![]() To encourage a bad peace in Ukraine is to encourage Putin and to encourage all those around the world who believe that aggression pays. The crocodile would simply come back for more.Īnd he would be able to claim that his aggression and his violence had paid off.įor Ukraine and all the other parts of the former Soviet Union that he might attack and perhaps even for countries – one thinks of Poland – beyond former Soviet boundaries, a disaster for them. He would be able to continue to twist the knife in the wound. He will never succeed in subduing Ukraine, and the sooner he comes to that understanding the better.īut nor should he be allowed the partial success of swallowing some of the country – as he has done before – and declaring a ceasefire. He has fundamentally misunderstood the psychology of his opponents, and what Ukraine really is. Putin has made a colossal strategic error. They have shown by their heroism that they will fight to defend their homeland, and they have shown that they will win. We are simply not in a position to tell them what to do. Never mind that abandoning the Ukrainians would be morally repugnant, since they are the victims, and they have an absolute right to defend a free and independent country. I don’t believe that option is really open to us. I know that there are some who argue – not in this country perhaps but elsewhere – that the price of supporting the Ukrainians is now too high.Īnd they should be encouraged to accept whatever terms Putin may ask. The price of oil and gas looks likely to remain high for a while to come, and the same goes for grain and feed and fertiliser. World markets have responded with a significant spike in prices, partly driven by sanctions, partly by the elevated risk premium – the inevitable increase in what businesses have to charge to compensate for raised global levels of uncertainty. That progress was brutally interrupted on 24th of February, when Putin decided on his disastrous and unprovoked war in Ukraine. The world responded for instance to the shortage of lorry drivers, for instance, by hiring more, paying them better, and giving them better conditions. ![]() Six months ago, there were good reasons to hope that the laws of supply and demand would start to operate, and that these problems would begin to abate. The sudden surge in demand for gas from China, the world shortage of container ships. ![]() Much of this has been driven by problems in global supply chains that followed the pandemic. The increases in the cost of food, the spooling digits on the petrol pumps, energy bills growing seemingly ever larger. I want to talk frankly about what we need to do together, so that we come through this period together, as fast and as strongly as possible.Īnd the first step is to understand the scale and the causes of the problem.Įveryone can see and feel the impact on household budgets. It is an amazing fact that we now have more job vacancies than there are unemployed workers to fill them – and that in is itself feeding inflationary pressures. We now have unemployment at its lowest level since 1974, and youth unemployment at or near a record low. Of being told in their millions that they were surplus to requirements, that there was no job that they could do. People don’t face the misery of the 1980s or 1990s. Our position is far better than during past economic difficulties. We will get through it, we will get through it just as we got through the far greater challenge of covid, and the colossal fall in output that entailed. We face global pressures on prices caused by the lingering effects of Covid and the shock of Putin’s aggression in Ukraine. Today we are living in the aftermath of the worst pandemic for a century, and once again we are steering into the wind. ![]() The persistent scourge of high unemployment. Industrial disputes that tore communities apart. We live longer, healthier and more prosperous lives than any previous generation.Īs we look back at that enormous span of history – our monarch’s lifetime – we see that this progress was sometimes uneven, and sometimes achieved against serious headwinds.Īn existential war, when the very independence of our country was threatened. We are at the forefront of multiple waves of scientific and technical advance. To travel the world, to communicate globally, to express ourselves – artistically, politically, culturally – as never before. In the last 70 years the British people have begun to live lives that were unimaginable even to our grandparents, even our parents. What happened to the people, the condition of the people? After seventy years of an astonishing reign I think there are many reasons why Queen Elizabeth will be remembered as one of our very greatest monarchs.īut there is one particular criterion that’s applied to all reigns throughout history.
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