By Graham Vanbergen: Today’s global pandemic and climatic conditions that has seen searing heat, continental drought and regional floods along with a new war on European soil may well have been enough to reach a degree of apocalyptic fervour back in biblical times. But coming down the road in modern Britain on top of all this turmoil is an economic meltdown, and this government will fail the big challenge it presents.

There is no doubt that the pandemic has not just caused a mass death event across the world (estimated currently at 6.49million) but Putin is taking advantage of the weakness of the global economy to recover from it. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has seen rocketing energy prices that will affect millions more with malnutrition and starvation, the cold and rapidly rising poverty. Putin is waiting for the winter months to entrench his position. In the past, winter causes all sorts of problems when fighting a war – but for Putin, he can simply turn off Europe’s main source of energy as a bargaining tool.

People will tire of Putin’s tactics quickly and blame their governments for not protecting them. Some countries will do better, some worse. For Britain, the economy was already on a dangerous precipice.

Leaving aside the politically driven wedge rammed into society with the highly damaging EU referendum and subsequent fallout or indeed the more recent foreign policy dilemma presented by Putin and Ukraine – there’s a whole set of internal problems set to implode.

The cost of living crisis will, in many ways, be worse than the global financial crisis of 2008. The main problem now is that there is not one issue to solve but numerous issues and some are not in Britain’s control. But the consequence of the global financial crisis was that Britain’s national debt exploded by nearly £1 trillion and it has left us with much less financial firepower to weather this new storm.

The bottom half of households in Britain are going to suffer this winter – and half of them will suffer dreadfully, irrespective of government handouts. The national mood will decline and react to the ever-depressing news cycle. It will cause a recession by the year-end, then stagflation slightly further out. Unemployment will rise as company bankruptcies and closures go through the roof. Inflation will keep going – and it’s those at the bottom who get to take the brunt – again.

If Liz Truss gets into power and does what she is promising – cutting taxes to drive economic activity – she will only add to the problem, probably U-turn when its too late which will only make matters worse. The public will get angry.

Public finances are already in a dire state. Even without all of these new problems, public finances as a result of poor economic management and the pandemic are a mess. Public services are further stressed as they now face a winter of much higher than expected inflation, energy costs and of course, wage settlements.

Debt interest is soaring and as Truss cuts more taxes and revenues fall, public debt increases but so do interest rates to stem the inflationary pressures. This makes public finance even more expensive that causes more debt or cost-cutting of the same services that help protect the public. It’s a vicious cycle.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies published a report only a few days ago that said: “Only last month the OBR warned that the public finances are already on an unsustainable long-term path: large, unfunded, permanent tax cuts would only act to make this problem worse.”

Team Truss has publicly stated they will not take advice from the Office of Budget Responsibility.

Public health is another huge challenge. In its near 75-year history, the NHS has never faced such a colossal test as it does today. With 6.7 million already on waiting lists, there are an additional 1.5 million waiting for mental health treatment, made much worse by the pandemic. Another winter crisis is expected, especially as Covid has not yet been defeated. The overall NHS waiting list is expected to increase by another 3 million by the spring of 2024.

Social care is an unexploded bomb about to ignite. The fuse was lit years ago. Politicians knew what it was but kicked the can down the road. Now, the can is too heavy to kick and won’t move. Social care as an industry has a shortfall of 165,000 employees. The NHS, which takes a significant hit because of it – is already another 100,000 health professionals short and GPs, the traditional frontline of public health and social care has effectively fallen apart. This winter, many of our elderly will die, but many more will suffer.

Brexit and Ukraine are also big problems. Both are serious foreign policy issues, and both have serious economic consequences. The former is a self-inflicted wound, which will be made worse simply by having a Tory PM. Whoever takes the seat in No 10 – they will have to acquiesce to the will of the all-powerful right-wing faction within the ERG who have inflicted a hard Brexit on the nation. This same group will also be pushing the Northern Ireland Bill that will take relations with the EU to breaking point. A trade war could easily erupt with our friends and it isn’t beyond the realms of reality to think that a hot war with our enemies in Europe could happen at the same time. Can you imagine falling out with our European allies just as Russia goes all in!

These challenges are big enough on their own to test any competent government – but combined and with a government like this one, we’re in big trouble. It is a party that, as The Economist rightly says was ‘ruthless, pragmatic and efficient but now cowardly, incoherent and inept’. It doesn’t matter if Truss or Sunak takes the reigns – they are not driving the agenda; the party hardliners are – and they have been proven wrong on just about everything from water, transport, energy, health, housing, education to the economy on so many occasions.

By the time we reach the spring of next year, public anger may well be spilling over onto the streets as the government loses control. That makes the assumption that a general election hasn’t been called before it all goes south.

There’s really only one way to save the economy, to save householders from going under, from rapidly rising poverty and destitution. The Bank of England should do as they did when the banks blew up the economy in 2008. Whilst the national debt would appear to be increasing – inflation will kill its on-book value. Right now, Britain’s national debt stands at about 100 per cent of GDP. In 1950 it was 240 per cent. An extra £250bn pumped into the system to save the nation from an economic meltdown will only raise national debt by 10 per cent. We can afford that. Crucially – we can’t afford not to.