In a deja-vu moment Rachel Reeves recent budget speech brought back memories of old Labour economics: she talked about rebuilding Britain just like in 45‚ 64 and 97. Its interesting how history plays tricks on us
The 60s and 70s werent exactly golden years for UK economy (even with good-looking stats). While GDP grew about 3.5% yearly back then British industry was losing ground to Euro competitors. The pound kept dropping and strikes were hitting factories everywhere
Harold Wilson tried fixing things with state-planning and picking winners but that didnt work out. His government made some big-time mistakes - like putting together car companies to make British Leyland which ate tons of tax money and still failed. The National Enterprise Board spent lots of cash on tech companies that dont exist anymore
We used to think that you could spend your way out of a recession
Now Keir Starmer and his team are bringing back state-led economics with a green paint job. Theyʼve set-up stuff like Great British Energy (with £8.3bn to spend) and the National Wealth Fund; its like watching a re-run of 60s industrial policy
The new Labour bunch talks about “economic strength needs partnership“ and “transforming challenges“ - sounds just like old times. Theyʼre betting big on climate-change plans but nobody knows if throwing state cash at green projects will work better than past tries at picking winners
Todays Labour folks dont have the excuse of coming right after WW2 state-control like their 60s counterparts did. Theyʼre copying an old script that didnt work first time round - but now with extra rules about saving the planet