In terms of fiscal policy, if the wider economic picture does not allow the debt to GDP ratio to fall, then the focus of the markets will be on the need to keep the public finances in shape.
My argument is simply one of affordability (including, by the way, by dropping the triple lock) if our public finances are going to be sustainable.
There is next to no support among its ranks in the Commons for more immigration, liberalising planning law and improving access to European markets.
Rather than an ideological approach, these four ideals – pragmatism, stewardship, One Nation and empowerment – should be the foundations of Conservative economic policy.
The new Home Secretary is potentially well placed to break any deadlock in a nominations process among Conservative MPs.
The carnage in the markets is a reminder that she will need all the support from Conservative MPs she can get. That will require handling them with more tact and skill than she has shown so far.
At the very least, we need an Office for Economic Growth, as proposed by both Kemi Badenoch in her leadership bid and the former Treasury minister, Lord Agnew.
The Government seems to have no plan to communicate as cost of living woes multiply. Here’s a first stab at one.
My instinct last week was that he tried too hard to please the Tory press. Nothing’s that’s happened since has suggested otherwise.
If the war lasts a few years at most, the Chancellor can take the hit. If it’s a new normal that lasts for decades, the outlook is grim.
His Mais lecture revealed more about what he’d be like as Chancellor during the normal times that once again are denied us.
The fundamental problem is that costs are going up faster than we are getting more productive.
Lumping more onto the UK’s tax burden – already at the highest sustained level seen in peacetime – cannot be the answer.
The Chancellor extolled principles that point to the possibility of meaningful pro-growth reform of how revenues are raised.
Combined with windfall taxes on both fossil fuel and renewable energy generation, Britain’s business tax regime is getting less, not more, competitive.