency services along with a renewed sense of community spirit are just some of the welcome changes we can all look forward to when the crisis is eventually over.

THE ENVIRONMENT

This is one of the most obvious extra benefits of the lockdown, but the positive impact the near-global shut down has had on the environment is incredibly important and, once the crisis is over, it could be one of the most significant legacies of COVID-19.

Since industry and transport ground to a standstill, the impact on the environment has been dramatic. Air and water quality across the world has improved while waste levels have plummeted.

Strikingly, some of the most polluted cities on the planet have seen clear skies for the first time in decades, though the unfortunate irony of the lockdown means those living in them can’t go outside to enjoy it.

Industry will ramp back up – and with it, the damage to our planet – but the lock-down shows real change is possible if people are willing to embrace it.

REMOTE WORKING AND TECH SKILLS

The world’s economy will be devastated by COVID-19 and an almost-certain recession, but there is a silver bullet in the form of remote working.

The tech industry continues to grow online and remote working is becoming a more and more intrinsic part of the global economy.

Despite that – in Ireland in particular – many companies and workers have failed to get to grips with working online.

Not anymore. Thanks to the lockdown hundreds of thousands of workers are now learning how to work together online and from home.

With schools closed for weeks and students all over the country learning online, we will also have a generation of students more qualified at remote working than ever before.

The growth of remote working has the potential to be an economic game-changer in rural Ireland, but we will have to wait and see how the rural broadband plan works out before we know for sure.

A FIX FOR THE HOUSING CRISIS? Before the Coronavirus one of the main issues facing the country was the massive shortage of houses and the huge numbers of homeless across the country.

The lock-down and the extraordinary measure taken to combat the virus prove it is possible to deal with the housing crisis, if there is a political will to act.

One of the main things exposed by the global lockdown is the phenomenally adverse effect services like AirBnB were having on the rental market, with scores of landlords opting to offer their properties to the lucrative tourist sector rather than long-term renters. Within days of the lock-down, in Dublin alone, hundreds of former Airbnb properties were being offered for long-term rent.

Many thousands more homes are still needed, but the lock-down has shown the need for new rules to control sites like AirBnB until the housing crisis can be resolved.

The second issue is a freeze on rent increases. While rents sky-rocketed across the country, the Government argued that introducing a rent freeze was difficult and would not actually have much of an impact on Ireland’s housing shortage.

In the last fortnight we have seen that imposing a rent freeze can be done with the swipe of a pen. Granted this has been done to deal with an emergency, but the Government can no longer argue that such a freeze is unworkable

GENERALLY BETTER HEALTH While the current focus is obviously on dealing with COVID-19, the public’s change in behaviour should have longterm benefits for the general health of the nation.

In the last few weeks we have all become used to social distancing; constant hand washing; giving each other plenty of space and generally trying to stay hygienic and not spread any germs or anything else we may have unwittingly picked up.

While the hygiene habits we are now all used to will certainly lapse, to some extent at least, once the crisis is over it is impossible to imagine everyone reverting to their old, unsanitary ways.

Hopefully this should have the effect of drastically cutting the spread of more typical illnesses such colds, flu and ailments like the winter vomiting bug.

That in turn will keep more people away from hospitals and would help ease the often-chronic overcrowding in our emergency units.

There’s also the fact that most people are drinking less during the lock-down, which should also have a positive impact on people’s physical and mental health.

RIGHTS FOR THE LOWER PAID For decades now – during the Celtic Tiger; the early 2000s boom and the post-crash recovery – the focus of the State seemed to be on high-skilled workers and especially those in the multi-billion-Euro tech sector.

Tech workers – and their multinational employers – have been idolised as the vanguard of the entire economy while nauseating eulogies to ‘heroic’ entrepreneurs have become ten a penny.

All the while the real backbone of the economy – those in the services sector or food production, for example –have been forgotten or ignored.

Those receiving welfare payments – including many thousands of part-time workers – have been positively vilified.

No longer. However good Facebook,

Google and their ilk are at keeping the country connected, they are practically useless when it comes to keeping the nation fed and watered.

Service sector workers, such as those working in supermarkets or keeping delivery services moving, are on the front-line of the Coronavirus fight and, thankfully, their hard work is being recognised.

After years of denying the cash was available for welfare increases or to hike the minimum wage, with another swipe of a pen the Government has been able to release millions of Euro in funds for workers – primarily those in the hospitality, service and retail sectors – that have been laid off due to the crisis.

It is deeply ironic that, in order to save Ireland’s deeply capitalist economic system, the Government – led by a Thatcherite Taoiseach – has resorted to borderline socialist measures not seen since the birth of the welfare state.

We truly live in stage times.

SLASHING RED TAPE

Finally there is the red tape so beloved of the Irish State and the civil service. Until now, when a problem reared its head in Ireland – such as the aforementioned housing and health crises – the obvious solutions were usually shot down or hampered by bureaucrats and pencil pushers arguing that the solutions were too radical or tough to implement. Coronavirus has shown that where there’s a will – and no need for political point-scoring – there is most definitely a way.