Is Starmer about to get rid of his ‘zero growth’ chancellor?

Another zero. The latest estimate from the Office for National Statistics for the growth of the economy in the month of January is a big round nothing.

- JOHN RENTOUL

Of course, it is just one month’s figure. It may be revised. But the unavoidable impression is of growth so sluggish that it might as well be zero. And that is before the shock of higher oil and gas prices knocks it lower. Which ought to mean tough questions for Rachel Reeves, for whom growth was the rhetorical priority, and who promised the “highest sustained growth in the G7”.

This ambition has not materialised. This is hardly surprising after just 20 months of a Labour government, but there is no prospect of it happening, and - crucially - almost no plan to make it happen.

In which case, should not the principle of democratic accountability require Reeves to consider her position? Or require Keir Starmer to consider it for her? Presumably, the prime minister has sometimes wondered if Wes Streeting, the health secretary, could do a better job of communicating the government’s economic message - if only someone could work out what it is.

But there are persistent murmurings from some of those around Starmer that he thinks Streeting is plotting against him - and indeed, suggestions that Streeting might be sacked in the next reshuffle rather than promoted.