Rachel Reeves smiled through the storms in Liverpool (or was it a grimace?)

Austerity? Free frocks and specs? Snatching winter fuel from shivering pensioners? Dismal polls and facing a conference defeat on the latter? The chancellor grinned and bore it, observes Joe Murphy

As for austerity, Reeves assured ‘Today’ listeners not to worry (Reuters)

Rachel Reeves glided through the morning media circus wearing a Stepford Wives smile that said, “Honestly, everything’s just peachy” when we all knew that, actually, it was anything but.

So relentlessly upbeat was she, so blissfully radiant with good cheer, that even radio listeners could tell she was still beaming as a vast bucket of brown stuff was poured onto an electric fan perched close to her face.

Austerity? Free frocks and specs? Snatching winter fuel from shivering pensioners? Dismal polls and facing a conference defeat on the latter? Loud and dramatic protest? All grinned and borne.

Yes, she tinkled, it might seem “a little bit odd” that politicians got freebies but, you know, some of her best friends are multimillionaires and one “good personal friend” popped her a cheque for £7,500 “to buy clothes for big events”. What else are friends for? As for the suit she had on, she had bought it from Hobbs with her own money. So, nothing to see here.

As for austerity, Reeves assured Today listeners not to worry as “there won’t be a return to austerity, there will be real terms increases to government spending”. That wasn’t very reassuring at all, since even George Osborne couldn’t help increases in total spending.

Pressed about departmental budgets, which are what really matter to terrified new-hope Labour MPs and the grumpy trade unions gathered in Liverpool, Reeves was less forthcoming, saying she was waiting for the numbers.

Whoever sent out the memo telling Reeves and Co to be unremittingly cheery clearly forgot to cc Wendy Nichols, the dour Unison matriarch chairing this morning’s opening session.

“With the weather out there, I don’t think it’s appropriate to say ‘good morning’,” she scowled, possibly joking.

A procession of irate trade union chiefs then jumped up on points of order, having also not received the memo. “It’s is an outrage,” spluttered Andy Green of Unite. He was talking about a classic conference stitch-up by Starmer’s apparatchiks, moving behind the scenes to delay a vote (which they will probably lose) on Reeves’s cuts to winter fuel payments until everyone is halfway home on Wednesday.

Then the conference hall actually booed when Lynne Morris, the chair of the Conference Arrangements Committee, where such dirty tricks are hatched, tried to explain things away with: “This is a busy conference.”

“No booing,” Nichols ordered. “This conference is being looked at from all over the country, so let’s show a bit of respect and stop all the booing and shouting.”

All this – and it was still barely 10am on Monday. Proof that nothing can stop a Labour conference hall from being grumpy, not even the biggest election landslide in memory.

Luckily, Labour had a secret weapon to cheer everyone up. From a secret hideout, Agent Truss posted a comedy video on X/Twitter, sat behind a No 10-style desk pretending that she was still important. “If the mini-Budget hadn’t been undermined by the economic establishment, things would be very different now,” Liz intoned with the deadpan seriousness of an asylum inmate who thinks she is Napoleon.

Ellie Reeves was in the chair for her sister’s debut conference speech as the first woman chancellor in history. Endearingly, both women were bursting with pride.

Reeves Sr began her speech with an extended passage celebrating Labour’s victory and the chance to take the economic reins. “Consider that a promise fulfilled,” she said, mastering the school head trick of speaking fluently while constantly smiling.

Two hecklers yelling about selling arms to Israel interrupted the speech. But the bulk of the hall was solidly behind Reeves, who declared as they were bundled out: “This is a changed Labour Party … not a party of protest.” Keir Starmer led a standing ovation for that, the first of several during the speech.

Reeves stopped smiling for the exceedingly tricky section where she had to explain why 10 million pensioners were being made worse off by her slashing winter fuel payments. “I did not take that decision lightly,” said Reeves, fixing the hall with earnest puppy eyes.

Crucially, nobody booed. Quite a lot actually clapped. Which proves that this chancellor still has plenty of spare political capital in the bank.

With that out of the way, Reeves relaxed and turned to her big crowd-pleaser, a reannouncement of fraud tsar to overturn lucrative PPE contracts awarded to Tory donors during Covid. “We want that money back!” cried the chancellor and the crowd stood up and whooped and cheered for the sheer joy of bashing Conservatives again, so much easier than all that miserable stuff about governing.

Another ovation broke out when she doubled down on the bumper rises agreed with the public sector unions. “If the Conservative Party wants a fight … bring it on!”

Reeves promised active government, big-ticket investments, a higher pay floor and even that ancient cliche, “an end to the nay-saying” – getting claps for each line.

Trust was a fragile thing, she cautioned, and “when the national interest requires hard choices, Labour will not duck them”. A quieter clap for that.

It ended with a massive ovation, hugs from Keir and Ellie, and a sudden sense of political stability despite all the splits and scandals.

A conference vote may go against her later this week, but this hall is solidly behind its history-making chancellor.