People always like to grumble when something changes. Fury followed the mandatory wearing of seatbelts, with the editor of Motor Sport ranting in 1964 that he would “not use them in my car for the same reason that I do not take a parachute when I fly”.

As UK economics editor, my life for the last week has felt a lot like surrealist movie Being John Malkovich — but with Rachel Reeves in the central role.

British finance minister Rachel Reeves spelled out her plans to revive the country's slow-moving economy on Wednesday, adding to recent pledges to reform investment and planning rules with a commitment to back airport expansion at Heathrow.

That left Rachel Reeves, Britain’s chancellor, with an uphill task when she arrived at the Swiss alpine town to court investors at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. She met a raft of Wall Street bosses,