Mayclips Chancellor’s wings – and orders him to start spending

£1bn for roads as Hammond is warned by PM: Don’t try to push other Ministers around

PRIME Minister Theresa May has won a power struggle with Chancellor Philip Hammond by ordering him to take a ‘handsoff’ approach to other Ministers and stop trying to emulate his predecessor George Osborne.

Following weeks of heated exchanges between No 10 and the Treasury over the contents of Wednesday’s Autumn Statement, Mr Hammond is preparing to announce a £1.3 billion boost for roads and help for the JAMs – the struggling families who are Just About Managing.

Mr Hammond will also formally ditch Mr Osborne’s austerity targets as he embarks on a drive to spend his way through the economic disruption caused by Brexit. But while Mr Osborne used to force other Ministers to give him their most eye-catching policy plans to announce as ‘rabbits out of hats’ in major Commons setpieces, Government sources pointedly said last night that Mr Hammond had agreed to stick to his ‘core job’ of balancing the books.

It comes amid growing irritation in Mr Hammond’s team over the amount of economic policy being generated by Mrs May and her advisers, who are determined to shift more of the balance of power back to Downing Street after the end of the Osborne era. The Chancellor will publicly claim that he supports his wings being clipped – because in his previous Cabinet jobs he had himself been irritated by Mr Osborne’s interference.

However, a senior source last night compared Mr Hammond’s insistence to ‘the scripted lines used by hostages in kidnap videos’, adding: ‘Hammond would like to be every bit as powerful as George was, it’s just that Theresa won’t let him’.

Mr Hammond has been shocked by projections that the turbulence caused by the Brexit vote will open up a £100 billion hole in the public finances by 2021.

But Mrs May has insisted that he should find the money to help the JAMs: the six million working families who struggle to pay the bills on incomes between £18,000 and £34,000.

Crucially, they are the voters most likely to be floating Labour or Ukip supporters.

Among the measures being considered by the Chancellor to appease Mrs May are the cancellation of a 2p rise in fuel duty, help with childcare costs and a cut in air-passenger duty.

He is also considering reversing Osborne’s cuts to Universal Credit which reduced the incomes of more than three million people by an average of more than £1,000 a year, which Downing Street believes disproportionately hit the JAMs.

Last night a Government source said that the aim of the Autumn Statement would be to ‘ensure that everyone feels the benefits of economic growth’, by pledging billions of pounds for public building projects.

A Treasury source said: ‘Mr Hammond will take a different approach to the Autumn Statement by announcing top-level spending decisions rather than announcing full details of individual projects.

‘He believes the Treasury should be focused on its core job of economic policy, managing the public finances, and not doing spending departments’ jobs for them.’