Why was ‘Barbie’ in the autumn statement? Yeah, I’m confused about that, too…

Jeremy Hunt dolled up Britain’s part in this summer’s feelgood hit – but the truth is we’re more in the red than the pink, writes Chris Blackhurst

Ryan Gosling and Margot Robbie in Barbie, which was partly filmed in Watford and contributed £80m to the economy (Warner Bros)

It’s not what the chancellor revealed in his autumn statement that’s important – it’s what he chose not to share with us. 

On one level, his words were full of promise and optimism. There were 110 measures to promote economic growth. Wow, 110! What were they, exactly? Ah, well, he would rather spare us the actual detail…

The economy is flatlining, and Jeremy Hunt claims to have a panacea – a veritable cocktail of 110 ingredients – but he won’t tell us what’s in the glass!

Have you ever known a politician to shy away from doling out good news? Of course not. Which suggests that what he had to tell us was not that good at all. 

The Office for Budget Responsibility (how the Tories must rue the day they ever created that watchdog) now expects inflation and interest rates to be higher. In realpolitik terms – and that is where we are, with a general election looming – that means millions of mortgage holders, homeowners who could be counted on to vote Tory, will be feeling the pain when the ballot arrives, probably in the autumn of next year. 

With this autumn statement, reading between the lines was more useful than the chancellor’s script. We heard how parts of the movie Barbie had been filmed in the UK – a morsel for the industry – but why mention it now? As they say in this summer’s feelgood hit: “Yeah, I’m confused about that, too…”

Where was the thumping investment in hospitals, schools or the similarly suffering transport network? What about homes? Again, not a peep. Hunt hasn’t got the money, so they all remain off-limits.

He did, however, choose to tell us how he was cutting taxes for businesses, and how he was removing obstacles to capital investment. But, as Hunt surely knows all too well, what determines whether someone invests or not is infrastructure at the chosen location – a functioning healthcare system, an education service that produces the recruits that businesses want, efficient roads and public transport. 

Can Britain claim to have any of those? This government went in for speedier railways, but scrapped that idea at its recent party conference. Now giving a lift to infrastructure, full stop, did not merit a mention.

On it went, the public giving and the sleight of hand that takes away.

National insurance contributions are coming down – but the overall tax burden is set to hit a post-war high. Universal credit and other working-age benefits are to be increased – but the thumbscrews are to be applied to make people work.

Some of the reforms, rather like the reference to Barbie, seemed more surreal than real. Households living close to new pylons are to receive up to £1,000 a year off their energy bills for a decade.

Why? Why put this in a major set-piece speech about the economy and public spending?

It might sound a lot, £1,000, but whether it will be enough to stop protests at the erection of these eyesores, with all the attendant humming and paraphernalia, will be interesting to see. Was the pylon cash included in the list of 110 measures to improve economic growth? No idea. It’s hard to see how it could be – but, there again, Hunt must have got to that tally somehow. 

Some of it, much of it, sounded plain desperate, smacking of someone clutching at straws. A sum of £3m is to be made available for tackling paramilitarism in Northern Ireland (and there we were, thinking they were doing that anyway). And £3m, in the context of a state machine that consumes and spews out billions – how bizarre. 

Similarly, we were treated to news of £7m over the next three years for organisations like the Holocaust Educational Trust to tackle antisemitism in schools and universities. Nothing wrong with that, especially now – but hard to see how it really belongs in an address of this magnitude. 

One bugbear is our planning laws and processes. So, yet again, we were told about a new, premium planning service across England, with faster decision rates for major business applications. It’s all very “same old, same old”.

How we sought genuine income tax reductions, a trimming of VAT, announcements concerning the recruitment of thousands of extra teachers, nurses, doctors and police.

How the high street would like the ditching of the hated business rates, and their replacement with an efficient, easily understood levy.

How London, in particular, but also other visitor centres, wanted the tourist tax to be scrapped. Retailers and hospitality providers can campaign as loudly and as vigorously as they want, but this government is not for moving on that one (not yet, anyway). 

There were scraps aplenty, but that’s all they were – scraps. Much of it was billed as new and innovative, but closer inspection reveals it was frequently this Tory administration only undoing what a previous Tory government had introduced.

That’s where we are, after 13 years. Our elected rulers have run out of roads. As for the condition of the nation’s roads… well, it’s best to follow Hunt’s lead and not go there.