In September 1997, Tony Blair addressed the Labour Party Conference for the first time as prime minister. His approval ratings hovered at around 75 per cent. His majority stood at 179. The British economy was bigger than China and India’s combined. There was a sense of confidence about the country. This was, Blair declared, a “New Britain” which would be a “beacon” for the rest of the world. How darkly comic that promise now feels. Almost 30 years later, no one thinks Britain is a beacon for anyone. While it is easy to look back on Blair’s decade in power as some halcyon time, there were warning signs for those willing to look. Real wages began to stagnate from around 2003. The BNP grew rapidly from 2004. In 2005, the then Bank of England governor Mervyn King cautioned that the “Nice” decade of non-inflationary continuous expansion was soon coming to an end. By 2008, after the global financial crisis, Britain had entered the 20-year spiral of disorder, confusion and decline from which it has not yet escaped.…