YOU can’t keep a good man down as the old saying goes, and it would appear that this applies doubly to duplicitous, conniving chancers.

Thus, as we were, ahem, treated to newly annointed (at least one presumes that is the procedure, he was certainly oily enough) Chancellor Philip Hammond’s inaugural Autumn Statement none other than Gideon Osborne once more rose to the surface like a fat-berg in a London sewer.

Hammond, showing he was at once a master of self-delusion and completely out of touch with the overwhelming mood of the populace, his own party and the world in general seemed to think his financial statement had gone rather well.