I embrace Sir James Dyson - he took just one bad-tempered meeting with Hunt to wipe the floor with him, says Kelvin MacKenzie

A great way to look at life.

So 40 years later he finds himself sitting in a room at the Treasury with the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, an engaging chap who has made a few bob in his own business venture.

Sir James was there ostensibly looking for more tax breaks for research and development. New ideas are the bedrocks of the Dyson future, but when you have been as successful as him you are used to giving your views to the room whether they asked or not.

And most people would agree with his views. The increasingly irritated Chancellor was not in that club. And they had, according to all media reports, a bloody bad-tempered meeting.

Firstly, Sir James said, government spending was out of control and needed to be cut. Not an original point, but the reality is that not since 2001 have tax revenues and expenditure been in balance.

We have living beyond our means for 23 years. Throw in the £400billion needed for Covid through furloughs and increased health expenditure, and you can see we are broke.

Next Sir James suggested taxes should come down from their historic highs. A little easier said than done as Labour will find out.

Finally, that the we should dump also those diversity managers employed at the NHS. They have done their job very well, as far as I can see the it is white people who are the minority in the medical world.

These policies, and perhaps the manner in which they were delivered, massively irritated Hunt. All that training for the marathon had was proving too much. So what did he do?

The bad-tempered meeting had happened last Wednesday, so he waited a diplomatic few days until the Monday and then briefed the Financial Times with a wholly one-sided account of their meeting.

The line put out was that he told Sir James that if he was so confident of policy change he should stand for office. That is the old fallback of all politicians and is unworthy of Hunt.

What he should have tried to do is explain why it wasn’t possible. Then two clever men could have thrown economic bricks at each other. As one witness described the meeting of these titans; ‘’It was awful.’’

We cannot have Tory Chancellors and business tycoons at each other’s throats. Whether we like it or not the success of our nation is based on wealth creation and that won’t come from politicians, trade union leaders or charities. They talk a good game, but talk doesn’t pay the bills.

It’s people like Sir James who do.

Last year his company paid £101million in taxes. The Chancellor may not like it but he needs to keep people like Sir James happy. Sir James does not need to repay the compliment.

King's Cross controversy cover-up

So my instincts were correct.

When those Ramadan messages inexplicably turned up on train departure boards at King’s Cross, Network Rail claimed that for similar diversity reasons they had done the same for Christmas, Passover and Diwali.

Frankly, I thought that was untrue and tweeted my view, demanding to know where the photos were to substantiate the claim. Those photos never turned up. There was a good reason; they didn’t exist.

Now Network have changed their tune and their story and, according to The Telegraph, have started an investigation saying the investigation will last several days as multiple members of the station staff had access to the departure boards.

Since the message included Hadith of the Day- the thoughts of Prophet Mohammed- clearly the culprit was a Muslim employee. He or she will also be a trade union member so you can be sure they will fight like fury not be shown the door.

Perhaps, while they are at it, Network Rail might also discipline the Network Rail spokesman who had misled the Telegraph on Day One of the story by saying other religions had been allowed space on the boards, but said they couldn’t prove it as they didn’t have photos.

That was clearly twaddle as you can imagine the Islamic fury if the North London station had carried Hebrew tracts on Passover.

Look forward to the next chapter of the cover-up.