THINGS were going so well for Sir Keir Starmer and Labour.
The Tories’ self-implosion showed, as if the country needed reminding, that they were no longer economically responsible. Lord Jim O’Neill, himself a former minister in David Cameron’s government, led a review that was quite unlike usual Labour pleas to be taken seriously where business is concerned. Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor, who commissioned O’Neill’s study, gathered with Starmer, 350 business leaders in Canary Wharf for the unveiling of his report.
These were not the normal also-rans, asked by the chairman or CEO to represent them at a Labour event - these were chairmen and CEO’s. Labour, too, received warm applause from the CBI.
It looked, for a period, as though Labour had usurped the Conservatives as the “party of business”, a slogan that is trotted out repeatedly during general election campaigns, in broadcasts, interviews and on the doorstep. “Trust us,” they’re saying, “we are the most qualified to look after your money.”
Then, suddenly, the tide appeared to shift. A succession of public sector and rail strikes, which did not engender public hostility at first, have served to play straight into Tory hands - perhaps not the nurses, everyone forgives the nurses, but the postal workers and train crews, those who were timing their moves to cause maximum discomfort at Christmas, they’re now not arousing much widespread sympathy. They’ve turned down offers, that on paper seem to be reasonable, certainly by a populace struggling with soaring energy and food bills.
The strategy of the Prime Minister is to hold the line, not always with the approval of some of his colleagues. Generally, though, Rishi Sunak wishes to be seen as tough, not giving in to strikers’ demands, being seen to be careful with our money.
Compared with the events that brought down his predecessor’s short-lived stab at governing, Sunak has engendered a sense of calm. So, as the year ends, the two main parties are back to their historical battle positions. Except they’re not.
The damage to the Tories’ carefully-nurtured and somewhat oversold reputation as managers of the economy, caused by Liz Truss and her chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-Budget, was immense and not something that can be righted in a matter of months.
Likewise, Starmer has managed to survive the harm being inflicted by the strikes - yes, they’re Labour supporters and in the case of some unions, their backers, but Starmer is not being put in the firing line - except by Tories. He is not the one who can open the public purse to produce a settlement, he is not able to tell his Transport Secretary to get the rail networks and drivers in a room and they cannot leave until agreement is reached.
The two most significant indicators for what lies ahead, in 2023, is that first, the O’Neill study remains as a highly credible document, one that talks in detail about bridging the gap on start-up funding, uniting the private and public sectors, as happens in France, to drive entrepreneurship and growth. As an analysis of how growth can be achieved in the UK it is spot-on, not lost in the usual fog of calling mainly for greater infrastructure investment - it’s reasonable, seeking more from the British Business Bank, and highly achievable.
Growth, let us not forget, was what Truss said she stood for. In fact, just so we were sure, she repeated it, frequently, three times: “Growth, growth, growth.”
Much of what she proposed, ironically, was sensible but she was impatient and felt she also had to show her true ideological colours, to appease those who elected her, so her growth agenda was coupled with tax-cutting moves that benefited the rich.
Second, Sunak’s challenge as the new year dawns, is to come up with his own, believable, practical recipe for growth. He has to do that, after a post-Truss Budget that emphasised the parlours state of the nation’s finances and now. industrial unrest.
It’s a tough ask and one he will struggle to accomplish. Efforts to convince the “Red Wall” of new Tory Northern MPs that Sunak is committed to “levelling up” have not convinced - Sunak is no Boris Johnson where making seductive promises is concerned. They believed Johnson because they wanted to believe him. Sunak has to find a growth policy that is not Labour’s and is real and deliverable.
So, as we head towards 2023, it’s where we were - with Labour, for once and still, holding the baton as the party of business; and the Tories desperate to recover their lost hegemony.
