Get a grip on this culture of decline

Just as the Government was seeking to get back on the front foot, it has found itself engulfed by a serious new scandal that could well get significantly worse. The closure of dozens of schools, built with “crumbling” reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete, may only be the start. Experts fear that many more buildings will have to be shut, with thousands of children facing a return to online learning. The timing of the decision – days before the end of the summer holidays – has brought particular criticism.

Why wasn’t anything done sooner? How much will it cost to put this problem right? How long will it take to fix it?

The Left is already seeking to turn this mess into another bat with which to beat the Government, declaring it to be a case study in 13 years of Tory failure. But many voters will just be wondering how on earth Britain has ended up with school buildings that are apparently in danger of imminent collapse despite the country labouring under the highest tax burden in decades.

Vast sums of money are spent on public services, and yet the outcome is rarely excellence, good service or efficiency. It is dilapidated infrastructure and a state that is no longer able to fulfil its most basic functions. Everywhere one looks, Britain seems to be failing.

To some extent this is a question of priorities. A generation of politicians has lived in terror of doing anything meaningful to fix the NHS, which becomes less productive by the year, wasting huge amounts while seeming to deliver ever less for patients. Unless something changes, the demands of an unreformed health service will either necessitate yet more tax increases the nation cannot really afford, or continue to crowd out spending on other important areas, including education.

Welfare dependency and indolence is another big – and growing – drain on the taxpayer. The Government is said to be contemplating changes to the eligibility criteria for certain benefits, but will they really be radical enough to counteract the disastrous cultural effects of the lockdown and furlough scheme? Large numbers appear to have given up on a life of work altogether, while many people in employment seem to want to prioritise work-life balance over the financial rewards that come with career progression.

But the shabby state of the country today is also an indictment of the British state: its extraordinary institutional incompetence, its depressing lack of accountability, and its inability to get anything done.

Even the reaction to the school closures has exposed the can’t-do mentality that has gripped swathes of the governing class, particularly since the lockdowns. Surely all efforts should be targeted now towards immediately finding alternative locations for lessons to take place in person? Some schools seem to be doing this, but others appear not to be bothering, forcing children to attempt to learn from home instead (and preventing their parents from going to work).

The Education Secretary also looks strangely powerless, buffeted by events rather than in control of them. It would not be surprising if her capacity to direct this situation were limited. For decades, governments have farmed out powers and responsibilities to a nexus of quangos, agencies, and regulatory bodies, under the apparent assumption that they would be spared the blame if anything goes wrong. But it has also limited their ability to insist on particular courses of action, even in emergencies.

Moreover, the Government will be blamed if the issue of “crumbling” concrete is not addressed rapidly. As MPs return to Westminster next week, ministers have no option but to get a grip. Otherwise, the condition of the nation’s schools will be added in voters’ minds to the growing list of areas in which the country appears to be in increasingly visible decline, a trend for which the Conservatives will be held responsible.

But this is also a problem for the whole political class. British taxpayers will not put up forever with having to surrender so much of their money to fund a state that is incapable of meeting its promises in return. The solutions are also unlikely to be technocratic quick-fixes, or parachuting in more talented managers to run public services.

The entire system is in desperate need of a comprehensive overhaul. Which politician will be brave enough to admit it?

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