Long before she had developed a booming, baritone timbre and an air of psychopathic omniscience, Margaret Thatcher sought to persuade swathes of the proletariat that the job of prime minister was rather like that of a housewife.

Both were concerned with managing money in and money out, whether it was to the Treasury’s coffers or a woman’s purse, ensuring that bills could be paid on time and that luxuries were restricted to when they could be afforded.

The problem with such a comparison was that it was dangerously reductive drivel. In all the time I was growing up, I never once saw my mother close a coal mine or cosy up to a murderous, South American dictator.

To be fair to the blue-rinse bombscare, she was making a very specific point about living within one’s means, but you get my point.

Managing a household budget is not remotely similar to running a country, without the multiple, complex pressures, considerations and consequences that accompany and impact every spending decision.

Doing a supermarket shop will decide what a family will eat for the next seven days. Setting the health service budget will determine whether people live or die.

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In Thatcher’s Britain, most voters were savvy enough to recognise such patronising piety when they saw it. People voted for her because they wanted a radical change in the political direction of the country, not because she knew the feel of a ripe pear in the greengrocers.

Today’s leaders appear to have less respect for the people who elect them, evidently believing that the most shamelessly transparent crackpot gimmicks will substitute for genuine policy if sold with the right amount of conviction.

The latest ruse is to co-opt well known........

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