There is plenty of trade protectionism as we are within the EU. Unadulterated free trade with producers in African countries would put our money in *their* hands, by choice. Our Government being charitable to poor African countries puts our money in African Government’s hands without us having much say in the matter, and African Governments do not have a good record of spending money wisely.

You’re right on the employment protectionism. The minimum wage served to distract from the increases in living costs this Government has encouraged. The regulations from Brussels adopted as a matter of course have increased the cost of employing people. The ever extending statutory maternity leave requirements is also adding to this burden. I sometimes wonder if the Government is trying to make women unemployable to try and ‘create’ more jobs for unemployed men. They aren’t, as that would require some intelligence rather than the incompetence that runs rich through our Government, but that’s what it looks like.

These various attempts at nationalising employment contracts benefits corporations and the Government not workers and consumers. Life gets more expensive and employees see more of their wages disappearing in taxation.

Trust me. If you could, Cameron wouldn’t have been keeping his mouth shut for 3 years.

Putting aside Alan and Livy’s astute points about “relative” poverty and living within one’s means, it’s the assumptions behind the idea that we need a debate about the kind of society we want, that intrigue me. If economic performance were in any way dependent on the quality of a nation’s education system, the US would have the best schools in the world…so much for that theory!

Maybe, just maybe, it’s better to approach the entire business of education as truly great teachers and schools have done for centuries: as predominantly about the individual and not about society? That way, the kids you educate become genuinely free to choose the society they need: where “society” connotes the flesh and blood human beings one chooses to share one’s life with, and not an ideological construct rooted in chronic dissatisfaction and envy.