No Ukraine and Iran are not to blame for

the record number of small businesses going out of business here. The government, particularly our Prime Minister, might keep trying to tell us that the wars in those places are to blame but are they really? Is the greatly increased price of fuel solely because there are wars in other parts of the world?

The figures tell us the Prime Minister is lying but he still insists it is not true. He is ignoring what is obvious even to a twelve year old trying to save enough money to buy a surfboard. 

"At the rate things are going we won't even get to Glenelg this year," his mother told me. I am not sure failing to visit that overrated beach would be any loss but I understood what she meant. The family has usually rented accommodation much further down the coast for a couple of weeks in the summer. It has been a cheap holiday but even that is looking to be too expensive this year. The small business they run is struggling. There is plenty of work and they can still pay their staff but they are taking home less than their staff. They should be doing well but all the additional expenses are strangling them. They have enough work to employ at least another two people but they simply cannot afford to do it under current conditions.  

It is not just the cost of fuel or power or even the cost of insurance but the costs of employing other people that are not related to the wages they provide. It is all the "occupational health and safety" requirements and the "training" requirements. It is a tax on any number of things that do not relate to the actual business and the increased council rates. The "paper work" is done at night after they have both the children in bed. 

On the surface these people appear to be doing well but a closer look shows the strain. Both parents are working in the business. They do far more than the hours their employees are required to do. They are also very conscious that their employees are doing unpaid overtime simply in order to keep their jobs. They do not like this. It worries them especially when one of their employees has Down Syndrome. They say they could not manage without him but they are very conscious they may be taking advantage of his willingness to "help a bit more". They do not see it as right or proper.

Our Prime Minister has never employed anyone. He has never run a business. He clearly has no concept of what it means to worry every day as to whether the bills can be paid. He is not concerned about the increasing price of power or raw materials and the cost of employing people or dealing with all the rules and regulations. He is not concerned about the effect tax increases and changes to trusts will have on a business because those things will never affect him. 

Perhaps all this can be said about any politician. Perhaps it is why so many people really enter politics. Stay there long enough and you get that pension for life. It does not matter how much harm you do because you can blame it on wars elsewhere. Taking responsibility for your own actions, your own failures, is not something you do in politics. 

I wonder if the twelve year old will get his surfboard or whether the increased expenses for other people elsewhere will always put it just out of reach.