The worst of the crisis seems to be behind us. But as Dominique Strauss-Khan, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, yesterday told this year's gathering of business leaders at the Hilton Hotel on London's Park Lane, the road ahead is far from clear.  The recovery is fragile, and still largely maintained by extraordinary levels of fiscal and monetary stimulus. A double dip recession is still possible, while there are signs, particularly in the banking sector, of a return to the bad old ways. Bankers, possibly in anticipation of the coming regulatory crackdown, are using loose monetary conditions to party again as if in the midst of a full scale boom. The reality in the real economy, as many of those at yesterday's conference could have told the miscreant financiers, is still shrinking levels of credit availability and rising unemployment.  With the task of household balance sheet repair still barely begun, and a fiscal consolidation of truly daunting magnitude fast approaching, it is hardly surprising that despite the nascent recovery, the mood among business leaders is scarcely any better than it was a year ago. Business is struggling to see where the demand and the growth, let alone the credit, is going to come from. The theme of the CBI conference was "routes to recovery" but as one wag put it, a more resonant title, given the mood, would have been "routes to nowhere".  Mr Strauss-Kahn identified four key concerns. One is how to withdraw the exceptional levels of fiscal and monetary support without damaging the economy. His message here was that there is not yet enough private demand to allow for a swift exit.  Second, he's ever more worried about burgeoning capital flows to emerging markets, which he sees as potentially destabilising. Developing countries are ahead of the curve on recovery. This lack of syncronisation is leading to a heavy influx of capital into emerging markets, which in turn is helping feed asset bubbles and overheating.  Third, where are the new growth engines going to come from? The hope is that it will be the big surplus nations that provide the future demand, but as things stand, they are nowhere near big enough wholly to compensate for weak consumption in mature economies.  And finally, there is the whole question of financial reform. On this front, Mr Strauss-Kahn was almost apocalyptic in his warnings. It was vital, he said, that the world got this right, for another banking bailout of the size just seen would be socially unacceptable for democratic societies. It would not be possible to bailout the banks again, either politically or fiscally, so if we are faced with another financial crisis five years down the line, the consequences would be catastrophic.  So much for the analysis. What about the execution? All three of Britain's main party political leaders were on hand yesterday to outline their plans for fiscal consolidation and restoring growth.  Drawing comfort from Mr Strauss-Kahn's warnings about the dangers of withdrawing fiscal support too quickly, the Prime Minister stuck to already announced plans for halving the deficit over four years. He promises to keep fiscal support measures in place for as long as it takes to produce a sustained recovery in private demand.  Yet in placing so much of his hope for future growth on infrastructure spending, he seems to have plain forgotten that his fiscal consolidation plans involve some of the biggest cuts to capital spending by the public sector ever seen. The rhetoric on creating a business friendly Britain wide open and attractive to inward investment says one thing, but the practice of higher taxes and more regulation the complete opposite.  The other party leaders scarcely instil more confidence. Having been hurt in the polls for focusing too much on the pain of fiscal consolidation, David Cameron was keen yesterday instead to stress his strategy for growth.  An immediate "emergency growth budget" is promised if he wins the election which will include cuts in corporation tax. Unfortunately, it's a reality for a nation as fiscally challenged as this one that politicians cannot blithely go around promising tax cuts with no method of funding them. Mr Cameron plans to pay for these reductions by cancelling allowances and other reliefs.  But nor is Mr Cameron stepping back from his commitment to start the fiscal squeeze earlier than the other two main parties propose.  I'm not going to enter the debate on whether fiscal expansionism crimps private sector growth and therefore undermines, rather than supports, recovery. Mr Cameron was banging on about it again yesterday, citing the example of aggressive marketing of national savings to support his contention that funding of public debt is sucking the lifeblood out of the economy. But you can argue it convincingly both ways.  There is in any case a less contrived justification for the Tory approach, which is that as things stand the country is set on the road to national bankruptcy. The sooner the problem is fixed, the sooner the economy can reboot and return to decent levels of growth. Fiscal support at best only smooths the correction. It doesn't eliminate it, since the effect is only to transfer a private sector debt overhang onto the public sector and therefore the taxpayer.  Mr Brown is right to insist that all major developed economies face similar fiscal challenges. And to be fair, he's not as oblivious to the dangers as he seems. He's looked long and hard at the example of Japan, which is already a good deal further down the road to fiscal ruin than Britain with little in the way of growth dividend to compensate. He claims to be determined not to repeat these mistakes.  Ignore the electioneering, and the underlying policy prescription from all three political leaders seems wearingly similar. Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat leader, even seems to have accepted the Treasury's existing timetable for the restoration of balanced budgets – eight years.  The Liberal Democrats have been a bit bolder in saying how they would get there, but all the three parties need urgently to put more flesh on the bone.  What none of them can yet bring themselves to admit is that the immediate fix will require a big further increase in mainstream taxes on top of those already planned, regardless of any spending cuts further out. And that's why those in business are so pessimistic about "routes to recovery". It's a changed world they've entered. Britain's flexible labour market will help the country adapt, but it's going to take time the economy to reshape itself around its changed circumstances. No wonder the capital is flooding east.
When the CBI met for its annual conference a year ago, the world economy was    still staring into the abyss. Since then, we seem mercifully to have pulled    back from the brink. Most major economies are already technically out of    recession. Britain is expected to have joined them by the end of the year.