One of the most pernicious aspects of the loss of competitiveness is that it happens very unobtrusively – it creeps up on us. It is due to a multiplicity of factors and there is no single cause or moment in time when we suddenly become uncompetitive. I suggest that over the past few years we have been closing our eyes to reality and allowing it to happen. Some of the consequences have been hidden or masked and we have been slow to realise what was happening. For instance, last year the exceptional performance of the chemical sector masked quite serious and sharp falls in our overall industrial performance. Our unemployment figures have been creeping up over the same period, but not by anything like they would have done had they not been masked by the one-off and quite unsustainable increases in public sector employment in the run up to the last general election.