On the day the new prime minister steps into No 10, the heap on his doormat will be ceiling-high with missives imploring, advising, warning and counselling. No doubt there will be many pearls of wisdom and some bad ideas too. Each one will involve getting or spending money, decisions for his first totemic 100 days.
It so happens that his first day, 20 July, is the first week of school summer holidays in England and Wales. As he walks into Downing Street, millions of children will leave the school gates “walking into nothing”, as one child told the Children’s Society. Lonely, isolated, caring for siblings, many hungry, some at risk – for those children, six weeks will loom ahead with Covid-like emptiness, home alone as parents work, no splashing in the sunlit waves of the holiday ads.
