Growth Incorporated

This UK Government are “newbies” – next week they come of age It’s popular to say the new UK Government has had a terrible first 100 days. It’s completely overdone. In policy and substance terms they’ve actually done a really nice job. In political and comms terms? Not so much. But last week they published an outline Industrial Strategy. We've seen a lot of these and we must say, it’s pretty good. It prioritises sectors that are high productivity and high comparative advantage for Britain. That is a big deal. The previous Industrial Strategy ended up catering to all sectors, scared of having winners and losers. The truth is we must as a country focus on high productivity sectors. And comparative advantage matters. Post Brexit, the UK suddenly looks like a sub scale economy. Economics has gone continental. Take green industries for example. The US green stimulus is post $500 billion. The Europeans is c$300 billion and the Chinese post $1 trillion. In the UK, Labour had to give up on ￡28 billion and settle for single digits. When you’re small you have to play to your strengths. The Government has also moved really fast on both energy and health reform. They are grappling with economic inactivity. They are linking immigration and skills. They are going after planning. These are really big leaps forward which can be legacy achievements. The winter fuel allowance, the internal staff changes, the perks problems all got more attention of course. They filled a vaccum and it all now looks like such classic rookie errors. Remember we have just handed the running of a country to a group of people, most of whom have never had middle management positions, and now are CEOs of billion-dollar enterprises! This is what always happens with new governments of course and we should learn the lessons for next time. Yet, following the Industrial Strategy of last week, next week is when the economic strategy of the country gets real. There is a lot of fervour about the Budget and what will happen to capital gains tax and one year spending settlements. These are important to get right and show whether the Government is resilient and maturing. More significant is the Business Tax Roadmap which will set out the tax landscape for the next five years. If the Chancellor can deliver a predictable tax regime alongside the Government’s big majority, that is the stability "couplet" that international investors crave. At a time when the US, France, Germany and others confront instability, suddenly the UK can jump up the league table of great places to invest. And if the Government next week can show precision with their public investment budget – focusing on what investment is catalytic to private sector investment – this Government will be off to the races on tackling poor UK investment performance. The Chancellor has rightly identified this as the kernel of our poor productivity and growth record. So next week it really begins. Probation period over.

We are delighted to be working with Okana a goal placemaking consultancy launched today. The question of how we build great places to live, work and thrive is a huge part of this country's growth story and Okana are leading the way with vision and energy. Excited for the future! https://www.okana.global/