58 Britain The Economist June 11th 2022
veyed. In innovation clusters like Oxford
and Cambridge, building is constrained by
strict rules preserving historic architecture
and the surrounding countryside. Housing
is eyewateringly expensive, making it
harder to attract newcomers who could
productively work there alongside others.
The next category of improvements in
volves people. Although it has been suc
cessful in encouraging more youngsters to
go to university, Britain has struggled for
decades to equip people with specific
skills, from engineering to welding, that
employers demand. The share of the popu
lation with higher secondary qualifica
tions—ie, people who do not take a degree
but who do stay on in education after the
age of 16—is around 32%, well below the
oecdaverage of 42%. The level of collabo
ration between vocational schools, fur
thereducation colleges, businesses and
local government is minimal. Plans for
lifelong learning are just that—plans.
The quality of people at the top of firms
seems to be a problem, too. Compared with
Germany and America, Britain’s managers
fall short. One study published in 2021
found that only around 11% of firms were as
wellmanaged as the top 25% of American
firms. The government is trying to tackle
this through its “Help to Grow” pro
gramme, which offers subsidised manage
ment training to leaders of small business
es. Uptake has reportedly fallen far short of
what was expected.
Better training leads naturally on to a
third category, the spread of knowledge.
Productivity improves when highskilled
people work with other highskilled peo
ple, when transport links are integrated,
when ideas diffuse. Geography is one di
mension of this problem: regional in
equality is very high in Britain. According
to an analysis of such internal disparities
by Philip McCann of the University of Shef
field, Britain is more unequal than France
on 15 out of 21 measures, and more unequal
than Germany on 17. Improvements to ag
gregate productivity rest partly on pushing
forward the frontier of innovation and
partly on helping less productive firms to
catch up with the leaders. That is a lot hard
er if, as Bart van Ark of the Productivity In
stitute puts it, many lagging firms are “in
regions that are essentially stuck”.
Britain’s diffusion problem is not just
geographical. Although Britain has world
beating research universities, it struggles
to spread the knowledge they generate to
companies. Compared with America, for
example, the country relies relatively
heavily on universities and less so on na
tional laboratories, which tend to be more
focused on applied research. On average,
Britons take out patents at a rate half that of
people in America, France and Germany.
Britain has no shortage of problems to
fix, then. If anything, they are mounting.The effects of weaker international compe
tition because of Brexit will sap dyna
mism. The obrthinks that eventually Brit
ain’s productivity will be 4% lower than if
it had stayed in the eu. Britons are ageing,
another drag; climatechange commit
ments imply cost as well as opportunity.
Some hoped that the pandemic would
kick things into a higher gear. Although
productivity soared when it first struck,
that was because relatively unproductive
sectors shut down. The latest data suggest
that productivity has settled back to its
precovid trend. In March the obrsaid that
thepandemicwouldpermanentlydamage
tfp, partlybecausefirmsareholdinglarger
inventoriesincaseoffuturedisruptions.And then there is the question of
whether policymakers are capable of mak
ing the changes that are required. “Powers
of Ten” finishes by steadily zooming back
in again, progressively narrowing the field
of view until it reaches the subatomic lev
el. A narrower view also yields a depress
ing conclusion. The productivity problem
has thwarted far more competent govern
ments than this one. Mr Johnson has made
no headway on growth since winning a
stonking majority in 2019, and the erosion
of his authority after the vote of confidence
makes the chances of bold, longterm ac
tionevenlower.Butatleast there is no
doubtwherethisgovernment and its suc
cessorsoughttofocus.nTheprimeministerThe divine right of Boris
I
t is hard to escape the English Civil War
in the Houses of Parliament. Conserva
tive mps arriving to vote on Boris Johnson’s
future on June 6th would have passed a
statue of Oliver Cromwell, who led the par
liamentarians to victory against Charles I.
They may then have walked through West
minster Hall, where the same king, who
had insisted upon his divine right to rule,
was sentenced to death. Near the chamber
they would have passed a mural to Speaker
Lenthall, who stood up for the Commons
against the crown. Perhaps those things
played on their minds; many would later
say their party was in a state of civil war.The Tories have been divided on Mr
Johnson since he became prime minister
in July 2019, but only now is it clear just
how deeply. The revolt against Mr Johnson
was triggered by illegal parties in Downing
Street during the covid19 lockdowns,
which wrecked his standing in the opinion
polls and among his party’s activists (see
chart 1). In a confidence ballot triggered by
his own mps he received 211 votes in his fa
vour; 148 voted against him. His support
was shallower than previously supposed,
and his opponents, many of whom had
been reluctant to choose a side until forced
by their colleagues, far more numerous. At
59%, his share of support is lower than that
received by Theresa May and Sir John Ma
jor, two of his predecessors, in similar bal
lots. It leaves his authority broken and his
rivals wrestling to succeed him.
The Conservative Party is riven by fac
tions: northern and southern, Remainer
and Brexiteer. Yet the split over Mr Johnson
has defied easy analysis, running through
all its tribes and regions. It separates Steve
Baker, a leader of the Brexit right and a
Johnson critic, from Jacob ReesMogg, a
Brexiteer loyalist. New northern mps, such
as Dehenna Davison and Peter Gibson,
found themselves on opposite sides; so did
some southern Remainers. Douglas Ross,
who represents the party in Scotland,
wanted Mr Johnson gone; Alister Jack, who
represents Scotland in the cabinet, backed
the prime minister. This split reflects an
other fault line, a philosophical gulf
among Tory mps over the scope of Mr John
son’s power and the source of its legitima
cy. It is a struggle, says one, “between parThe Tory civil war is a split between Roundheads and CavaliersUneasy lies the head