Today’s Tory manifesto will pledge to eliminate the deficit by 2025, several years later than Philip Hammond vowed just a few months ago and 10 years later than the Tories promised back in 2010. When Hammond became Chancellor he said he would clear the deficit by the early 2020s, in his Budget in March he said the deficit would fall to 0.7% of GDP by 2021-22. Now the Tories say the books will not be balanced until 2025, the middle of the next decade…

George Osborne consistently failed to achieve his deficit forecasts in the last parliament – the deficit in 2015 was almost five times what he envisaged in 2010. The Tories used to say Labour would “load debts onto our children that they can never hope to repay”, May and Hammond now warn voters of Corbyn and McDonnell’s policies: “Where’s the money coming from?” The answer is the same place they get it, the deficit. It isn’t just Corbyn and McDonnell’s Labour who are an anti-austerity party…