Dear Rishi, what’s with the mad talk of tax rises?

When Britain went into lockdown in March last year, you as Chancellor were one of the few government ministers who got the enormity of the situation, both economically and socially.

Within days you had fired off a couple of gigantic bazookas, paying out over £280 billion of taxpayers’ money in 40 various furlough schemes, grants and loans to protect jobs and businesses around the country. You even twisted the arms of the banks – which don’t like to lend to SMEs even in the best of times – to extend loans to millions of businesses.