Music, theatre and art have been crushed by years of Tory cuts. They need to be nurtured again, with purpose and with pride

As the Conservatives clutch at political straws, the Labour party is readying itself for government. Some predict a general election as early as next spring. In Thangam Debbonaire – who started out as a professional cellist – there is the unusual prospect of a culture secretary who understands the arts from deep personal experience. Two months into her job shadowing the unimpressive incumbent, Lucy Frazer, she is in listening mode. The next step is to get herself a serious, ambitious plan for power.

As Labour culture secretary, she would almost certainly score easy points by just not being Tory. That means, to pick some random examples, by not being among the 12 Tories to hold the post in 13 years . By displaying less ignorance about the brief (Nadine Dorries’s startling misapprehension , when culture secretary, that Channel 4 is publicly funded, stands out amid a strong field). By not relentlessly starving, punishing and criticising the BBC, the UK’s largest cultural organisation. By not dragging the arts into a cynical, divisive culture war. By not being part of a government that unleashes something as self-harming as an exit from the European Union. By not engaging in a zero-sum game in which London is pitted against the rest of the country in the name of levelling up.

Charlotte Higgins is the Guardian’s chief culture writer

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The chancellor’s tax giveaway will simply load even more painful spending cuts on to an inflation-devastated public sector

Jam today, austerity after the next election – that was the thrust of the chancellor’s heavily trailed autumn statement last week. As expected, Jeremy Hunt announced tax cuts that the country can ill afford. But despite his claims to be focused on the long term , he is paying for these cuts by raiding the money that should be reserved for public services after the next election to help them cope with rising inflation.

If this further round of spending cuts is imposed, it will blight the lives of the people who disproportionately rely on Britain’s public infrastructure – children from disadvantaged backgrounds, older people with care needs, women suffering domestic abuse. It will also continue to suppress the country’s future growth prospects, perpetuating the austerity fallacy that cutting public spending makes good economic sense despite the fact that it inevitably shrinks future tax revenues.

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The extent of Tory spending cuts could prove unpalatable for voters – and leave a Labour government with a huge hole

One of the most striking pieces of recent polling showed nearly 80% of Britons think public services have deteriorated in the last decade. This would seem an electoral gift to Labour. But as this week’s autumn statement shows, the long shadow of austerity is hugely problematic for both parties.

Jeremy Hunt’s de facto budget was, even by the usual standards of such events, something of a smoke-and-mirrors affair, boasting of big tax cuts while also contributing to a fiscal mix in which the average household will be worse off .

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Western nations are caught in a low-growth trap, with tricky political choices to make – but there is a way out

The past 15 years have been the most difficult for western economies since the 1920s and 1930s. Public anger has risen as living standards have been squeezed by a prolonged period of weak growth. American politics is as ugly as it has ever been, while parties of the far right have emerged as powerful political forces in Germany, Italy, Austria, Finland, France and Sweden.

The new age of anger is a far cry from the six decades between 1948 and 2008. Sure, there were recessions – often deep ones – during that period but growth resumed and living standards bounced back. Certainly, there were protests – sometimes prolonged as in the demonstrations against the Vietnam war – but the young people who marched eventually secured a stake in the system.

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‘Destitute’ means a living standard so sparse, it should be consigned to history. It now applies to 4 million in the UK

It starts slowly at first. A food bank crops up inside your local mosque. You notice more sleeping bags on the walk to work. Over time, the signs seem to grow. A donation bin appears in Tesco for families who can’t afford soap or toothpaste. Terms such as “ bed poverty ” emerge in the news because we now need vocabulary to describe children who are so poor that they have to sleep on the floor.

Then one day you read a statistic that somehow feels both shocking and wearily unsurprising: about 3.8 million people experienced destitution in the UK last year. That’s the equivalent of almost half the population of London being unable to meet their most basic needs to stay warm, dry, clean and fed.

Frances Ryan is a Guardian columnist

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We need a redesign of taxation to reverse the gross inequality that causes poor health, writes Rob Perrin . Plus letters from Ewan Hamnett , Angela Vnoucek and Dr James Andrade

Sally Davies, a former chief medical officer for England, echoes the fears of so many experts and commentators, informed by the research of Michael Marmot , among others ( Last time Britain was this sick, drastic action was taken. This time, politicians don’t seem to care, 18 August ). Low productivity, stagnant wages, austerity and the steady dismantling of public institutions leads vast swathes of the UK population down the road of poverty, poor diet, ill health, educational failure, menial employment, substandard housing and state dependency.

The links between gross inequality, overwhelmed healthcare and our rapidly declining status as a western economy are plain to every politician, business leader and media mogul in the land, yet we collectively limp along, wallowing in our misery, in the naive belief that an election will put it to rights.

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Record numbers of parents are fighting councils in court to get the support they need. They shouldn’t have to resort to this

For parents whose children have special educational needs or disabilities (Send), getting help can resemble an adversarial battle. Over the last decade, parents have increasingly resorted to taking councils to court for failing to carry out assessments for education, health and care plans (EHCPs), or for issuing a plan that fails to recognise their child’s needs. Cases heard at tribunal have soared by 580% since 2011. Delayed support is harming children’s education and leaving many in distress. Parents who don’t have the time, money or confidence to fight their council, or who don’t speak English as a first language, are especially likely to see their children go without the help they need.

When the Northamptonshire Chronicle recently submitted a freedom of information request to its local council, the newspaper found it had spent £275,000 on fighting such cases at tribunal. Most of these will be lost; 95% go in parents’ favour. The cost of providing specialist support has the potential to bankrupt local authorities, one council treasurer recently wrote . Faced with rising demand for EHCPs, councils seem to be dragging out the process to save money. Similarly, huge waiting lists have led some NHS managers to drastically restrict initial autism assessments for children. Unless that is reversed, a greater number of children will go undiagnosed and miss out on support.

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