QUOTES OF THE DAY

“This will hit everyone, but perhaps it will be those on middling sorts of incomes who feel the biggest hit. They won’t benefit from the targeted support to those on meanstested benefits. Their wages are falling and their taxes are rising. Middle England is set for a shock”

– Paul Johnson, economic director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, paints a grim picture of Britain’s

economic future following Thursday’s autumn statement.

“I don’t think it’s the right way to boost growth because it would be against what people were voting for when they supported Brexit which was to have control of our borders and membership of the single market requires free movement of people”

– Chancellor Jeremy Hunt rules out a UK return to the single market after conceding Brexit in its current form has created trade barriers with the EU.

“She is a friend of mine and I have trans friends and intersex friends who are deeply upset by her. That is a circle I have to square personally”

– Stephen Fry, above, says he will not “abandon his friendship” with Harry Potter author JK Rowling and urged calm in the debate over transgender issues.

“We just had to do it. Christmas World Cup songs are not like buses. If we’d let this opportunity pull away, it would have been a very long wait for the next one”

– Comedian and Three Lions singer Frank Skinner on why he and David Baddiel decided to release a festive reworking of the classic football anthem for the 2022 World Cup.