The PM thinks his interventionist approach to the economy is a winning formula. Without a coherent opposition, he could be right

There’s nothing original about saying Britain needs a new economic model. Nor that poverty wages should be a thing of the past. Or even that business needs to stop relying on cheap imported labour and invest more in skills training instead.

The idea that Britain needs root-and-branch reform to make it a high-productivity economy has been around for decades. It is voiced every time there’s a scandal involving gang masters or the squalid conditions in which migrant workers have been forced to live.

Larry Elliott is a Guardian columnist

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