How bad can it be? Predictions for 2023 have been universally miserable. Even if inflation and interest rates stop rising, there’s no pundit out there who believes consumers, homebuyers, investors or business owners will be cracking open the Mayerling brut rosé recommended below in 12 months’ time and saying: ‘Phew, that was tough but I feel great about 2024, so pull my cracker and I’ll put my paper hat on.’

And I’m not here to buck the trend. We’re in for a long haul of budgets squeezed and projects deferred. Let me nevertheless rebut one doom strand with a plea for common sense, provoked by a Telegraph piece headed: ‘Why house prices will nosedive in 2023… Property experts predict a plunge as buyers are priced out and sellers panic.’

Top marks to the unknown subeditor for ‘nosedive’, ‘plunge’ and ‘panic’ in one strap. But what are we really talking about? Nationwide’s UK house price graphs, taking Q1 2020 as 100, peaked in Q3 2022 at around 127 for houses and 118 for flats: irrational surges since the onset of the pandemic, before a Q4 droop. Nationwide itself foresees a 5 per cent further fall in 2023, agreeing with Halifax and Zoopla but a touch gloomier than Rightmove – four sources that between them have access to all the UK housing market data there is. Meanwhile, most mainstream economists now expect interest rates to peak at 4 per cent, affecting a minority of mortgage-holders unlucky enough to be coming off fixed rates at the wrong time. And yes, inevitably, house sales will be sluggish. But a sellers’ panic? I seriously doubt it.

What we’re looking at is the loss of, say, half the pandemic price spike and with it a slight positive shift in affordability to offset an uptick in long-term mortgage rates. So let’s calm down on this one and if I’m wrong (yes, I sometimes am) I’ll eat my paper hat.

Chinese swan

But what if there’s a black swan – the financial shock, outbreak of war, revolution, killer bug, nuclear accident or cyber wipe-out that knocks all conventional predictions aside and which only the off-grid lunatic fringe will claim to have been expecting? Your guess is as good as mine, but if it happens I’d say there’s a 60 per cent chance it will come from China, 30 per cent from Russia, 10 per cent from anywhere else. So that’s the way I’ll scan the horizon. Meanwhile, my darkest prediction is that Putin and Xi will both still be in power in 12 months’ time.

Hero of a bygone age

Lord Young of Graffham, the former right hand of Margaret Thatcher who died last month aged 90, was an inspirational friend of mine. A passionate believer in the power of entrepreneurship, David Young liked to point out that the 1980s cabinets in which he served were not only a decade older on average than those of the Cameron-to-Sunak years but also wiser, worldlier and more effective in delivery – because many members, like him, had built businesses before going into politics.

Perhaps it’s a trope of getting older ourselves that we believe the immediate past generation held more wisdom than our own. But David really was wise, kind, genuinely interested in other people’s opinions and – remarkably for his age – fascinated by the new: an early adopter of the Apple watch, Adobe Photoshop for his photography hobby, and the MacBook Air.

Above all, as he wrote in his foreword to my book on capitalism, he believed prosperity depends on ‘a successful enterprise economy that has the support of the people. If we lose that support… we risk returning to the chaos of decades of old’. As workers and bosses hurl abuse across the barricades this winter and entrepreneurs huddle against the storm, let’s remember that warning.

Seasonal winners

Pointless to name all the disrupted, under-manned and mismanaged services that let us down during what we’ve learned to call ‘the holiday season’ – to which I’ll return in a moment. In more positive mood, let me cite businesses that triumphed against the odds or simply did their job well.

Starting, love ’em or hate ’em, with Amazon, whose next-day promise never failed and whose white-van men deserved a happier Christmas than their truculent Royal Mail cousins. Next, Ryanair, brutally efficient as ever: my cheap new year flight to France was bang on time and full to the last seat. Likewise Grand Central, the German-owned north-south train operator that strove to maintain service despite network chaos. And cheerful Co-op corner shops, open all hours everywhere.

I’m sure you’ll have other suggestions (to martin@spectator.co.uk) for this roll of honour. Here are a few more seasonal picks: Ben Lonsdale, the Grimsby fishmonger who makes a weekly tour of Yorkshire markets. F.W. Read & Sons, the family farm at Alford that makes Lincolnshire Poacher, the best new English cheese of the past 30 years. Cave de Turckheim in Alsace for Mayerling brut rosé, most elegant of sparkling bargains. And Mud Daddy, the portable dog-washer that was a regional winner in our 2022 Economic Innovator awards: I gave one to a friend for Christmas and her spaniel’s now the cleanest in town.

Don’t mention the C-word

Harry and Meghan’s ‘Joyful Holiday Season’ card showed anyone with commercial ambitions how to avoid causing offence by mentioning Christmas. But a booby prize goes to Barclays for its ‘Best Wishes for the Holiday Season’ email, illustrated with frosted holly, which continued: ‘This message is… not a recommendation, advice, offer or solicitation… It is not directed at retail customers.’ No, I don’t suppose it would be. As we pack away our non-denominational decorations this weekend, let me nevertheless wish every-one – even Harry, Meghan and Barclays – a shock-free 2023.