Rushed or slow policy making come at a cost

The law of rhetorical headlines says any news headline ending in a question mark can usually be answered ‘‘No’’. Will a ban on gang patches get them off our streets? Will the restructure of district health boards solve the hospital waiting list, recruit more nurses, or get them paid more? No.

There are exceptions to the rule. Do prime ministers get more interested in foreign affairs the longer they’re in power? Is Prince Andrew the only royal to reduce his carbon footprint? Does Fletcher Building’s board look like a clown show? Indeed.

The late broadcaster Sir Paul Holmes pioneered answers to complicated questions with simple answers. To flatter by imitation: Will a ministerial taskforce on the plasterboard shortage, to ‘‘troubleshoot’’, ‘‘streamline’’ and ‘‘explore’’ solutions, ensure builders get supplies, buyers get homes, and Gib’s market dominance gets crushed? No.

If Fletcher Building has 95% of the market share, does it also own the problem? Of course.

Is the Government’s immigration policy part of the problem, when we are short of 4000 nurses, patients are dying because there are too few staff to see them, while qualified nurses can’t get visas? Oh yes.

Does the Labour Party have an unannounced policy of reducing immigration in the belief that more immigration reduces wages, even though it’s the Government that pays the wages of most nurses? Good question.

Does the Government overcomplicate problems with taskforces, reviews and working groups, and then make policies in a panic?

I told you the answers to complicated questions are simple.

Question: Was 24 hours starting on a Sunday afternoon enough time for officials to produce advice to Cabinet about reducing the excise on fuel, how to stop motorists from buying up years of discount road user charges in advance, and explain why petrol taxes are being cut while petrol car imports are being taxed and EVs subsidised to get people out of petrol cars? Answer: To paraphrase Mark Twain, ‘‘There is a solution to the cost of living crisis: simple, quick, and wrong.’’

Question: Did the National Party avoid criticising the confused inconsistencies in the petrol tax cut because it was scared of being against a popular policy that it should have been on top of since it had made the same policy on the hoof? Answer: How cynical!

Question: Is it complicated to change migration settings, let in more nurses, pay them more, and clear up the backlog of operations, instead of spending $9 billion now to restructure the health bureaucracy? Answer: You do the maths.

Question: When the PM asks health experts for their views on reintroducing mask mandates in schools, ‘‘as hospitals struggle with Covid and flu patients’’, will the Government’s health experts tell us to mask our children forever to prevent seasonal flus and colds?

Answer: Well, teachers feel vulnerable.

OK, let’s dig into this one. I understand the vulnerability, but mask mandates in schools are a simple solution to a problem that lies elsewhere. Making kids wear masks because the health system can’t cope feels like reducing child poverty by subsidising Teslas.

It’s hard to have a reasonable conversation about this. Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt says the US Right has been so determined to minimise the risks of Covid that the virus has disproportionately killed Republicans. Meanwhile, the Left has made masks, vaccines and lockdowns political symbols.

The cost of that is not deadly, like spreading fear and lies about vaccines, but it’s also not cost-free.

A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that mask mandates in schools reduce the incidence of Covid by about 20%. The survival rate among American children with confirmed cases is approximately 99.99%.

If the aim is to save children’s lives, other interventions – such as free swimming lessons – would be more effective.

Covering the lower half of the face of both teachers and children reduces the ability to communicate. Children learn by mimicking expressions. Positive emotions like laughter and smiling are more recognisable. If everyone in the classroom is wearing a mask, the report found, mask-wearing over time increases the chances of children becoming anxious and depressed.

At least let’s not rush into a blanket mandate the Government will have to apologise for in a few months.

Delaying tough decisions on urgent problems with yet more working groups is a bad way to make policy. So is rushing into it when the political pressure comes on.

Is there a better way? Most definitely.

The Left has made masks, vaccines and lockdowns political symbols.