Did this week’s Autumn Statement open up a path to a snap election in the spring, following a winter of Tory poll recovery?
Bookies’ odds that Rishi Sunak might go to the country earlier than expected shortened after the interim budget. It contained voter-pleasing cuts to National Insurance coupled with hikes to the state pension and minimum wage.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt was at pains to deny that he was indulging in pre-election giveaways. But a YouGov poll gave the Conservatives a four-point bump after the Autumn Statement - albeit only to 25 per cent.
Mr Hunt set the spring speculation going partly because he brought forward the 2p cut to National Insurance from April - the start of the tax year - to January.
He insisted the next day that he had not discussed the timing of the General Election with the PM, but set more spring hares running by refusing to rule out an earlier annual budget.
“Normally it’s in March, but we will make a decision at the appropriate time,” he said, while also hinting at more tax cuts to come.
He left inheritance tax unchanged this time - seemingly recognising that for now, voters wouldn’t like him offering another break to the rich in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis.
The tax remains hated on the Right and if the economy turns up more, Messrs Sunak and Hunt may conclude that they can portray it as a levy on aspiration as part of a wider narrative pitching traditional Tory values against Labour.
But beyond the headline-grabbing measures, the tax burden will actually continue going up in the coming years, and Mr Hunt trimmed the next chancellor’s room for manoeuvre by budgeting for hefty real-terms cuts to Government spending.
The odds remain on that chancellor being Labour’s Rachel Reeves. The opposition party, on 44 per cent, continues to enjoy a commanding lead in voter intentions, according to YouGov.
Sir Keir Starmer said he was “ready for an election straight away” and indeed Labour insiders say the party has long been readying for an earlier contest just in case the PM does spring a surprise.
“The reason for that is because I don’t think that the British public, and the voters, can afford to wait any longer,” the Labour leader said.
Mr Sunak, however, will have been delighted at the welcome given to his Autumn Statement by right-leaning newspapers. The whole point, politically, was to open up clear blue waters with Labour and remind voters of what the Tories are meant to stand for.
His problem remains that after 13 years in power, his party is presiding over falling living standards, record NHS waiting lists and crumbling schools. This week also saw another bout of Tory bloodletting over unprecedented levels of net migration.
While individual measures such as the National Insurance cut polled well, YouGov also found that most people - 55 per cent - believe Mr Hunt’s package will make “no difference” to their own lives.
And no party has overcome such a mountainous deficit in the polls, meaning that the PM and Chancellor probably need all the time they can get to start making that difference.
