It is hard not to despair at the gravity of our economic plight. The forecasts to be released this week are expected to confirm that Britain's output will not recover to 2008 levels until 2014, representing the deepest recession and slowest recovery since the 19th century and even that prediction may prove too optimistic. The money supply is barely growing; new credit advanced to small and medium-size entreprises (SMEs) is still falling. This should not be happening more than two years into recovery.