George should listen to Danny

Britain is in the middle of the deepest slump in our modern history. What can be done? The best idea we seem to have is one which Danny Alexander drew up on the back of an envelope. When advising Nick Clegg, the now Chief Secretary to the Treasury came up with the idea that no one paid below £10,000 a year should pay income tax. His short-lived predecessor, David Laws, reprised the idea this week, calling for the policy to be financed by cutting higher-rate tax relief on pensions. The Liberal Democrats are rightly exploiting one of the more worrying gaps in British politics: the vacuum where a Tory growth agenda ought to be.

George Osborne performs many roles in the government. He is the chief strategist and the arch-fixer. But he has yet to demonstrate a knack for effective economic policy. Britain’s national debt, now at the £1 trillion mark, will hit £1.4