Jeremy Hunt was designed to exclude unnecessary body movements. Tall and gaunt, his demeanour faintly bird-like, he worked through his Budget statement at a steady pace, sipping regularly from a tumbler of water. Or was it vodka? No, it was water, of course. Hunt has the air of someone who always waits for the green man to flash before crossing the road. And every library book he has ever borrowed came back on time.

At the despatch box he wore a Davos costume: white shirt, bland tie, midnight blue suit with no badges or political emblems attached. Is there a man alive who can project ‘anonymity’ better than Jeremy Hunt? Probably, but we’ll never know what he’s called.

Hunt wants Britain’s over-fifties to stop lazing around at home

Chancellors like to announce goodies galore and to keep the bad news hidden. But Hunt broke with tradition by declaring that Britain’s growth is stagnating. In fiscal terms this means the ‘technical recession’ predicted by some economists won’t materialise. At this news, his backbench colleagues broke out with gleeful squeals. Which was not a good look. Tories in ecstasy as their Chancellor boasts that he hasn’t crashed the economy.

Britain is facing a labour crisis which Hunt aims to crack. Right now, a million jobs remain untaken. At the same time we have seven million adults who could work but don’t. Hunt will nobble these idlers by removing their excuses. To help parents return to work, he’ll make childcare cheaper and get schools to provide a full nannying service from 8 am till 6 pm. The permissible ratio of minders to children will increase as well, so that each adult can oversee five kids (previously it was four). Good move. He could have gone further by re-designating children of eight or over as ‘adults.’ An eight-year-old can easily supervise five little ones. It happens in large families all over the world.

He wants Britain’s over-fifties to stop lazing around at home and to start learning new skills. That’s what he did when he turned 50, he told us. He said he ‘faced a moment of anxiety’ and decided to supplement his parliamentary salary by ‘finding a new career in finance’.

‘How’s that going?’ shouted a Labour MP.

‘It’s going well, thank you,’ said the Chancellor. Typical Hunt. Sharp-witted, terse, polite. Not a syllable wasted.

To get the over-fifties back to work he’ll bring in apprenticeships for oldies but he uses the word ‘returnerships’ for some reason. He’s fussy about vocabulary. Staff in his department called the over-fifties ‘older people’ and he ordered them to say ‘experienced’ instead. Many ‘experienced’ workers are NHS doctors who like to retire early. He’s closed that fiscal loop-hole to keep them in the NHS.

He played politics in crafty ways that will cause difficulty for Labour. He made a droll remark about ale. ‘British beer is warm but the duty on a pint is frozen.’ And he introduced a tax break for pubs, ‘which was not possible when we were in the EU.’ He christened it ‘the Brexit pubs guarantee.’ This tells us that Hunt believes Brexit will still be a live issue at the next election, and he hopes to rewrite history by posing as an anti-Brussels head-banger. So if Labour vote against his Budget he can damn them twice over. He’ll say they love the EU and hate the pub.

He’s come up with an ingenious ruse to increase our green fuel output. The word ‘sustainable’ will now apply to nuclear power. But why stop there? He should brand fossil fuels as renewables too. That’s what they are, taking the long-term view. Today’s rainforest is tomorrow’s coal-mine.