It's a new year but problems of 2025 aren't going away

HERE is a growing sense that 2026 might be the year Britain finally locks in its managed decline.

- Esther Krakue

This year must be one of renewal for the UK or we risk serious decline

By April, Rachel Reeves's tax rises will begin to take effect. And Labour's inability or, more accurately, its refusal - to shave even modest amounts off the growing welfare bill has given the professionally unemployed a fresh wind in their sails.Meanwhile, everyone else is asked to accept that there is simply no alternative. Public spending continues to rise while productivity stalls, and the growing gap between effort and reward makes hardworking people wonder why they even bother turning up to work.

Add to that an unsettled geopolitical backdrop and a lingering sense of economic inertia, and it is difficult to find anyone approaching this new year with much confidence.

No one is going into 2026 believing the country is in good shape. If anything, there's reason to be more pessimistic than ever. Few people seriously expect Keir Starmer to be Prime Minister in a year's time.

His government has spent much of its first stretch oscillating between uncertainty and incompetence somehow managing to look both risk averse and woefully unprepared at the same time.