By City AM reporter
One would hope that growth figures revealing the economy was shrinking would serve as a wake up call to our political overlords. After all, governments do not tend to win elections when the economy is in reverse gear.
What did we get instead from the Conservative Party yesterday? More infighting and some asinine tweets from the Prime Minister about halving inflation, which he is bright enough and financially savvy enough to know has about as much to do with the government’s actions as the colour of tomorrow’s sky.
The lack of urgency within Tory ranks is staggering. It is as if they have forgotten there is an election due, luxuriating in internecine disputes rather than attempting to hit reset on our stagnation nation.
Where is the plan? The strategy to get Britain growing? Instead senior members of the government are blowing hard-won political capital on a Rwanda scheme which – forgetting its merits for a moment – is vanishingly small in its impact.
The oft-quoted words of Bill Clinton’s adviser back in 1992 – “it’s the economy, stupid” – haven’t lost their veracity despite their overuse. The Tory party will not win an election based on a culture war and “wedge issues” if the average Brit feels worse-off.
The tragedy of all of this is not that a group of objectively smart people across the four main offices of state are highly likely to be turfed out at the next election. No, it’s that time is being wasted: an economy in the toilet is not just a line on a graph but job losses, failed businesses and fewer opportunities.
With a Tory party in turmoil and a Labour Party that is marching to power almost without scrutiny, it is hard to have much confidence in political support of a turnaround.
Over to you, private sector.
