I mean, what do you expect out of a resource poor island? The only reason the UK was on the map is because it has intelligent, well spoken people that could make deals and exploit the resources of their colonies. That’s not enough when you don’t have colonies. It’s reverting to the mean.
Seems like a bit of misconception given it has coal (more relevant historically), iron, North Sea gas, a temperate climate, fisheries and coastline, plenty of arable land and more recently massive potential for renewable energy.