November 22, 2023 - 2:45pm

We don’t have politics: we have theatre. Parliament isn’t a place of debate or genuine Government scrutiny, but instead of drama — make-believe for men in grey suits. Today’s Autumn Statement is the perfect illustration of this reality, a moment once specifically designed to be dull but now rolled in the same glitter as every other event in our political calendar. What was once an update about the state of the public finances has become a great pantomime designed to dazzle and amuse. And like a pantomime, nothing you see is real. Beneath the gags and sparkle on display from our own Widow Twanky — Jeremy Hunt — lay a pretty cynical message: tax cuts now paid for by spending cuts later. This, in other words, was a pre-election performance designed with an encore in mind. My immediate reaction was that the statement surely suggests a May election is seriously being considered in Number 10. The fact that Hunt also announced he was rushing through the 2p cut to national insurance to come into effect in January is further evidence in favour of those who think May is most likely. To my mind, the 25-point deficit in the polls still points towards a later election, but it’s clear the Tories — having steadied the ship after Liz Truss — are now fully focused on the election. But whatever the merits and demerits of today’s statement (and there were both), it was not a serious “long-term” plan as Sunak keeps telling us. The Government is now essentially pencilling in massive spending cuts to departments other than health and education — spending cuts few think are at all plausible, or not, at least, without a radical reevaluation of what we want the state to actually do. Draped over this great political pantomime, then, is the biggest illusion of all: that we can sustainably reduce the tax burden as Hunt promises without changing the responsibilities we have given the state for looking after the retired. The fundamental reality of this Tory government, remember, is that it has increased taxes, not reduced them. Promising that it will now reduce them without addressing the reason they have gone up is not serious, long-term politics, but electioneering. The real Autumn Statement could be summed up in four words: an election is coming.

Tom McTague is UnHerd’s Political Editor. He is the author of Betting The House: The Inside Story of the 2017 Election.

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