Where are we, four years on? None of the promises that were repeated so loudly during 2020 and 2021 have come to fruition: neither the New Normal – a new age of safety and perfect management of the hazards that beset humans – nor the longed-for “back to normal”.
The Covid Era has been followed, instead, by a plethora of crises. All of us are dealing with higher prices and many of us have been pushed into a lower standard of living. The news suggests that intractable conflicts in far-away places may yet come to our doors. The tax take is of World War II proportions, but public services are being cut ever further. Potholes and roadworks are everywhere; it sometimes seems as if the fabric of modern Britain is disintegrating.
