Hunt is talking about ‘headroom’ again and indulging in public expectations management. Hunt’s attitude to tax cuts seems to be fickle, one minute he feels the tax burden is “unfair” now he’s saying there’s nothing he can do about it, and we can’t afford tax cuts. What voters can’t afford are high taxes.

Speaking on the Peston show last night, Hunt said he won’t “have the kind of room that I had for those very big tax cuts in the autumn.” This comes after the Office for Budget Responsibility handed the government its first round of estimates, which is said to have given Hunt headroom of £14 billion – less than half the £35 billion headroom they said he had in Autumn. That seems a suspiciously volatile forecast from the progressive economists that pack the OBR, just last week the OBR chairman admitted reports were a “work of fiction“. The doomsayers from the OBR lead to a tightened grip on high taxes, which leads to lower growth. Guido will tell his readers what he’s said before: Trusting a forecaster that consistently misses the mark by £53 billion every year on UK public sector net borrowing isn’t the smartest budget move. The Tories are flatlining in the polls and are unloved even by their natural supporters. Twiddling with taxes won’t work. Radical tax cuts are needed to revive support.