Ahead of next week’s announcement by the chancellor of her departmental spending allocations for the next three years, I have two observations.

My first one is that Angela Rayner’s department of housing, communities and local government and Yvette Cooper’s home office have still not agreed their budgets.

“Conversations are still ongoing”, said a government source.

With time running out to lock down the comprehensive spending review, due to be announced on Wednesday, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that Rachel Reeves and the Treasury will impose settlements on them, with the two secretaries of state in effect reserving their positions that their core services would not be able to perform as desired on the basis of the financial allocations.

As is well known, the deputy prime

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