He's The PM Not Our National Cheerleader

Regrettably, the UK is having a torrid time. With a battering from the financial crash, austerity, Brexit and then the pandemic, things are on a downward trend. The high street is on its knees, the roads are full of holes, the trains don't work and are getting yet more expensive, kids go to school hungry and the our water resources are filthy. And the NHS is floundering. The Government is scrambling with its lenders to prevent a meltdown, while interest on the increasing national debt costs the same as the state pension, and is twice what we spend on defence and on public order and safety. That just can't be right.

The only real growth industries are airport parking charges and illegal migration. Perhaps the people smugglers will find a new business opportunity in offering return tickets once the illegals realise it's not all it's cracked up to be.

And yet our master cheerleader, the Prime Minister, puts on his happy face (and his hard hat) and says we've got the fastest dot-dot-dot, or the most dit-dit-dit, and that's something to celebrate. But the public don't believe it and don't care if it's true or not. It doesn't feel right when the food banks are getting bigger and the infrastructure is crumbling.

So, as a diversionary tactic, Sir Kier becomes the International Statesman and puffs about on the World stage to get better brownie-points at home. But the British public are not fools.

The problem with a happy face in these dreadful times is that the Prime Minister appears to be in complete denial. And that's worrying. It's one thing to have problems, but it's quite another to have a leadership that pretends everything is going well and that the problems either don't exist or will magically disappear. The answer this term seems to be a crammed legislative agenda. Deckchairs and sinking ships spring to mind.

Yet we all know first step to take to get out of a problem is to admit you've got one. And that the Government isn't doing with anything like the degree of clarity that's needed. It's defending the indefensible, even though most of the problems have been decades in the making, and for which they can't be held wholly responsible.

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When I've had severe challenges in my businesses, my first step was to be honest about those challenges. To be clear about the issues and to draw the team towards potential solutions. Gather people around you and share the pain - don't hide it. Not to promise the Earth and insist things will get better, with fingers crossed behind my back.

The UK is a great nation, with a rich heritage, but that doesn't guarantee its future. It's in trouble and it's time to stop messing about trying to find a statistic, any statistic, that will show something positive. If it's all negative for a while, so be it. Lay that out to the public and be honest about the challenges we're facing.

The next big opportunity will be the Budget. God help us all if the Chancellor puts on her happy face and tells us that with a few nips and tucks the problems are solved and she commends it to the House.

So, Sir Kier, if you want to get out of this mess, the starting point is to draw the public towards you. And you will only begin to do that if you're honest and robust about our problems. You don't have to pretend that everything's OK - you lack credibility when you do that. Jettison the perpetual happy face and spell out what's happening and why. Then tell us what you can do to put some of them right and which ones, for the moment, are out of reach and will take more time.

Then you will start to build trust again.

Next Butt