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Along, cold weekend brought a haul of business news more bad than good. The worst was from aero-engine maker Rolls-Royce, which announced a £5.4 billion half-year loss — adverse currency movements plus a collapse in new orders and engine-repair work — and warned that in the ‘plausible downside scenario’ of an extended slump in global aviation, the company might cease to be a ‘going concern’.

That’s a horrendous prospect for what’s left of British engineering. And unlike recent losses on a similar scale at BP, there’s no consolation in terms of long-term repositioning of the business: in short, the fewer jets flying, the grimmer Rolls’s future. As cash runs out, survival will require capital injections bigger than the company’s bombed-out £5 billion market value — possibly from HM Treasury, if ministers don’t want this beacon of British excellence to pass into foreign control.

The alternative will be a merger, for which BAE Systems looks the only feasible UK partner.