So this is the scenario: we are emerging from recession, the economy is on the mend, an election looms with the likelihood of a coalition, the deficit is enormous so tough spending decisions need to be taken but details have yet to be spelled out although they are complicated by the ring-fencing of education and health budgets.

I am talking not of now but of five years ago, March 2010. The similarities between then and now are worrying. In hindsight we see that the depth of the recession was indeed in the last quarter of 2008 and first quarter of 2009 when GDP fell by 3.6%.