Recent prime ministers have become very good at the politics of the long grass, and Andy Burnham is at risk of following this line. Promise the big things: growth, clean rivers, better defence, cheaper energy, new nuclear, decent transport and social care. Then push the hard choices beyond the next election, offer short-term palliatives, and hope that someone else will eventually pick up the bill. The result is not merely delay; such an approach actually results in higher costs in the long term, weaker infrastructure, and yet another obstacle to the growth that he, and many of his predecessors claim to want.
What is needed right now in Britain is not another slogan, mission or target, but a serious long-term framework for investing in the much-needed assets: energy, water, transport, communications and defence. The politics of the long term is harder than the politics of the long grass, but, without it, Britain will keep choosing affordability today at the expense of prosperity tomorrow, and at the risk of passing on an inheritance to the next generation that is much poorer than the one it inherited.
