When Keir Starmer and his right-hand woman Rachel Reeves started talking down the economy, the people that mattered most, investors, understood it was just politics as usual.
Take power, trash the opposition’s record, say you have been left a terrible legacy and that things are even worse than anyone knew.
Folk out there who already thought things were hard may not have appreciated being bashed over the head with that fact, but they probably reasoned the last government was even worse than they’d already decided.
The message from the City on the doom and gloom lately is this: enough already.
Labour’s point has been made – now tell us the good stuff. This is more than just a matter of optimism; it’s pragmatism.
Labour insists it has a growth agenda and is organising a global investment summit for next month when it plans to persuade the richest individuals, countries and nations on earth that the UK is gushingly open for business. And moreover, that it has some serious advantages over rivals that make it the right place to invest.
That message doesn’t tally with the gloomster stuff and City folk say it is becoming a disincentive.
Investors in the City and from further afield are nervous about what is going to happen to tax on pensions, inheritance and property.
They weren’t previously worried about the level of national debt – an irksome issue to be managed like many others – but are starting to think it is unhelpful for the government to talk about how bad it is.
You’re not in opposition anymore, say the financiers.
There’s enough real economic gloom around – today’s jobs figurers are not great – without the PM and his chancellor talking things down.
Time for some concessions to optimism, to remind people who have forgotten that Britain is an awfully resilient place, especially when given the right encouragement from the right places.
