But whichever party or parties make up the new government, it’s vital that the profile the industry’s leaders have engineered for retailing ahead of the election with their National Insurance campaign is maintained.

The time for visits to Asda or Morrisons by Gordon and David is now over, and by the time you read this, you should have an idea of who’s going to be running the country. Sadly it won’t be our imaginary retail cabinet outlined on page 32, although with their experience running complex businesses, they could arguably do a much better job than many career politicians.

But whichever party or parties make up the new government, it’s vital that the profile the industry’s leaders have engineered for retailing ahead of the election with their National Insurance campaign is maintained.

Retailers are a driving force behind what remains a fragile recovery and one that could easily be derailed by further economic instability. Both David Cameron and Gordon Brown talked a good game during the campaign when it came to understanding retail’s role as a generator of jobs and prosperity. Now it’s time for them to show their words weren’t just campaign rhetoric.

So postponing the National Insurance rise, which Cameron so rightly described as the “jobs tax”, is essential for the sector to continue to grow. Beyond that, the constant piling of incremental costs - from the minimum wage to business rates - onto retailers has to be arrested, because the sector cannot keep absorbing them forever.

The scale of the public deficit means tax rises are inevitable and most leaders in the sector are resigned to them, but they have to be managed carefully and with a firm eye on what the knock-on impact will be on shoppers. Maintaining low interest rates and inflation will help the sector weather the storm. But it’s crucial that the new government takes a long hard look at itself before ramping up taxes. Public spending needs to be taken under control before it starts loading additional costs onto taxpayers and businesses.

Now that the fog of campaigning is over, what we need is honesty about just how bad a shape the economy is in and what measures the new government is going to take to put it right. Certainty will help retailers and consumers plan for what will inevitably be challenging times ahead.

There’s no reason why the worst-case scenarios need to come true. The UK’s shoppers and its retailers have proved their resilience through the worst recession anyone can remember, and administering the required medicine in a measured way will help ensure consumers keep their nerve. And that will be good news for retailers, and good news for a UK economy more reliant on our sector than ever.