The Chancellor is groping his way, knowing well that the future is unknowable, trying to hold on to as much of the past as he can.
Given the Coronavirus uncertainties, whatever he announces could be even more provisional than most schemes of most Chancellors.
It’s a good thing for former senior Ministers to keep thinking, going and contributing, and we wouldn’t be surprised to see a comeback to government.
This crisis, though we wish it could have been avoided – is a big wake-up call to these institutions that business cannot continue as normal.
Getting the economy moving won’t even begin to give the Government political momentum. It will need to conduct its own Fairness Audit.
After a decade of forward guidance, credit easing and quantitative easing, it was clear even before the Covid-19 crisis that monetary policy had run out of road.
The Government can avoid worsening it. But that requires as bold a deviation from ordinary policy as the extraordinary relief efforts we saw before.
The Government should temporarily suspend or increase the benefit cap – so that all families on UC benefit from the emergency measures.
It’s not only a matter of highly-skilled jobs for working class people. Firms like these gives cities like Derby a sense of immense civic pride.
If employers turn to cheaper foreign labour, the Conservatives will suffer very heavily, especially in the new “red wall” constituencies.
If, that is, interest rates carry on at rock bottom rates. But we have to take a chance on growing our way out of this crisis.
One area that has had relatively little attention, but could get much more, is the behaviour of commercial landlords across the country.
‘Short-time’ working is the Chancellor’s best bet for weaning employers off state support.
We should be aggressively backing UK manufacturing, science and green tech as a key plank of our recovery.