Gordon Brown was a master of the art. His spinners would brief that he was planning to say something newsworthy in a speech. Reporters would eagerly write it up. Then he would give his standard speech with no trace of the promised story.

George Osborne is not in the same league. But there were echoes of Brown in the Chancellor's Mansion House speech. This had been billed as the point at which he would kiss and make up with the banks. A page would be turned in the government's relationship with the City. There would be a new détente with the financial services industry.