A united Tory Party can still sell its message to the electorate

As the Tory Party gathers for its annual conference on Sunday, there will rightly be a good deal of anguish at the turmoil of the past week. But while it is true that poor communication and a lack of detail to go alongside its broad announcements have winged this new administration just when it was seeking to take flight, panicked cries that it has been mortally wounded are greatly overdone.

That is because with each passing day, more and more evidence appears to support the fundamental analysis of Liz Truss and her Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng: Britain’s productivity is dire, leading to a widening gap between what we spend and what we earn. What greater proof is needed of our economic malaise than yesterday’s figures showing that, of all G7 economies, Britain’s was the only one not to have recovered to pre-pandemic levels? The pound too, has not just collapsed this week; it has slumped all year against the dollar. Borrowing costs have also risen for many months.

So long left unaddressed, the nation’s productivity crisis and its addiction to cheap debt are now, like two pincers, clanging shut. And as so often it is those pointing out the danger - Truss and Kwarteng - who are paying the price. Naturally the safer course would have been to do nothing at all. But they have chosen to be brave.

That is why the basic errors which have undermined their much-needed economic prescription are so frustrating. Their margin for manoeuvre is now smaller. Their support on their own back-benches undoubtedly weaker. Their credibility in the markets diminished. But their path is the right one. Perhaps the pair failed to realise how radical their long-pondered ideas would appear once unveiled to a country so used to an orthodoxy which has delivered only stultification.

That stultification is the fruit of 12 years of Conservative governments which have, to their discredit, embraced big statisms. Even during the Cameron-Osborne government notorious for “austerity”, state spending fell only to 39pc of GDP; while a relentless focus on short-term fiscal balance came at the expense of medium-term productivity. Incentives for businesses to invest in the future fell away.

From the off, Theresa May signalled still greater state intervention in the economy, instituting “a modern industrial policy” with government, as she said, “stepping up to a new, active role”. Then came Boris Johnson’s big state levelling up - notably of our taxes. All three administrations also demonstrated slavish devotion to a green agenda that has left the country exposed to the current energy shock.

Even so, the last week has been a bruising reminder that the right ideas alone cannot win arguments, or elections. Nos 10 and 11 must henceforth communicate far more clearly with the markets and voters. For the former they must produce the detail and the numbers to convince, so that pensions and mortgage rates, on which so many of us depend, are not repeatedly tossed about on turbulent exchanges. For the latter, they must not sabotage their own announcements. It is astonishing, for example, that amid the frothing market mayhem, news of the energy cap - among the biggest government handouts in history - has sunk without trace.

Yet they are hardly alone in botching the essential message. The Bank of England’s projections for inflation, GDP and interest rates this year have all significantly missed the mark. There were more substantive errors too. In the last decade the Bank was the chief pusher of addictive cheap debt, raising asset prices and crushing real wages. Given how slow it has been to wean Britain off easy money in the face of inflation, it is little wonder the withdrawal symptoms have been painful.

Happily, the Conservatives now have a golden opportunity to put all this right - a four day window until Liz Truss makes her conference speech on Wednesday, during which they can reframe their messaging without jettisoning their message. Both voters and traders will be watching.

As they do, it is essential that Tory MPs show their own backing for their new leader. How can anyone beyond Westminster be expected to show faith in a new political direction if those on the government benches do not? Talk of rebellion is self-indulgent. Talk of unity and unflinching dedication to a greater purpose which is, and must remain, growth. That is the hard currency of economic and political success and this government will be judged upon it. If and when it returns, it will be proof that while it is possible to correct the bad delivery of a good idea; even the ablest politician cannot deliver when they depend on bad ideas - or have no idea at all.