For the first time in a long time, Rachel Reeves looked happy. The Conservative benches tried their best to damage her. They mock-laughed whenever she mentioned an economic improvement. They jeered whenever she revealed a forecast. But it all sounded flimsy and unconvincing. She had a spring in her step and they could see it.

The Chancellor mocked the Tories for their economic record – basically shooting fish in a barrel. Then she looked to her right and turned on Nigel Farage, or rather she would have done if he’d bothered to turn up. So instead she attacked the Conservative MPs who now populate the Reform UK benches. “The same people, the same policies and the same disastrous outcomes for working people,” she barked across the Chamber.

She looked confident, steady and in control. And there was a good reason for that. She was finally delivering on the core pledge Labour made to the public when it came to power.

One of Keir Starmer’s greatest promises in opposition was boredom: beautiful, elegant, reassuring boredom. A return to a world of politics which normal people could sensibly ignore.

We had undergone nearly a decade of drama – Brexit, Partygate, the mini-Budget meltdown, an endless cycle of crazed prime ministers treating No 10 like an Airbnb. But the Labour leader seemed to offer something else: a stable period of dull, dutiful competence. A good night’s sleep after a horrible party.

He has since proved utterly unable to deliver on that promise. No matter how staid his appearance, he somehow manages to create more chaos than he solves. But today, not before time, the Chancellor took the first faltering........

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