This government’s greatest failure is economic

‘The main job of a government is to ensure that the economics don’t go wrong.’ So argued an economist friend of mine to me many years back. And I must admit that my first response was uncommonly cynical. ‘Well, you would say that, wouldn’t you?’ I replied. ‘You’re a political economist.’ It is to be expected. In the same way a military-defence type might say that the most vital job of government is to be able to defend these islands and project military force. Or Lulu Lytle might explain that the most important thing in government is to get the interiors right.

But as the years have gone by, I have realised that my cynicism was wrong and my friend’s argument was true. Relatively dull subject though it is, it probably is the primary duty of government to get the economics right. Because when the economics go wrong, everything else goes wrong in very short order.