Remember, every time someone calls for more money for the NHS, or social care, or universal credit, as it seems just about everyone is nowadays, they are also implicitly calling for higher taxes in the long run. That’s a less exciting thing to call for. And these issues of tax design may be particularly unexciting. But bigger spending without better taxes will cost us much dearer than it should.

'Right at the top of the agenda for government should be how to make up this educational deficit created by the pandemic and our response to it — especially for the least advantaged children.'

Rishi Sunak will have a host of tough choices and trade-offs to make as he steers the economy and the public finances into calmer waters. At the very least, the chancellor needs to avoid exacerbating these inequities further, as his predecessors often did. That means looking at tax and spending decisions according to how they affect those with wealth, and those without.

Life goes on in Whitehall even as the combined crises of COVID and Brexit come to a head. It is to the credit of our system of government and those who work in it that, over the past couple of weeks, the fruits of much labour on the longer-term crisis that is climate change have emerged in the form of three important policy documents.

The politics may make sense. The economics less so. Earnings in general have had a terrible decade. People in the public sector have fared worse. The average teacher earns 9 per cent less, after accounting for inflation, than in 2010.

It’s spending review week. The chancellor has postponed the budget and decided not to have a full three-year spending review, but Rishi Sunak nevertheless will be delivering yet another big statement on Wednesday, setting spending levels for next year. That’s the idea, anyway.

I write this column every fortnight, and every fortnight it seems we have a big new expensive policy from Rishi Sunak. Last week the chancellor opened the purse strings once again, extending the furlough scheme right through to the end of March. That, alongside another four weeks of England-wide lockdown (at least), will add to this year’s deficit, a deficit already set to be the biggest in UK history outside of the two world wars.

'The present crisis might yet turn out to be that kind of more permanent shock as, in all probability, will Brexit. As we saw after the 1980s, permanent shocks can leave lasting scars.'

Choices over benefits policy are never easy. There are unavoidable trade-offs between cost, generosity and incentives. This year offers an opportunity to improve what we’ve got and to make a conscious choice over how generous we want the system to be.

As for phase four, the return to normality, Mr Sunak needs to learn one big lesson from policy in the wake of the financial crisis. From 2010 on that policy was dominated by the desire to reduce the deficit. But it lacked a crucial second leg: an actual economic strategy focused on productivity, growth and economic success. Phase four must not just be about getting the huge deficit down. It must involve a smart economic strategy for infrastructure investment, education, economic governance, tax reform and more besides.

There’s a reason that sterling fell in the wake of the Brexit vote and fell again sharply last week as it appeared that our government planned to break international law. The reason is that these events, this pulling back from trusted institutions, relationships and legal norms, will make us poorer. With this government showing less respect for the institutions of state than any in a generation, and with the real risk of further constitutional upheaval emanating from north of the border, we would do well to beware of the risks.

Millions of children will be returning to school this week. For many, it will be the first time that they have been in five months. The consequences of this loss of schooling will be profound, persistent and socially unjust.