Is Boris in denial about the looming economic crisis?

The priority for the UK and other rich democracies is to protect the people of Ukraine from the depredations of Putin’s forces. A close second should be protecting the poorest people in our countries and vital public services from the cancerous impact of soaring inflation, made much worse by the West’s economic warfare against Putin’s Russia.

The most basic costs of living are soaring. And that means a devastating recession that has already begun for all those but the richest. This blow to living standards will be the worst in living memory, more pernicious than the impact of either the banking crisis or Covid.

Talking to ministers and MPs, it is clear to me that they as yet fail to appreciate the scale of the economic shock that is upon us.

And ahead of the Chancellor’s spring statement in a fortnight – his annual economic health check – there will inevitably be significant tension between Rishi Sunak and the prime minister about how much to spend to protect living standards and the most important public services from the ravages of inflation.

This is a very different debate from the one about how much to spend to protect workers and the economy from the impact of Covid, because the virus was thought to be a temporary phenomenon, whereas the reconfiguration of the global economy forced by the invasion of Ukraine will be permanent.