We need to control long-term immigration but also make it easier for entrepreneurs to visit the UK so that they can invest in and work with British companies.
I hope that we will see more of the Chancellor during the campaign explaining how his plans can help support investment to boost productivity.
Raising national insurance, fewer “sin taxes”, public sector pay rises, more schools spending – all are part of his programme.
The then EU Budget Commissioner told me that giving control of this funding to national governments would make it subject to “democratic whim”.
Through tax competition, we could truly have a real Northern Powerhouse and give cities in the north a fairer chance against London and the south east.
But more money and powers need to be given directly to the North to drive further progress.
In a balanced economy, the north would produce around £70 billion more. Here is one way to help close that gap.
It would be easy, but mistaken, to take the path of least resistance and simply re-enact the dated Cameron ‘modernising’ agenda.
There needs to be a paradigm shift in policy and culture. Our state should work to keep us healthy and allow us as individuals to be responsible for our actions.
The lack of a Conservative Commons majority prevented the Chancellor from doing much more than playing it safe – which he did effectively.
The Chancellor needs to help deliver the sense of direction so strikingly absent in Manchester last month, and indeed since last June’s election.
We have our reservations about the Foreign Secretary, but concede that he alone, of those Ministers who spoke this week, made the Tory message sing.
For Britain to prosper after Brexit, and Corbyn to be thwarted, the Northern Powerhouse is indispensable.
The first article in a five-piece series by the author on how Britain must prepare for March 31 2019 – and has less than 600 days to get it right.
His position as an adviser was more than decorative and he will be a loss. But as someone or other once put it, there is no alternative.