Becoming little England

‘Painful measures are needed to pull us out of decline but neither politicians nor voters will face up to them,’ he wrote, castigating the government for a series of what he called unforced errors.

‘How did the Tories keep getting re-elected?’ he asked. ‘We might acknowledge that in a democracy, the government is often a reflection, however imperfect, of the people who elect them.

‘So why are we voting for hopeless politicians? Could it be that we are part of the problem?

‘Is it we who want higher growth without paying for the investment to secure it? Who want better public services without having to pay? Who want more houses while retaining the local right to veto them? Who want cheap immigration because we can’t accept higher short-term costs? Who want social care but not the bill?

‘Is it we who are living in denial, and not just our politicians?’

Syed says that Britain’s rise as a great power was due to its worth ethic, willingness to defer gratification, fidelity to creditors, and utter realism. Characteristics of the growing Guernsey 50 years ago, one which had rebuilt and was starting to reinvent itself from the Occupation onwards – and maybe characteristics that are not so prevalent today.

He classes Britain as a ‘politically unserious nation’, with joke candidates offering laughable solutions in a background of inane parochialism.

In another nod to the noise being made about reform of government in Guernsey: ‘We might blame the electoral system, the way parties elect leaders, anything to distract us from the more difficult truth – namely that a critical mass of voters are not yet ready to hear about our predicament, or the radical changes needed to pull us out of decline.’

The comparisons with Guernsey are stark, revealingly close, and concerning.

We will need more sense, and fewer electoral platitudes than those that were offered in the 2020 election, to steer us towards a better future.