The Chancellor & his advisers seem to have expected that the decision to make us pay VAT on hot pies, sausage rolls & pasties would be greeted as only fair to those who already have to pay VAT on their fish & chips.
I heard the head of the project to simplify taxes express genuine astonishment – no one guessed it would be seen as a tax on poor old grannies.
In retrospect this reception may serve to persuade all political spinners that you can have too many leaks, that there is something after all to be said for budget purdah. That way the press & public are not left to hunt around for something new when the official details are finally revealed & will just concentrate on those issues you expected to be trouble & hoped to defuse.
Then all the confusion: panic - don't panic - oh well, panic just a little bit, about petrol supplies.
The Germans pulling the rug out from under our plans for nuclear energy.
The result of the by election in Bradford - also a very real shock to the politics professionals – I was listening to Radio 5 Live as the first rumours of the upset came in.
This morning neither the Today programme nor any of the BBC news bulletins which I heard were leading with the news; I am still puzzling over why not - whether it was because they thought it genuinely not the top story,did not know how to explain it, or just did not want to give the winner too much oxygen of publicity.
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Political messages
Political messages
