Richard Murphy: Elected politicians offer no vision to a public shorn of hope

This summer is not normal. The independence debate is more alive than usual (thankfully). And (regrettably) we have yet another Tory leadership contest that is intent on deciding who might make the biggest possible mess they can of governing the UK as a whole until the next such leadership election is held sometime early in 2025.

I hope you will forgive me if I do not discuss either issue. Important as independence is there is not much new for me to say this week, whilst the Tories' internal crises are just part of an ongoing fiasco that will not change anything of substance. So, I am going to stand back instead as if this was a normal summer.

Except it is not, of course. This summer is, even with these two events being ignored, anything but normal. Climate change is too apparent for that to be the case now. So too are the other worldwide existential crisis that now face us, from pandemics (and I am still recovering from my second bout of Covid), to war, food shortages and energy crises.

As if these global threats were not enough, at home we face a cost-of-living crisis; the risk of a debt crisis for millions of households as a result, with threats to the ability of many to stay in their homes as a consequence; plus public services that are facing varying existential threats in the face of underfunding that the Scottish Government is ultimately unable to prevent given the powers it has available to it. And then there is inflation, which both the UK Government and Bank of England seem intent on making as severe in its impact as it could possibly be. Nothing about this summer is normal.

Governor of the Bank of the Bank of England, Andrew Bailey

Looking back over my own life, the moment that might have felt most like this summer was the summer of 1976. I was 18 and admit that I only have happy memories of that summer. But I know we did face crises then, including inflation, industrial disruption, the threat of an energy meltdown, and the threat of war. It was not all bliss, despite the great weather. However, the essential reason for drawing comparison is that looking at the current moment through the eyes of the young people I know that they have a sense of despair that no young person seemed to have back in 1976, whatever might have been going on in the world at that time.

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There is good reason for the difference. In 76 everyone assumed that they would get a job when they left school or university, because we all did. Everyone also assumed we would have somewhere to live. Houses were affordable, and whist council housing suffered a waiting list, it was not that long.

Much more important, we thought we had a future. The Cold War wasn't really thought by anyone to be much of a threat. And whilst inflation was high, trade unions made sure that working people by-and-large survived the stresses that it brought, even if doing so brought down a Labour government that had given up representing working people's best interests and ushered in Thatcher. And thankfully, back in 76 none of us knew how bad the new Tories might be.

But now we do know. We now know that the Tories don't care, whether that be about us, democracy, the planet, Scotland, jobs, public services, those who work in them or pretty much anywhere else (unless it's in the City of London). They’re also utterly indifferent to the sense of security that comes from knowing that we might have somewhere where we can afford to live in a community that cares for us, and about which we care. They just don't give a damn. All that matters to them, as Johnson's government proved, is keeping their mates happy by passing them dodgy contracts, unjustified honours and inappropriate jobs for which they are wholly unqualified.

Compared to 76 the world feels like a place shorn of hope for most people. Except for those with the security of a home without a mortgage on it, a significant pension fund and an inheritance - which are things enjoyed by only a small minority in society - 2022 looks like a time deprived of any reasonable grounds for optimism. If anyone can suggest otherwise after listening to recent speeches by the Tory party leadership candidates - or Keir Starmer, come to that - then they are deluding themselves or are possessed of at least one of three causes of good fortune I just noted. I hate to say it, but the summer of 22 looks bleak when I stand back to survey the world.

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My question in that case is a simple one, and is for how long will people put up with this, and the dire politics that is making us suffer this fate? And that does not mean I am just back to questions around independence again. Instead, I am asking where is the vision to build better? It is totally absent in Westminster. It is also largely absent, I regret to say, in a lot of what seems to happen in Holyrood, although there are glimmers of hope in some Scottish think tanks. But is that enough to promise Scotland a better future by persuading people that it is possible to break free from the dire UK political landscape? I just don't know as yet. And I wish I did.