©Michele Monticello Essay https://www.michelemonticello.com/ all photos ©Michele Monticello

I’ve been trying to understand why I feel increasingly frustrated by politics. At first, I thought it was because I disagreed with particular policies or particular politicians, but the more I think about it, the more I realise my frustration runs much deeper than that. It isn’t really about one government. Nor is it about one political party. Looking back over the past decade or more, I see a pattern that seems to transcend whoever happens to be in office. The feeling is difficult to describe, but it is one I hear echoed by many people. I want to work. I want to build. I want to plan. I want to feel that if I invest my time, energy and resources into the future, there is a stable framework in which those efforts have a chance to succeed.

Instead, it often feels as though the country is constantly reorganising itself. Structures are changed. Responsibilities are moved. Departments are renamed. Power shifts between institutions. New strategies replace old ones before the previous ones have had time to mature. Yet beneath all this movement, I struggle to see the underlying economy becoming noticeably stronger. It feels like motion without momentum. Perhaps that is the real source of my frustration.

I don’t want to object to reform. Every successful organisation must adapt. But reform should serve a purpose beyond itself. It should make it easier for people to create, invest, employ others, develop new ideas and build productive lives. The question I keep returning to is not, “How should government be organised?” but, “How do we create the conditions in which people can thrive?” and these are not the same question.

If the UK was a business, we would not judge its success by how often it reorganised its management structure. We would judge it by whether it was producing better products, attracting customers, investing for the future and growing sustainably. A nation is, of course, more complex than a business, but the principle is similar. Administrative change has value only if it improves outcomes. Reorganisation is not growth. It may enable growth, but it is not a substitute for it. Perhaps this is what I have been trying to articulate all along.

The deeper truth beneath my frustration is not that government changes too much. It is that too much political energy seems to be spent changing the machinery of government, and too little on creating the conditions in which ordinary people can move forward with confidence. People do not build their futures around administrative charts. They build them around opportunity, stability and the belief that hard work has the chance to bear fruit.

A body can move without becoming healthier.

A business can reorganise without becoming more profitable.

A government can reform itself without creating more prosperity.

A photographer can take thousands of pictures without seeing more deeply.

In each case, the appearance of change can hide the absence of transformation. Perhaps that is the deeper truth beneath my frustration.