WITH RETURN BE BOOST TO OF LIBERTY, THERE WILL THE BATTERED ECONOMY
THE BLACK clouds of Covid still hang low in the winter sky. After all the devastation it caused last year, the disease continues to wreak havoc with a savage intensity. As businesses are ruined, livelihoods imperilled and freedoms lost, the death toll from the coronavirus rises remorselessly, reaching a daily record of 1,820 last Thursday.
Not only has our country the highest Covid fatality rate in the world, but the number of British people who have died in the pandemic is now higher than the total civilian losses during the Second World War.
Yet amid the gloom there is cause for hope, reflected in the decline in both positive cases and hospital admissions.
What we might be witnessing is the last baleful gasp of the storm.
Remarkable as it may now seem, a return to normality could be on the horizon, heralding an opportunity for national renewal.
As spring arrives, our current despair could give way to a resurgence in optimism and selfconfidence.
In April 1941, during one of the grimmest moments of the war after Britain had endured a string of defeats overseas at the hands of the Nazi war machine, Churchill made a stirring broadcast in which he quoted some lines from the Victorian poet Arthur Hugh Clough.
They ran, “And not by eastern windows only, when daylight comes, comes in the light. In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly. But western look, the land is bright.” Churchill told his audience that those words “are appropriate for our fortunes tonight”.
They are also appropriate for our fortunes today.
We will need all our resilience and patience for the difficult months ahead, but there is every chance that we will then reach “broad, sunlit uplands,” to use another of Churchill’s resonant phrases. The key to breaking the cycle of contagion and lockdown is the vaccination programme.
Thanks to the foresight of the Government, the efficiency of the pharmaceutical suppliers, the expertise of medical staff and the support of a huge volunteer army, this is turning out to be an inspirational success story.
With five million jabs already delivered, the NHS is well on course to meet its target of inoculating 15 million of the most vulnerable Britons by mid-february.
Having also developed the Oxford-zeneca vaccine, been the first country to approve the Pfizer product and demonstrated the effectiveness of anti-covid treatments like the steroid Dexamethasone, it is no exaggeration to say that Britain leads the world in the medical fight against Covid.
Last summer, when the Government refused to sign up to the EU vaccine programme because of our own advanced work in this field, Labour and the Liberal Democrats branded the move “unforgivable”.
How foolish that criticism now sounds, in view of the EU’S dangerous sluggishness compared to our pioneering dynamism.
Indeed, the highly respected US economist Tyler Cowen wrote recently that “the Brits are on track to save the world” and that our biomedical response to Covid “has been first-class”.
This achievement is not down to good fortune, but is the result of shrewd, long-term investment in the industry, as well as ambitious planning by the Vaccine Taskforce headed by venture capitalist Kate Bingham.
That enterprising spirit is epitomised by the decision, taken long
before the outbreak of Covid, to build a vast £158million Vaccines Manufacturing and Innovation Centre at Harwell, Oxfordshire.
Opening later this year, the plant will be able to make 70 million doses in five months, enough to keep the entire population regularly inoculated. Once the public is fully protected, the Covid restrictions can be lifted.
With the return of liberty, there will be a mood of relief and celebration.
In turn, that will give a huge boost to the battered economy, which could rebound dramatically from the present paralysis.
Only last week, Andrew Haldane, the chief economist at the Bank of England, predicted that once the recovery starts, it will proceed “at a rate of knots”. All the ingredients for rapid growth are certainly in place, including low inflation, low interest rates, and low corporate taxes, in addition to a flexible labour market. Already in recent months, innovative management and investment in new technology has seen productivity grow at its fastest rate for 15 years.
EQUALLY important are the huge extra savings accumulated during the lockdown by British households, estimated to be worth more than £100billion. Due to this cash pile, the reopening of the economy will herald a potent release in pent-up demand, fuelling a consumer boom. According to the Centre for Economic and Business Research (CEBR), national income will grow by eight per cent in 2021, the fastest rate since the Second World War.
Doug Mcwilliams, the Centre’s deputy chairman, believes that the recovery will “be quicker and stronger” than is often thought because “our tendency to splash out once we are let out of lockdown is greater than in many other countries”.
Economic revival will be further accelerated by Brexit, as our nation is freed from the regulatory straitjacket of EU rule.
The advantages of full independence have already been demonstrated in our global lead in vaccines, and they will become even more apparent on the economic front over the coming years. Through the scaremongering of Project Fear, the Remainers repeatedly claimed Brexit would leave us in decline and isolation.
But just the opposite looks likely to happen.
Thanks partly to the indefatigable efforts of the Trade Minister
Liz Truss, Britain has now concluded deals with 60 other countries and is on the way to joining the mighty Trans Pacific Partnership, which contains several of the world’s fastest-growing economies.
Apart from trade, Brexit brings a host of other economic benefits.
Instead of free movement, we can set our immigration, tax and social security policies to suit our national interests.
Similarly employers, no longer able to rely on cheap foreign labour subsidized by the welfare system, will have to train and pay properly British recruits.
The end of our annual contributions to the EU means more cash for our own public services, while in the long term our escape from the Common Agricultural Policy should mean lower food prices.
Beyond economics, Brexit will bolster cohesion and solidarity, both of them vital ingredients for the task of rebuilding after Covid.
No longer a supplicant province in the Brussels empire, we will reawaken as a sovereign nation once more, in charge of our own destiny.
But that mission will be all the easier because of the enduring strength of our national institutions.
Just as the Covid crisis proved the heroic resilience and stoicism of the British people, so it has also revealed the resilience of the fabric of British public life.
In the face of the biggest ordeal in its long history, the NHS has coped magnificently, just as the British army has lived up to its reputation for reliability and efficiency in providing logistical support.
‘What could have been one of our darkest hours may well prove
to be one of our finest’
‘As spring arrives, current despair could give way to a resurgence in optimism and self-confidence’
COMPASSION has shone through the performance of key workers and voluntary organisations like the St John’s Ambulance Brigade. And upholding democracy throughout these unprecedented times, Parliament has successfully mixed the traditional with the innovative.
Apart from the errant Duke and Duchess of Sussex, the Royal Family have done their duty superbly, providing leadership, comfort and reassurance.
Particularly impressive has been the contribution of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. Throughout the crisis, he has exuded a new authority, just as she has reached new heights of elegance and empathy.
Covid has been a unique test, but Britain is pulling through and could emerge stronger from adversity. What could have been one of our darkest hours may well prove to be one of our finest.