NO 10’s time-honoured fashion for testing political waters is leaking to the press. It has limited plausible deniability but it is still effective.

However, Rishi Sunak doesn’t subscribe to such underhand activities, preferring to shoot straight from the hip. His latest idea is to abandon the Tory party manifesto pledge to protect the pension triple lock.

Whatever kind of lock you can dream up, it all points to one thing: less money. Having to fill the Covid money pit, pensioners are easy targets. Those on benefits who have already been trashed have no money left, and rich Tory party donors will turn off the tap at even the suggestion they should pay more.

Increasing taxes goes against the idealogical grain of the right, so what is left? According to the mainstream media pensioners are all well-off, job done. But there is one problem they are ignoring – UK state pensioners are already the worst paid in Europe.

Mike Herd
Highland