Courage is needed
It is cute and quaint but does it work? Why are we trying to run a country of 66 odd million people out of a couple of Georgian era houses in a small back street in Whitehall?
Like much which is wrong with this country, total reform never seems to happen, we are stuck with a system that only ever seems capable of fiddling at the edges.
No. 10 should be a ceremonial site, ideal for pressers and photo ops, the odd banquet and state visits. With the real work done in a huge, well designed, modern, spacey building nearby.
That would just be a start, we need far better Civil Servants, better paid ones with better training and experience. We need proper regional policy and a proper second chamber, the list is almost endless.
But the key point is that the band width and capacity of the state is not up to the job. 14 years of small state idealogical attacks on government have broken a tottering system.
If you want a country that works, you need a government that can work and work well. The Tories have proved beyond doubt that undermining the state is suicidally stupid, but who will have the courage to rebuild it?
Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.
By Jonty Bloom Media
Bravo! But I guess someone as well-informed and profound-thinking as you, Jonty, has known this for a long time.
As has the IfG, the Freemans (Sam’s 2024 book on the state of the UK is aptly titled “Failed State”) and many others outside the Tory bubble and its client media (sadly, extended to include the BBC, GB “News”, Talk TV etc etc).
Outside the latter, there seems to me to be something like a consensus: “things have got to change”.
Yes we need courage - and also money. The tories’ 14 years of destruction have left us broke, as well as broken. And what do we get in return? A 4 numpty clown show and a crap book full of lies and self-serving bullshit from a disgraced, defenestrated pm