Where are we going as a country?
As I continue to reflect on the proposed Lime Down Solar Park, I’m seeing there is an underlying issue that is having a negative impact not just on our countryside and our ability to reach Net Zero, but is also affecting education, the NHS, pollution in rivers, agriculture, and business.
What is that issue?
As a country, we don’t have a plan.
We have pledges and manifesto promises and a never-ending series of 5 things that a party promises to do, but we don’t have a fact-based, rigorously researched and debated, long-term vision of where we’re going.
When I was on the Pacific Ocean, there was a point where I had to decide whether to push against the elements to get to my original destination of Tuvalu, or to opt instead for the Republic of Kiribati. For a couple of weeks this question was unresolved. I’d spend a day rowing towards one destination, then wonder if I should have been trying for the other. I found it enormously stressful and demotivating.
I see the same happening in our country. I like to have a clear idea of where I’m going. I think most of us do. If we don’t know our destination, everything feels a bit pointless. Without knowing our goal, our teachers, healthcare professionals, water companies, farmers, and businesspeople can’t plan accordingly.
Even worse, from time to time we’re told that there is a definite plan, only for it to be rolled back a short time later, creating even more confusion, not to mention wasted time and investment in the interim.
Our current political system is somewhat to blame.
First past the post and short-term electoral cycles mean that the pendulum swings from one extreme to the other. Each incoming government wants to make its mark, often undoing the work of the previous incumbents to remould the country in its own image, at great cost in money, time, energy, and morale. Proportional representation would help reduce the extremes of the pendulum swing.
But even within those short electoral cycles, the turbulent 7 years since Brexit have seen an unprecedented rapid churn of ministers – we’ve had 7 foreign secretaries, 7 chancellors, 7 health ministers, 8 home secretaries, 9 education ministers and no less than 13 housing ministers, each of them eager to be a new brush sweeping clean. The ship of state has been tacking frantically this way and that.
The coming years are going to bring plenty of uncertainty. Disruptive technologies and disrupted weather are going to take us into uncharted waters. There will be much that we can’t control.
But there are some things that are within our control, and it is the job of government to maximise clarity, minimise uncertainty, to set a clear course for the country so we can all plan our lives and our businesses accordingly.
We need to have a national conversation about what the UK wants to be in the 21st century. We are a post-Empire, post-Brexit nation, struggling to find relevance and identity. We have much to be proud of in our past (and of course some things we are less proud of), but we don’t currently have a positive, shared vision of our future, a future that inspires us, a future that we can work towards, together and united – and we desperately need one.
Campaign Notes
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We’re always keen to welcome more campaigners to our team to help with deliveries and/or doorknocking. Please consider lending us an hour or two a month. Email my wonderful Campaign Organiser, Poppy Fair, for more details.
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Quote of the Week
“A sailor with no destination never has fair winds.”
― Seneca
Have a great week!
Photo by Red Zeppelin on Unsplash