Just to be perfectly clear, I'm not suggesting we dismiss the Swedish approach - we know very little about how community immunity will play out going forward. We certainly need to pay heed to the Danish approach i.e. stringent "lockdown" controls off the back of a tax to GDP ratio of 45%. Obviously having our ratio at 22% isn't a good starting point. There's certainly a case for increasing duty on alcohol which may further erode our dinking culture and by implication introduce a degree of back door social distancing. We also need to look at a broader tax base - free drinking quality water seems mad given that the majority buy bottled water for drinking, for example. Carbon taxes could present another reasonable target for the exchequer - a per nautical mile surcharge on air fares seems logical for a start.
