Taking successful people from the business world and putting them in government sounds like a good idea, but history proves otherwise, Nigel, writes Eliot Wilson

It is one of the hoariest and most hackneyed “solutions” to the institutional problems which beset British government: bring in dynamic, no-nonsense leaders from the business world. They will inject Whitehall with a sense of urgency and purpose and an efficiency which will be transformative, sweeping aside the pettifogging, nest-feathering bureaucracy of the civil service.

So hoary and hackneyed is the idea that it was no surprise to find it being articulated by Nigel Farage in June. The Reform UK leader, allowing himself to imagine a future in 10 Downing Street, would appoint “top business leaders” to his cabinet. One anonymous attendee at a breakfast meeting with the insurgent party contrasted it favourably with the Labour government:

“There is no one on that front bench with any real calibre of business experience… whereas [in Reform], you have Tice, who made millions in property, Farage, who knows the City, and Zia Yusuf… also........

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