The shift to subsidies is more than the timely, targeted and temporary measures that we saw during the pandemic, and signifies a bigger change in global public policy.
His plan for 2024 is to say: “I may not be most exciting politician in the world. But I’m the more reliable of the two before you. What I promise I then deliver.” It’s unlikely to be enough on its own.
The Prime Minister must make up his mind whether or not to see through a policy to stop the small boats – now an issue of profound symbolic importance.
Where there is need, front line staff like doctors and nurses are underpaid, relative to what they should receive, and where there isn’t, a whole host of people are well paid.
My guess is that she is too smart to allow the worst case scenario to happen. To do that, however, she is going to have to move swiftly from focusing on winning the confidence of Conservative MPs and party members to winning the confidence of the markets.
Businesses and employees are only responding to monetary conditions set by the Bank of England, where the real responsibility lies.
The public will react very badly if they come to see the strikes as essentially political, but the Conservatives won’t want to appear unable to govern.
Voters aren’t used to a world of rising prices and interest rates, and their hearts and minds are up for grabs.
Above all, to what extent will he present a clear plan and message? My starter for ten is “help hard-working people and go for more growth”.
If the party really wants to honour its past, then it must face up to problems of the present.
The Government seems to have no plan to communicate as cost of living woes multiply. Here’s a first stab at one.
The shock-absorber is a looser fiscal policy. Although the budget deficit is higher than one would like, the good news is that it is falling sharply.
A key economic problem during the 1980s was union power. Now it is weak incentives to move and retrain.
The first of a series of five articles on ConservativeHome this week about the main challenges that await the new Prime Minister.