We need to know what the Tories’ plans are for the future of Britain

Ignore the sound bites: where are the long-term strategies that we need to see our way forward?

From “Get Brexit Done” to “Stay At Home”, the three-word slogan has been a recurring feature of Boris Johnson’s premiership. And sure enough, as the Tories begin their virtual conference this week, “Build Back Better” is the call that rallies the troops.

The slogan has none of the drama of the promise to bring about Brexit, and lacks the urgency of the warning to the public to help halt the spread of Covid-19. “Build Back Better” is in fact a tacit confession that events have conspired to severely disrupt the Government’s domestic policy plan.

For the pandemic means that the task before ministers is no longer only about “levelling up” the country, but, first at least, helping the country to catch up with where it was before the distancing and the lockdowns began.

And the problems do not end there. First, it is not yet clear when the work of building back better can begin, because for an unknown length of time – six months was the Prime Minister’s last guess – it will be government policy to restrict social and economic activity, rather than promote it. And secondly, the cost of subsidising our inactivity now causes some ministers to doubt whether the country can afford to invest in levelling up later.

With the Cabinet also split between pandemic hawks, who want to open up the economy, and doves, who want tougher restrictions, it is easy to understand how the Government has become confused about its purpose. With uncertainty, too, about whether a Brexit deal will be struck in time before the expiry of Britain’s transition period at the end of the year, it is equally unsurprising that the public has started to pick up on the drift.

In such unusual circumstances, grown-up political discourse ought to reflect the inevitability of complexity and uncertainty. With the pandemic, ministers are fighting against a virus not knowing if a vaccine or even daily mass testing will become available any time soon. With Brexit, a deal remains more likely than no deal, but we are experiencing the storm before the calm as the two sides seek to extract what they can from one another.

But even appreciating that the Government is operating in fiendishly difficult times, ministers need to assert their sense of purpose and mission. And despite the difficulties, this is far from impossible. Notwithstanding the complexity and tragedy of the pandemic, Rishi Sunak’s interventions to protect jobs and family incomes have been decisive and conveyed positive values of solidarity and togetherness. Despite all the tensions of the Brexit negotiations, when the Government took its controversial position on the Northern Ireland border, the public understood the Prime Minister’s strength and resolve.

But we need to see greater decisiveness in other ways. It is not only down to Covid-19 that we do not know the Government’s broader economic policies, for example, for they had not been articulated in any detail before we were struck by the pandemic. We knew that ministers wanted to invest more in regional infrastructure, and we knew they were prepared to borrow more to fund the investment. But we knew little more than that.

With an ageing population more reliant on welfare spending, the National Health Service and social care services, and a relatively smaller working-age population paying the taxes, it has long been inevitable that the overall burden of taxation in Britain will increase. The extra borrowing to fund the furlough scheme and Sunak’s other recent interventions only add to the sense of inevitability. But what are the Government’s fiscal plans for the years ahead? Even now, with a spending review under way, Whitehall officials wonder if it will result in departmental budget settlements for three years, as normal, or just one.

Industrial strategy is a vital component of levelling up. Yet we do not know what the Government’s strategy will be. Individually, we know there will be increased investment spending, more funds for science and research and technology, and interventions that support the economy in particular localities. We know that Downing Street views the ambition to build a net-zero economy by 2050 as a means of making Britain a leader in innovation and new technologies. And we know it is holding out in the Brexit talks over its freedom to change state aid policies.

This all points to a far more interventionist policy – necessary and welcome if we are to rebalance the economy – but until we see the strategy, we cannot know if these policies will be more or less than the sum of their parts.

It is unlikely we will be given answers about fiscal policy and industrial strategy this week, but the Tory conference is an opportunity for the Government to get back on to the front foot and convey its sense of mission. Yesterday, the Prime Minister reiterated that the pandemic would not deter him from delivering his original agenda. “This is the moment not to be slowed down,” he declared, “but to speed up.” His speech on Wednesday will be an opportunity to tell the country how – and when – he can reconcile his immediate aim to shield the public from Covid-19 with still rebalancing the economy.

As the Chancellor will argue today, the Conservatives owe their recent electoral success to their ability to persuade enough voters that the party shares their values. This emphasis on values explains promises made over the weekend to increase home ownership among younger families and extending the hospital building programme. And it is why Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, made clear she will ignore liberal critics and reform Britain’s broken asylum policy, potentially even holding asylum claimants in centres outside the country.

As the public health experts and ministers tell us, with a rise in the virus’s reproduction rate, the country is in for a tough time in the coming months. The Government will no doubt face attacks for its policies and competence. But, to borrow a different three-word phrase from the Prime Minister’s hero Winston Churchill, ministers cannot afford to simply “keep buggering on”. They need purpose, pace and political direction – and this week is the time to regain it.