Liz Truss has a language problem

‘Grow the pie’. Somebody thought ‘grow the pie’ was The Thing, that ‘grow the pie’ was it. That this knockout phrase would silence the army of doubters and bring millions of voters back on side. They were proud of ‘grow the pie’. They thought ‘grow the pie’ was a great idea that people can really relate to and get behind. The same kind of person who thought reviving The Generation Game with Mel and Sue, or that Crown paint advert with the dead-eyed cult singing about ‘Hannah and Dave’ were notions of genius. Grow the pie – biff bang pow, now what’s your comeback to that, eh?

Did they test it out on anyone else before Liz Truss’s speech at Tory party conference? And if so, did nobody point out that pies may rise, they may crispen, they may warm up – they may even be smooshed into the faces of children’s entertainers now and again – but that they never grow.