Let’s stop talking about ‘great’ Britain – and rebrand ourselves as a different sort of country | Martin Kettle

Any plans for national renewal' after the Tories must focus on freeing the UK from its vice of wallowing in guilt or glory

Addressing the Labour conference in October, Keir Starmer promised to lead a decade of national renewal. After Covid, Brexit and the cost of living squeeze, few will dispute the need, although people may reasonably debate what renewal implies or where the priorities should lie. This week, though, has offered a warning that renewal, desirable though it may be in principle, will also have many enemies.

The essential first step is acknowledging you have a problem," writes the former Foreign Office chief Simon McDonald in his recent book on the future of British foreign policy. My Observer colleague Will Hutton writes: It is time to stop talking and thinking of Britain as a rich and broadly fair country," in his own call for a wider national remaking. We cannot help the world respond to the list of global problems if we ourselves are on it," echoes the ex-cabinet secretary Mark Sedwill in a pamphlet about the Foreign Office published this week.

Martin Kettle is a Guardian columnist