Madeline GRANT

Rishi Sunak spelt out the impending catastrophe in earnest, Boy Scout-style, in the Commons yesterday. Billed as a Spending Review, there was certainly a lot of Spending, though perhaps more Reviewing would have been in order.

“Our economic emergency has only just begun”, the Chancellor warned ominously, before rattling off a laundry list of misery. There were disappointing growth forecasts, soaring unemployment, a record peacetime deficit, and the worst recession since 1709 when the Great Frost ravaged Europe. His utterances contained none of the PM’S Churchillian bravado or “sunlit uplands” from last month. In fact, there was a strong hint of “I told you so” in the sheer lack of spin.

In a drizzly Autumn, with economic winter drawing on, at least the magic money tree was flowering splendidly – apart from the rotten stench emanating from its boughs. To the dismay of deficit hawks, the Chancellor turned on the taps and started spraying money around like an overexcited child brandishing a new water pistol while high on Sunny Delight.

At times, the borrowing and spending seemed almost impossible to rationalise between the volleys of eye-watering sums. Somewhere, amid the noise, was a new “local renewal fund” and a “once in a generation” investment in infrastructure. There was also a pay freeze for senior public sector workers outside the NHS, and a cut to the foreign aid budget which sent MPS across the House into virtuous tailspins. But eventually all I could hear was the whirring of the moneyprinters and the gale swirling sheaves of tenners off that wretched stump.

The Chancellor, however, remains a free-marketeer at heart – and his obvious frustration and cryptic warnings of the pain ahead gave a hint of his true yearnings. “This situation is clearly unsustainable over the medium-term,” he said, with galactic understatement.

In response, shadow chancellor Anneliese Dodds offered a boilerplate refrain that could have been delivered any time over the past few weeks.

“Earlier this year, the Chancellor stood on his doorstep and clapped for key workers. Today, his government institutes a pay freeze for many of them!” she howled dramatically. We were treated to some of Labour’s greatest hits, including “too little, too late” and “our lockdown would have worked better than your lockdown”.

Teachers, Dodds cried, were “being forced to tighten their belts”, by not receiving a pay rise. Not quite the same level of privation, you might argue, as that of the private sector workers shorn of their livelihoods without even the consolation of furlough or a secure government pension. For a socialist, she seemed surprisingly appalled by the suggestion that economic pain might be shared equally.

When Sunak rose to his feet, he seemed almost to be teasing his Labour opposite number. He insisted that “the British people will judge that this review reflects their priorities” and that “deep down” she will recognise it too. His tone may have been regretful, but the message was clear – “we’re singing off the same hymn sheet, and you know it”.

Rishi Sunak turned on the taps and started spraying money around like an overexcited child with a new water pistol