Is this the end of the 'crunch' beginning?

This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is perhaps the end of the beginning.

So ran Winston Churchill's famous quote in November 1942 after three years of war and the first notable victory by British forces against Germany in the desert of North Africa.

We are coming up to two years into our own "crunch" war. There have been recent signs that maybe the financial markets have stabilised — although more bank wobbles seem likely — and so does this mean we are at the end of our beginning and things might start to get better?

The "financial war" began in July 2007 but unfortunately the recession that has followed only began probably six to nine months ago and is likely to be longer lasting.

In the process of saving the financial system our Government has spent hundreds of billions of our money — and will

have to get that back somehow.

The likelihood has to be that the potential for recovery will be restrained by the need to tax the consumer and to reduce Government spending for many years to come.

The big drivers of the UK economy for more than a decade have been consumer and Government spending and with both of these under pressure it is difficult to see where the major boost will come, and with unemployment likely to rise by another one to one-and-a half million before the economy turns, Government finances will be stuck in deep red ink for some time yet. There is the real chance that sterling could fall very much further as overseas investors take fright.

I have been pondering these items for a number of months now in trying to look through the gloom.

My mind turns back to the early 1970s and the period up to the 1979 election. Those were really grim days, but those dire circumstances were turned round by 1985 as Mrs Thatcher changed attitudes and brought about a revolution in a remarkably short period.

We need a visionary leader now to carry us with government. One thing for sure is that it is not the current lot in charge. If we can get that message across to an incoming Conservative administration then maybe we might be able to accompany the new beginnings of an improving economy with a less hostile political environment.

Peter Linacre, the New Pub Company​