Peter Franklin: Everything is terrible right now – but Britain is in a unique position for change

Peter Franklin is deputy editor of UnHerd.

Let's be real, 2024 has been a miserable year. It was a low point for the Conservative Party, with of course the worst election campaign (and worst result) in our history. But more importantly, this has been a terrible time for our country.

Economically, socially and culturally, we are stuck. The lastdownward revision to GDP figures means there was zero growth between July and September – and now we have all the fallout from Rachel Reeves' budget to look forward to. Obviously, mass immigration Isn't it quite the tonic it claims to be; certainly not for social cohesion, as this summer's riots demonstrated.

To top it all off, this year's Christmas number one was Wham's Last Christmas, a song first released forty years ago. Wherever you look, the country runs on steam. The year's political changes (a new government, a new leader of the Conservative Party) should feel like a new beginning. But as I explained recently, this is not the case.

Indeed, the most dynamic aspect of Sir Keir Starmer's national leadership has been Labour's election collapse. According to Sky News analysisthis is the third largest drop in opinion polls suffered by a political party in a calendar year since the war. Starmer's 2024 disaster is eclipsed only by the rise and fall of Nick Clegg's Liberal Democrats in 2010 and the brief, if consequential, flowering of the Brexit Party in 2019.

And so, an exhausted and dispirited nation limped into 2025 with a government it already hates, but won't be able to get rid of until 2029. What hope does that leave? Well, more than you think.

This is not because I have exaggerated the depth of the abyss we find ourselves in, but because, more than most nations, we possess the capacity to climb out of it. After all, there's a reason the richest man in the world is about to becomeplow millionsin British politics. I am of course talking about Elon Musk.

A BBC News article seeks to explain its“curious fixation with Great Britain”but that misses the point. What Musk looks for in all his ventures is potential. For example, he didn't just invest in rockets because they're exciting, but because he saw an opportunity to transform the economics of space travel (which is exactly what he thinks). reached).

Likewise, he didn't invest all the money he could into electric cars because he's a Greta Thunberg-type environmentalist, but because he realized that gigaplantmanufacturing was the key to unlocking affordable clean technologies.

As for Twitter, it understood that by removing its bloated censorship bureaucracy, it could disrupt the media market while simultaneously reducing costs. If Musk is truly “obsessed” with Britain, it is not out of mere sentiment, but because he senses a huge, unrealized opportunity.

Cynics might present this in a negative way: this country is so poorly managed that even the most basic improvements will yield results.

And to be fair, the cynics would be right: the reason why growth rates in many developing countries (evenSoviet Union) are ahead of more advanced economies is that they still have plenty of low-hanging fruit to pick. Simply integrating the fundamentals of modernity, such as clean water and a reliable supply of electricity, can unlock a nation's potential.

The UK has not yet returned to third world status. But compared to our neighbors, our biggest cities beyond London have unusually low productivity levels – a consequence of chronic underinvestment (Leeds, for example, is the largest city in Western Europe without a public transport system). The Leveling Up Program was supposed to solve this problem, but, between them, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak have completely betrayed the 2019 promises.

The result is that among the G7 countries alone, the best jobs (and therefore the most talented individuals) have become more and more concentratedin the dominant region (in our case, London) while the rest of the country stagnates. So yes, there is still plenty of low-hanging fruit in left-behind Britain.

Yet there is a more positive side to Britain's room for improvement. As the political differences between France and Germany make clear, we are far from the only country facing deep structural problems. However, we are uniquely placed to do something about them.

To begin with, we are not in the European Union. We are limited neither by the regulatory superstructures of the EU and the single currency, nor by the tendency of national elites to entrust the task of fundamental reform to Brussels, Strasbourg and Frankfurt. There is neither the obligation – nor the excuse – of having to seek agreement from 27 other countries before moving forward.

This is particularly important when it comes to potentially transformational technologies like AI, robotics, automated vehicles and drones. If we really want it, the future can happen in Britain years ahead of the continent.

In some ways, we even have an opportunity to overtake the Americans. This is because it is one of the most centralized countries in the free world. As the economist Paul Collier recently said, Britain isled by around fifty people – most of them in the Treasury. This is not a good thing in itself, but for a determined and visionary government, it facilitates change.

For proof, just look at the biggest success of 14 years of Conservative government: Michael Gove's education reforms. There is a reason why the United Kingdom (or rather England) has risen to the global level.PISAAndTIMSSworld rankings. Gove, along with Dominic Cummings, had the courage to push through significant change in the face of concerted opposition from the infamous blob.

They won their case because, as Cummings saidarguesthey were ready to carry out purges against officials who got in their way. Even after weak-willed David Cameron sidelined Gove, reforms were embedded during the long and dedicated tenure of Education Minister Nick Gibb.

There is absolutely no reason why a future government of a truly conservative and reforming character should not adopt the same approach in all policy areas. Unlike America, Canada and Australia, with their federal constitutions, almost all the levers of power are there at the center, ready and waiting for a prime minister with the strength to seize them.

The devolved administrations of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are obviously an exception. But England, if she wishes, can use sixpence.

So why doesn't he choose it? Well, you only have to look at all the prime ministers since 2010 to find the answer: the five Tories and Starmer who failed. Establishment politics, whether tinged blue or red, are as broken as our economy, our society and our culture, and there is no point in looking to the usual circles for solutions.

So it's a good thing that in Britain change tends to come unexpectedly. Despite all the pride we place in the continuity of our national traditions, we have, at different times in our history, led the world through historic transformations. Moreover, this can happen even when the established order is doing everything it can to resist, as in the case of Brexit.

Could this happen again? Yes, because many of the smartest political thinkers are on the British centre-right. I won't mention my current colleagues, but a very non-exhaustive list includes Danny Kruger, Miriam Cates, Neil O'Brien, Nick Timothy, Michael Liebreich, Gavin Rice, Juliet Samuel, James O'Shaughnessy, Phillip Blond, Nicholas Boyes Smith, Yuan. Yi Zhu, Nikki Da Costa, Sam Dimitriu, Charlotte Pickles, Lawrence Newport, Tom Owolade, Iain Mansfield, Ben Southwood, Paul Goodman, Tim Montgomerie and of course Dominic Cummings.

It's not that I agree with everything these individuals do and say. They are also not in perfect agreement with each other. Rather, my point is that, unlike the left, the right has the capacity for deep and original thought.

For the moment, the thinking part of the conservative and reformist movement is largely disconnected from its public face. However, that could change – and if it did, a lot would change with that.