If Rachel Reeves did the spending review like a game show, she could invite her cabinet colleagues to “come on down” the catwalk between the two red lines in the Commons, to music and strobe lights, to take their seats on the front bench.
She could announce the winners of the competition for public funding over the next three years in reverse order, with David Lammy, the foreign secretary – who has lost a big chunk of his foreign aid budget – going first, followed by Heidi Alexander, the transport secretary, and Steve Reed, environment.
