They’re always tough, the first weeks back at work after a holiday, but the Prime Minister really has been off the ball since returning to the job from wherever he went. First, there was that awkward defence he made of the Home Office booklet requesting asylum seekers not rape people. Very odd. Now, Mr S has noticed him saying more strange things. ‘I’ve deliberately gone out this first month just doing things, saying we’ll do it, and doing it. No reviews, no commissions, no consultations,’ Andy Burnham told Times columnist Patrick Maguire in a piece for yesterday’s paper. No reviews? No consultations? Mr S hates to be a pedant, but that’s just wrong.

You’ll remember that one of the first things our new PM did on entering No. 10 was cut business rates for pubs and other venues. But do you remember how he said we’d pay for it? I doubt you do, because Mr Burnham never said. He just told us that the government would be ‘reviewing’ tax reliefs ‘for businesses that do not make a positive contribution to local communities, such as vape shops’. How long would this review take? Again, we weren’t told, so Mr S asked the Treasury. Is the........

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