Theresa May interpreted: her Sunday morning interviews

Theresa May has perfected the art of saying nothing in interviews. The most any journalist can hope for is a subtle shift in position, or an absence where a position once stood. She seems to think that, if you refuse to give the press anything, the public won’t care. Worse, she seems to be right – for now, at least. So it would have been with a heavy heart that Andrew Marr set off to see if he could try to draw blood out of the Prime Ministerial granite. Same for Robert Peston afterwards. A Theresa May interview means the recital or verbal formulae: ‘strong and stable’ here, ‘working families’ there, ‘for the many not the few’ there. Then a journalist afterwards tries to explain what message, if any, might have been buried in those words. So here’s my attempt.

Marr: One of the reasons that the Conservatives have had to oversee so many cuts in so many areas is that under the last government you made an absolutely clear and to many people ridiculous promise to never raise income tax, VAT or national insurance, the so-called triple tax lock.