Sunak’s plaster is no cure. It can’t hide the bigger problems

Whenever I think of Mrs Thatcher I come back to that picture, the one of her wandering across an industrial wasteland. It must be the northerner in me, but I can’t forget how the iconic photo was accompanied by not much at all. The emptiness of the landscape was matched by her sheer absence of a shared understanding and compassion, call it empathy.

She had many qualities but Thatcher failed to see beyond the demon she held responsible for the desolation: the trade unions. Defeat them, the prime minister reasoned, and all would be well: Britain would go on to prosper, its economy would flourish, hidden entrepreneurs would come to the fore and shine.

Hammer them, she certainly did. And while in many respects her crusade was brave and correct – the country really was being shackled – once victory had been secured, it was accompanied by nothing. Unforgivably it was followed by neglect.

Listening to Rishi Sunak unveiling his Job Support Scheme, that image once again flashed up, a haunting reminder of what can happen, of what, unless steps are taken, is likely to reoccur.

I searched in vain for any mention of retraining and the equipping with skills; I heard no mention of investment, no sign of a detailed recovery plan. As far as the application of Elastoplast goes, the chancellor’s address did the job, but that is all. It’s an emergency measure, temporarily designed to stem bleeding and to protect.

However, sticking on a plaster often is not a cure, it can mask an underlying problem, and if the cut is deeper may not work at all – and even aggravate the condition.

So far, before Sunak spoke, the total number of jobs lost since lockdown is around 700,000. They’re not going to return because of anything he said. Vast swathes of our economy are not functioning at all – our town and city centres are empty, office buildings deserted so that all those businesses that rely on serving their workers have no income. To them can be added tourism, travel, events, the arts. Not some money coming in, as the chancellor appeared to be implying – they have none. And it’s been like that for six months, and if Boris Johnson is to be believed, it will be the same for another six. That’s an entire year with zilch.

So, while Sunak targeted “viable” enterprises for assistance, finding a firm that can keep going with zero or next to zero revenue for a whole 12 months is likely to be impossible. Forget discussions about which employee to keep or lose, who to put on a part-time basis – conversations the chancellor was inviting bosses to have. These are businesses that will be shutting for good, they won’t require any staff at all.

These are the direct consequences of our response to Covid, instilling fear and encouraging people, customers, to stay away, to work from home.

The pandemic, though, has had another impact: it’s exacerbated the weaknesses that were already present. Consumers were heading online anyway, abandoning the high street. Our economy was heavily imbalanced, too heavily dependent on financial and professional services. Outside the M25, great areas of the country, and I don’t just include the north of England, were crippled with weak transport and digital infrastructure, and a poorly equipped workforce – rendering them unable to compete on a level footing with the southeast, let alone in the global marketplace.

The government is intent on curbing the flow. It may go some way towards achieving that, but only so far. Instead of four million unemployed, as many experts predict, we may end up with 3.5 million or 3 million or 2.5 million. These represent substantial savings but that’s all they are, trims.

What we’re not getting is how those made redundant or going to be made redundant will be re-employed. Neither are we receiving any forward vision, as to how we’re going to strengthen our economy – not patch it up, but make it better and fit for modern purpose (and an ambition that does not stop with the construction of a high-speed rail link from London to the northwest).

What I recall with Thatcher is how apprenticeship programmes turned to dust, how we allowed factories and whole industries to disappear, and how nothing meaningful and long-term was offered by return.

I’m hoping that while in one room ministers, advisors and officials are formulating the immediate corona fight, in another a group is looking beyond the here and now, and addressing the nation’s needs after the pandemic. I’d like to imagine they were joined together in their thinking, but that might be expecting too much.

Nevertheless, at the moment we’re left with the impression of an administration seeking to overcome a virus, and hoping they can hail as a triumph not matching the worst case scenarios for the numbers of cases and deaths put forward by scientists and falling within the gloomiest forecasts for total job losses. Just as Thatcher smashed the unions, however, we deserve more.

It has, as well, to be real. We’re already tired of being told how this government is going to galvanise our entrepreneurial spirit, turbo-charge the economy, boost productivity, torch red tape, and open up new trade opportunities. In years to come, to that image of Thatcher may be added one of Boris Johnson in a hard hat wearing a high-vis jacket (take your pick, there are loads as there are of his ministers including Sunak). Stop the endless photo-calls, the empty rhetoric delivered on factory floors to phalanxes of workers instructed to appear keen and interested; and start telling us how, exactly.