Britain has huge strengths, but it is now impossible to miss that we’re in a phase of relative decline. A year or two of poor productivity growth and flatlining wages is survivable, but 15 long years of stagnation is not: workers today take home no more than they did heading into the financial crisis. The cost of wages not growing as they used to? £10,700 a year for the average worker.

Slow growth combines with longer-lasting high inequality: the UK is Europe’s most unequal large economy. That combination has proved toxic for people in Britain on middle and low incomes. We think we’re similar to the likes of France or Germany, but our poorer families are now a staggering 27% worse off than their French and German counterparts.

UK politicians are still not serious about turning this around. Some seem to think “world-beating” rhetoric automatically translates into world-beating reality, while others hope there is a magic bullet to Britain’s troubles – be it “taking full advantage” of Brexit, lower taxes or a greener economy.

Instead Britain requires a new economic strategy built not on nostalgia or wishful thinking, but on our actual strengths. Britain has some great manufacturing industries,........

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