Dear Prime Minister

Raise your eyes from the Westminster village and realise there is a country to govern. More importantly a country which faces serious challenges – whether it is the ageing population, the ridiculous amount of money wasted on treating the all-too-preventable obesity crisis or the impact AI and robotics are going to have on our jobs. It is time to stop kicking every potential crisis into the long grass.

And then there’s Brexit – in particular, defining the shape you want it to take. Call me old fashioned but – like most business owners – I prefer to go into negotiations knowing what I want to achieve. That doesn’t seem to be the case.

As a business owner and a father, I want to see continued investment in our world class universities. We cannot turn the clock back: we live in a global society and we’re not just competing locally for the best talent, we’re competing internationally.

What’s next? A comprehensive review of the tax system. Seriously, what is National Insurance? Would anyone invent it now? People have more than one job, they’re employed, they’re self-employed, they’re contracting, they’re working overseas. Goods are designed in one country, refined in another, manufactured in a third, shipped across continents and sold across the world. The poor old tax system is puffing and panting as it runs after the money. Give business an incentive to invest and to make profits and it will generate the revenues the country needs.

I know this is looking dangerously to the future, but could we please have a full and speedy roll out of 5G? Right now the UK is ranked 54th in the world for 4G LTE connections and bluntly, it is not good enough. We are behind Morocco and Greece.

Lastly, could we please make long term investments in a coherent, joined-up, 21st Century transport system? £90bn on HS2? I can think of other priorities.

That’s it. Except that if you’re struggling to cobble a government together give me a ring. I know plenty of owners of SME’s who are first-rate negotiators. 10 members of the DUP to sort out? They’d do it before breakfast…