In the Song Dynasty, there is no law. Chapter 290 of the main text of the book "Making a Long-term Plan" In the next meeting, Zhao Jun talked with everyone about other plans.

For example, digging new canals.

In addition to Wuan, steel mills should be built in other places.

Zhao Jun plans to set up the second steel plant in the Nanyang Basin.

The Nanyang Basin is rich in iron and coal resources. It is connected to the Han River and the Yangtze River in the south and Henan Province in the north, and has convenient land transportation.

The most important thing is that there is a river here called Baihe. Although there is no canal directly to Bianliang, if you want to transport it by water, you can go south to Xiangyang, and it is connected to Sichuan in the west through the Yangtze River, Zhejiang in the east, and Huguang in the south.

In this way, the South will have steel production capacity. If, and just in case, there is a problem with the Wu'an steel production base on the Hebei front, or if it is attacked by the Liao people, the South will have sufficient steel production capacity to support it.

After Nanyang has a steel plant, steel manufacturing will continue to expand southward. When Guangdong has a steel plant one day in the future, the domestic steel industry will basically be fully developed and flourish in various places.

Moreover, around that time, steam engines had already been put into mass production, and the national steel industry was flourishing. With the civilian use of steam engines, trains, steamships and even cars could be manufactured.

Therefore, we are starting to lay out the steel industry now in order to wait for rubber to take root in Guangdong, Hainan and other places in a few years and to complete the laying of the foundation early.

Then there were some other trivial matters concerning various departments. The meeting lasted from the end of Chen hour to the end of Si hour in the morning. We talked for more than an hour and many official tasks had not been completed yet. Only then did we adjourn the meeting to deal with government affairs.

At about 3:30 p.m., around noon, everyone went to eat again.

Noon is a break time, and work will not resume until three quarters in the afternoon, which is two o'clock. Work until about five o'clock and then go to Chongzheng Hall on Zhao Zhen's side for a meeting. This is basically the daily routine.

Some prime ministers simply took care of their work in the Council of Political Affairs, asked the imperial kitchen to send some food, and continued to work, or took a rest in the room behind the Council of Political Affairs.

Some go home for lunch, while others simply go to restaurants outside. For example, Zhao Jun has recently particularly liked to go to Fanlou for dinner.

The reason is that since the ocean-going fleet brought back peppers in August of the previous year, the Ministry of Agriculture has planted large quantities of peppers in the imperial farm outside the city as a cooking condiment, and then began to supply them to some restaurants in the city.

Unfortunately, this thing does not suit the taste of northerners, and the people of Kaifeng don’t like it very much.

But Zhao Jun was from Hunan and had long been unaccustomed to the food of the Song Dynasty. Now that chili peppers appeared, he naturally could not miss them.

But he had just left the Constitutional Court and was about to go to Fanlou for a nice meal when Old Fan followed him stealthily like a little tail.

"what?"

It is mid-January in the lunar calendar, and tomorrow is the Lantern Festival, but the weather is still very cold.

Although it was not snowing outside, the cold wind was blowing. Old Fan was wearing a big cotton-padded jacket with his hands hidden in his sleeves, looking quite wretched.

Zhao Jun looked at him warily and said, "You're sneaking around behind me and trying to do something bad, right?"

Old Fan wiped his frozen snot, grinned, and revealed a mouthful of yellow teeth - there were toothbrushes in the Song Dynasty, but no toothpaste, so people could only use salt or a little soapy water to brush, and the effect was not particularly good.

He said with a smile: "I'll go with you to have a meal."

"Is there something wrong?"

Fan Zhongyan's ancestral home was in Guanzhong, his household registration was in Jiangsu, and he grew up in Shandong. None of these places had anything to do with spicy food. Zhao Jun guessed what he was thinking and said with a smile, "Want to come to me to ask about the next new policy?"

"Yeah, anyway, I'm the one pushing the new policy. I'm standing in the front and taking the blame. I should at least know some inside information."

Fan Zhongyan did not hide anything and spoke frankly.

Every time they implemented a new policy, they would discuss it privately first, hiding it from Zhao Zhen, Lu Yijian and others, and would only announce it after the formula was determined.

This is done to prevent the new policy from encountering resistance to its reform direction before it even begins.

But even so, there are still many difficulties.

In recent years, in order to implement the new policies, Zhao Jun first won over middle and lower-level officials, then gave concessions to interest groups, and finally eliminated many opposition officials, generals and nobles, and was even assassinated. It can be said that he faced constant resistance.

But fortunately, everyone managed to get through it. Although there were conflicts of position among the Political System Council members such as Lu Yijian and Wang Zeng, everyone was able to resolve many issues satisfactorily in the end and stood together again.

But for reforms, a plan must be made first, and the interests of multiple parties must be taken into account, so it is better to keep it secret from them. Unexpectedly, Lao Fan still followed them secretly.

"Okay."

Zhao Jun thought there was no need to hide it from Lao Fan. He was a reformist general and he had to take the blame for it, so he said, "Let's talk while we eat."

The two of them left the palace together. There was a carriage waiting for them outside the palace, and the coachman was waiting there like a driver every day.

After leaving Donghua Gate, the bustling streets are bustling with people, and the rows of signs are swaying in the wind. Countless scholars, tourists, passers-by, and vendors are walking around freely, creating a scene of Renzong's prosperous era.

In fact, in the past two years, many officials have praised Zhao Zhen's rule for the prosperous scenes similar to those of the Zhenguan and Kaiyuan periods of the Tang Dynasty.

The people lived and worked in peace and contentment, had ample food and clothing, and order was stable. Uprisings were almost extinct in various places. Except for the somewhat expensive housing prices in Kaifeng, the prices of other grains, commodities, and local housing were very low.

An ordinary worker could work in Bianliang for a few years and save a few dozen strings of cash, which was more than enough to buy some property and land in his hometown.

Even the number of beggars decreased a lot, because the imperial court established welfare institutions such as the Charity Bureau, Orphanage, Futian Home, and Nursing Home to specifically take in these beggars and refugees.

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