Ah yes, the mythical golden age. That brief, shimmering moment we are now assured existed, when everything was going splendidly for Labour, growth was blooming, confidence was soaring, and ministers were, what was it, “busting a gut” in heroic service of the nation.
Curious, really. Because nobody seems to remember it.
No jubilant shopkeepers, no triumphant farmers, no entrepreneurs popping champagne and declaring, “At last, the conditions are perfect, let’s expand, let’s hire, let’s risk it all.”
No, what people actually remember is rather less golden.
They remember the grand entrance, followed by an immediate procession of fumbles, freezes, taxes, reversals, sleaze and that now beloved Labour dance, the U-turn.
- Freeze pensioners, then wobble.
- Tax education, then wobble.
- Alarm the farmers, then soften it when the pitchforks appear.
- Give away British territory, then get stopped in your tracks.
- Announce, retreat.
Declare, reverse. - Scream, cry.
Repeat until dizzy.
A sort of governing-by-boomerang, every idea eventually returning to smack its originator squarely in the face.
And all the while, we were told, with a straight face and a steady tone, that this was control, that this was competence, that this was progress. Progress?
We’ve seen flirtations with cancelling elections, swiftly abandoned when someone remembered democracy is not entirely optional.
We’ve seen grand digital schemes unveiled with gusto and then quietly escorted out the back door when the public response hovered somewhere between “absolutely not” and “have you lost your minds?”
We’ve seen policy after policy marched up the hill, saluted, and then marched straight back down again. Not strategy, more rehearsal. A lot of incompetence.
And through it all, the real economy, the bit that actually matters, has been watching, quietly recalculating.
Small businesses, the supposed backbone, are not interested in speeches about momentum, they are interested in whether they can afford to exist. They are dealing with rising costs, rising taxes, rising obligations, and a regulatory maze so intricate it could double as a theme park attraction.
They are asking, increasingly bluntly,
“why would I expand?”
“why would I hire?”
“why would I stay?”
And when enough people start asking those questions, you do not have a messaging problem. You have a reality problem.
Which brings us, with exquisite timing, to the latest explanation.
Ah yes.
Now, it is not the policies. Not the reversals. Not the uncertainty, the cost, the creeping sense that the rules change faster than one can read them.
No.
Now apparently according to Labour Ministers it is all the fault of a man thousands of miles away. President Donald Trump.
A conflict abroad, a decision elsewhere, a shock from beyond our shores that has, we are told, single-handedly derailed what was apparently an economic renaissance of almost mythic proportions.
Mr Trump, it seems, has personally reached across the Atlantic and tipped over the British economy like a wobbly pint. Remarkable reach.
Because of course, before this distant thunder rolled in, everything here was, allegedly, ticking along beautifully.
Never mind that businesses were already tightening belts.
Never mind that confidence was already wobbling.
Never mind that policy after policy had already been revised, reversed, or rescued under pressure.
No, no, that was all part of the plan, apparently.
The real problem only arrived when events abroad provided the perfect, glittering opportunity.
A ready-made explanation.
A convenient culprit.
A get-out-of-responsibility card, stamped and delivered.
And so the narrative shifts.
It wasn’t us, it was them.
It wasn’t here, it was there.
It wasn’t decisions, it was destiny.
But here’s the difficulty with that story.
You cannot claim credit for stability that never existed, and then blame instability on someone else when the cracks were already showing.
You cannot point to the storm if the roof was leaking on a clear day. And you cannot expect people, who have been living through the consequences, to suddenly forget the sequence of events simply because a more convenient villain has appeared on cue. Because people remember.
They remember the taxes.
They remember the reversals.
They remember the uncertainty dressed up as strategy.
They remember the sleaze and lying.
And now, they are being asked to believe that all of this, every wobble, every misstep, every retreat, is really the fault of someone else entirely.
Blame the winds, by all means.
Blame the tides, blame the distant war, blame the man across the ocean.
But don’t expect applause when the audience can still see the stage.
Because there was no golden age so far under Labour. There was just the mess. And now, the excuse for it.
Stop lying Starmer. Resign.
