UKH

Face masks to incur VAT.

Sound fiscal policy, or smokescreen to hide school meal cock up

Perhaps they are considered luxury or optional items? If they are compulsory items then it's a nice little earner for HMG, to help balance the books.

If they were subsidised, more people might use them. Or if they gave out all those non N95 face masks they bought earlier in the year, there might be more compliance. (I believe N95 might be required in hospitals, but it seems that any face covering, is good enough in most shops.)

Will an extra 5p on a mask, off set the costs of a person hospitalised for a week?

Our village in France has distributed reusable masks to all residents for free so that nobody should be out of pocket in helping to keep others safe. Just one of a great many differences in approach between the two countries.

And a complete no-brainer.

Isn't it just that the exemption was time-bound?  It might yet be extended.

It only applies to PPE, so surgical face masks ie the blue disposable stuff.

Cotton face coverings are classed as clothing so are VATable anyway - a lot of people who were making them at the start are small home based people who wouldn't be above the VAT threhold so wouldn't need to charge VAT.

I suppose in a sense they are just a mandatory piece of clothing for being in public, not dissimilar to the way a pair of trousers/skirt is too, and those are VATable.

I'd imagine most people have a set by now, and hopefully this won't go on long enough to need a second set.

There are loads of YouTube videos showing different ways to make your own. 

The easiest no sew is to cut the sleeve off an old tshirt and use elastic, ribbon or string to make ear loops.  Just cut off the sleeve near the seam.  This gives you a tube of fabric.  Turn it so the biggest bit is for your nose.  The tube needs to be vertical.  Thread 2 lots of elastic (or whatever) through the tube and tie at the right length to go around ears.  

To be clear I don't think they should have VAT on.  

Neither, just the usual complete lack of strategic oversight we have come to expect. Remember, part time prime minister and full time horny haystack Boris Johnson took personal control of the covid situation in early June, what more can we expect!

The Telegraph hasn't taken this down yet https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/06/02/exclusive-boris-johnson-tak...

jk

Me neither, it's seems ludicrous, and maybe we should be more French.

for the record Missus cobra-Head made ours, but I'm just pissed off by the principle of taxing things which are for the benefit of everyone.

The exemption was made by the EU as a temporary order removing import duty and VAT on PPE due to the shortages at the start of the pandemic. As far as I know supplies are now adequate so this hasn't been extended. I bought a load last week fpr work and there was VAT on them but naturally I just claim it back. Community masks were never involved anyway.

Yup, tax those little blue/white flimsy *disposable* face masks all the way.  Get a re-usable/washable one (see example by marsbar above on this thread).  The blue & white disposable model is already becoming noticeable litter (cf paying for plastic carrier bags).

Surely the only thing that is different is the way hat you pay for your masks?

Plenty of non-mask differences too, notably including the ease and speed at which we can get tested. But even within the narrow sense with which you seem to have taken my comment, the difference effectively is that essential masks here are being paid for out of general taxation, which of course (theoretically) makes it a graded burden according to income, as opposed to a flat tax on individuals regardless of means.

Same in Germany, where many villages and even cities handed out free masks for anyone who did not get one via their employer or school. A few weeks later we also received two free, washable masks per person simply by mail, courtesy of the city council.

Might have been different elsewhere, as public health in Germany is devolved down to city or county councils.

CB

I get that it's trendy to talk the UK down but if France is better at testing how come it appears to have a lower rate of testing per head of population than the UK?

I don't know what the statistics say, just that anyone I know needing a test has got one right away with results next day.

If it bugs you, you cant just pick up a disposable one off the ground, thats what I heard someone did the other day when they forgot theirs and were refused entry to McDonalds.

Eewwwww

Good idea I never go to McDonalds though

Because our statistics aren't built on results for one thing, simply on the number of tests sent out, not what comes back, or those which are actually used for results.

Do you really not know what the statistics say or do you just not want to know?

Whatever is going on in your rural idyll in Ariege can hardly be taken as representative of France. I hear the testing system in The Shetlands is just fine so I guess the UK must doing well?

For a more accurate picture you could read this

https://www.thelocal.fr/20200909/covid-19-why-testing-one-million-people-a-...

and then this to see how most of Europe is suffering from the exact same problems as us.

https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-how-testing-is-going-in-other-europe...

What you say has some merit, particularly the point about all major European countries facing the same issues in delivering effective testing strategies and testing capacity. Unfortunately, reliable comparative data on waiting times for tests and for results doesn't seem easy to find.

But I take great exception to your implied accusation that I'm consciously lying on here or fooling myself regarding statistics. If I said I didn't know the statistics, I didn't know the statistics. Although as a general rule, I do often find that people expect others to behave in a way that they themselves might behave in similar circumstances.

I wasn't suggesting that you were lying. I was suggesting that you were using some highly selective and obviously unrepresentative evidence to imply (along with your other posts on this thread) that France is doing much better than the UK which it clearly isn't.

If you look back at my posts on this thread you will find that I imply nothing of the sort. I say nothing whatsoever about how the virus is spreading in France, but I do make two points: one is that France seems to have a better approach to distributing and paying for the distribution of masks, and the other is that my personal experience of testing here has been far better than anything I have so far read about in the UK.

I see nothing whatsoever wrong with making either of those points.

Fair enough but I was just adding the necessary context to put them in perspective.

Like I said, your point about testing is as meaningless as an inhabitant of the Shetland Islands telling us how everything around him seems fine, much better than what he's heard about Paris.

I can't speak for France but our testing is a complete shambles, at least from the people I know who've had to used it. Delays getting results, or no results at all, in at least 60% of cases.

It's a known fact that the government is lying to us, in regard to how many tests are being carried out. Counting test posted out is NOT the same as the number of tests being carried out.

Are other nations better at collating statistsics?

As far as I can see there is little standardidation on how different countries calculate their numbers so it's hard to make rational comparisons for anyone other than those who are out to push their own agenda.