Labour's doom and gloom mantra puts us on a path to fail

'It is entirely rational for businesses to hold off hiring'

- Stephen Pollard

READERS of a certain age may remember the 1940s radio comedy ITMA (It's That Man Again). One of its characters was the lugubrious Mona Lott. Her catchphrase, "It's being so cheerful that keeps me going," long outlasted the show's demise.

That was eight decades ago but it could have been written about Keir Starmer. Since taking office in July, the Prime Minister has turned gloom and misery into a programme for government - never missing an opportunity to bemoan how terrible everything is because of the "deep rot" left by the previous government.

And if you think things are bad enough now, just you wait, he tells us things "will get worse before they get better".

Next month's Budget, Sir Keir promises, is going to be painful - especially for those who he says can afford to take a hit.

Let's ignore, for the sake of argument, whether he and Chancellor Rachel Reeves are right to talk about a previously undiscovered £22billion "black hole" (they're not). And let's ignore the arguments Ms Reeves has made about inheriting the worst economic mess since World War Two (it's a preposterous idea 1979 was worse by an order of magnitude).