"Liz Truss was right: without growth, Britain is doomed

Dynamic economies are built on low taxation and limited business regulation"

Telegraph: 18th April 2024: Respected economist, Patrick Minford explains why Truss focus on growth was correct 

"On Tuesday Liz Truss launched her new book... It is a call to arms to those of us in favour of free markets and a free society to engage with the leftward drift of our governing institutions on the key choices of the day.

Central to the debate is growth.... for Britain to create jobs and raise living standards, the economy must grow at a reasonable pace...

British growth has been weak for a long time... higher growth was, in my view, the result of root-and-branch reforms to the economy brought in under Margaret Thatcher... this came to a halt, and in key ways was reversed, when Labour came to power in 1997. 

... turn to Liz Truss’s experience when she tried to reinvigorate UK growth... She met a wall of resistance, across the board, from left-wing think tanks..., through economic commentators... to – I suspect – the vast bulk of the civil service for whom it threatened...

...if only Liz Truss’s government and agenda had survived, we would be in a far better place. The burning question, then, is what killed it. 

The answer is not that hard. Our own institutions did. It quickly became clear to me that the Truss programme was opposed by the Treasury... by the Bank of England... and by the OBR... 

...our democracy and our economy have suffered grievously from this apparent insubordination by officials who are supposed to serve it. We are counting the cost today..."

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