Fair play to Rishi Sunak, a man who seems not overly blessed with good luck. Or with a talent pool of self-effacing, steady-as-she goes lieutenants on whom he can rely to at least stick to a script in the name of imparting confidence.
Which is why some of us were inclined to smirk when he pledged to halve inflation to just over 5% by the end of this year, as if this were in his gift, as if some crazy-go-nuts Home Secretary wouldn’t say something that made a mockery of such certainty.
Well as of this morning he is free of Suella Braverman, which ought to dampen demand for pricey police overtime.
The latest City expectation is that inflation on Wednesday will come in at 4.8% according to Refinitiv, or 4.7% according to Bloomberg.
That’s mostly down to the end of the last energy crunch and the Bank of England shoving rates up 14 times in short order, but it would be churlish not to give the PM a tip of the hat.
What he said would happen has actually happened (do feel free to lie down while you take that in).
The risk to all this must again be things not remotely within his control.
If the major oil makers get dragged into the Israel/Gaza fight, well, that surely sends oil prices up. That would be a mere inconvenience compared to what would happen to gas prices, since we spend twice as much on heating our homes as we do driving to work.
My Monday morning cup of cheer – an economist inclined to see the dark side of any moon – notes that global thermonuclear war might reduce consumption demand, sending inflation ever lower.
So that’s a thought.
Perhaps the thing to remember here is that however smart Sunak or the army of City economists who follow these things religiously are, they don’t pretend they can forecast massive geopolitical events.
Anyway, a win for Rishi. For now.
