Growth pains

THE recall of Parliament has served one important purpose – to allow the country to address the deepening financial crisis that has been overshadowed by the civil unrest on Britain’s streets.

With the Eurozone countries wrestling with the issue of protecting their own economies while bailing out failing member states, and America still reeling from the downgrading of its credit rating, there are genuine fears of a global depression.

Positive signs are hard to find but George Osborne, still struggling to exude the gravitas required of a Chancellor in times of strife, did his best to highlight some tentative “green shoots”.

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Although admitting the recovery will take longer than hoped, he boasted that the coalition had made the country a “safe haven” for investors with an economic policy admired the world over.

However, the bluster failed to be adequately supported by sufficient detail. It is no good bragging about growth forecasts – as the Government did at the last Budget – and then blaming other factors when these targets are missed. And to describe Britain’s economic policy as being admired internationally may surprise those in China and Brazil whose economies continue to grow, or those in Japan where recovery from the tsunami and nuclear disaster has been swift.

One area of investment in Yorkshire that could add much needed impetus to the recovery is renewable energy, but the revelations in a KPMG Green Power survey make sorry reading. It concluded that 75 per cent of investors would have put more money into the UK if legislation been clearer.

Mr Osborne is right when he warns the country’s economy is not immune to the “international storm” – but the Government, to the frustration of many, still fails to manage these key factors within its control.