Ryan Wain/Writing on the future of Britain
ResurgentBritain.
Britain’s best days can be ahead of it — but only if we choose renewal over decline. I write about the ideas, reforms and politics that could make this the decade Britain gets its confidence back.
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01 Latest from the Substack
Resurgent Britain
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02 Published elsewhere
The Agenda
23 pieces · 6 outlets
New New Labour, New Britain: Technology for the Many
Labour’s agenda should be ‘technology for the many’: harnessing AI to transform public services and revive growth, built on cheap energy, sound public finances, strong defence, secure borders and alliances with America and Europe.
Makerfield is Labour’s last lifeline
Makerfield gave Labour one last chance, and Andy Burnham’s campaign showed hope still galvanises voters. But hope dies on arrival in Westminster without a plan to turn it into results and finally confront decline.
How to stop Reform
Reform offers voters the chance to blow up the system. The answer isn’t incrementalism but a controlled explosion — radicalism from the centre that deliberately dismantles a failing status quo. (My contribution to a symposium.)
Policing That Makes Britain Safer – Not Just Better at Counting Crime
Crime is back at the centre of British politics, and recorded figures don’t tell the full story. Policing needs a radical, tech-enabled overhaul to restore public trust and actually make Britain safer.
Public-Service Reform in the Age of AI
AI and data make a fundamentally different state possible: always-on, personalised, proactive services that govern by ‘signal and steer’ rather than command and control — built on universal digital ID and outcome-based funding.
With Oliver Large
Reimagining the State: A Playbook for 2026
Leaders are tackling 21st-century problems with 20th-century machinery. My playbook: compete at the AI application layer, build AI-era institutions and digital ID, reform public services and become an electrostate.
The digital ID debate has gone mad
Conspiracy theories have hijacked the digital ID debate. It won’t mean mass surveillance — it will make us safer, replacing the hacker’s dream of emailed document copies with one secure, verified way to prove who you are.
Disruptive Delivery: Reversing Decline, Transforming Britain
The government’s project must be to stop decline and transform Britain. The swing voters Labour needs want bold change on growth, public services and immigration — not incrementalism.
Time for Digital ID: A New Consensus for a State That Works
Digital ID has majority public support — 62 per cent for, 19 against. It’s the foundation of disruptive delivery and the clearest signal that government can rebuild a state that works.
With Jo Puddick
Reform will own the week – Labour must own the future
Momentum is with Reform, which thrives on the public mood rather than detailed policy. Labour must take the fight to Farage by starting a fight for Britain’s future.
Digital ID is a chance to prove government can still work
Voters are volatile and want proof politics can deliver. Done properly, digital ID is disruptive delivery: public services at private-sector standards, and a real tool against illegal working.
Elections Explained: Rise of the AfD Signals a New Era for Germany
The AfD’s rise reflects discontent and fragmentation: disillusioned ‘Outsiders’ are moving to insurgents, pulling Germany into the same structural disruption reshaping democratic politics everywhere.
Disruptive Delivery: Meeting the Unmet Demand in Politics
Polling 12,000 voters in six democracies, we found ‘Insiders’ and ‘Outsiders’ united by a sense of decline. The message for progressives: disrupt or be disrupted — out-deliver the populists through technology-led reform.
With Peter Kellner, Jo Puddick, Alan Wager, Joni Smith, Robert Johnson, Kayla Crowley-Carbery, Alex Otway
If progressives don’t harness AI, the populist right will
AI will change everything, whether we like it or not. The progressive mission is to harness it for people — an enabling state where citizens control their own data. If we don’t, the populist right will.
Budget cuts risk fuelling populism. New fiscal rules could free up £52bn
Labour inherited plans that would starve Britain of investment and feed populism. Reforming the fiscal rules could free up £52bn for growth and public services.
A Coalition for the Future of Britain
Labour’s 2024 coalition is broad but fragile, spanning very different places and voters. What can hold it together is a shared concern about Britain’s trajectory — and a credible plan to change it.
Net zero needs a new politics
Most Europeans back net zero but few trust governments to deliver it. Leaders must show credibly how emissions fall and who pays — or populists will exploit anxiety about the transition.
With Tone Langengen
Labour should back Covid passports: they will save lives and win votes
Labour shouldn’t be tempted to defeat the government on Covid passports. They’re a sensible risk-management tool — and being reasonable and evidence-led is what wins votes.
Less Risk, More Freedom
Vaccinated people should face fewer restrictions, including quarantine-free travel, backed by a robust Covid pass — because vaccination sharply cuts onward transmission.
With Kirsty Innes, Brianna Miller, Daniel Sleat, PeiChin Tay
A Blueprint for Accelerated Vaccine Rollout
‘First dose to many’: by prioritising first doses for 29.6 million people, Britain could remove the vast majority of deaths and hospitalisations — with more supply, sites, staff and systematisation.
With Brianna Miller, Daniel Sleat
The Path to Mass Testing
A model for mass testing that can start immediately and scale with capacity — using every available lab and regular antibody tests — so Britain can exit lockdown safely.
With Daniel Sleat
Can We Ever Trust the Polls Again?
Polls aren’t neutral. Behind every published poll or model, a human being decides how to weight the raw data — and we should read them with that in mind.
Without a successful NHS App, the NHS itself could fail
The 8am GP scramble shows a broken system. The fix starts with a completely reimagined NHS App as the new front door — but without political grip from the top, it will only digitise what already exists.
Nothing matches that — try another word.
Summaries are AI-assisted.
03 Open questions
What I’m trying to answer
- 01
Why has Britain forgotten how to build — and what would it take to remember?
Housing, energy, infrastructure: the politics of saying yes.
- 02
How does the state get as good at using AI as the best companies?
A government that is faster, cheaper and more personal.
- 03
What does New Labour’s settlement — economic credibility with social justice — look like for the 2030s?
Renewal, not nostalgia.
- 04
How does the centre beat the populists without copying them?
Taking voters’ frustrations seriously, and answering them with delivery.
- 05
Can Britain grow again — and who gets to share in it?
Productivity, places and the people left behind.
- 06
What would it mean for Britain to believe in itself again?
National purpose, pride and a story about the future.
04 About
Ryan Wain
I’m a modernising Labour thinker working on how Britain renews itself — economically, institutionally and in the story it tells about its future.
I’m Senior Director of Policy and Politics at the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, where I advise leaders around the world and develop policy for Britain. I conceived and led the Institute’s Future of Britain programme, and helped lead its pandemic work on vaccines and testing.
Before that I was a senior political adviser to the Labour Party. I’ve stood for Parliament before, and I believe the New Labour tradition — ambitious, reforming, relentlessly focused on the future — is what Britain needs in the 2020s and 2030s. Resurgent Britain is where I’m building that agenda in public.
- Tony Blair Institute for Global Change
- Senior Director of Policy and Politics
- Prison Radio Association
- Chair
- Alder Hey Children’s Charity
- Trustee
05 Ask me anything
Ask Ryan
Got a question about Britain, Labour, or an idea you think I’ve got wrong? It comes straight to me — not to a bot, not to an inbox nobody reads.
I’ll answer the best questions publicly in Resurgent Britain. For anything else — speaking, media, or just to get in touch — choose “Get in touch”.