For the first time, the British public can see in graphic detail on cinema screens throughout the country why the woman they elected three times as Prime Minister was unceremoniously bundled out of office by her fellow Conservative MPs.

It could almost have been an American Republican speaking, such was the scorn that the Chancellor showed for the environment in his Autumn Statement yesterday.

Is Merlin working real magic? Or is it just a cheap conjuring trick? The banks say that the lending deal they agreed with the Treasury back in February is successfully delivering new credit to Britain's hard-pressed small businesses. But the Bank of England argues that small firms are still experiencing a credit crunch as banks shrink their balance sheets.

George Osborne last night claimed "real progress" had been made in avoiding economic crisis in the eurozone after 10 hours of talks with EU finance ministers.

The Government is planning to sell public land worth an estimated £10bn to address a chronic housing shortage and help erode its record budget deficit. The Housing Minister, Grant Shapps, is due to announce today that all government departments with significant land banks will be asked to identify, by the autumn, land suitable for sale for homes.

Britain's video game industry needs greater government support if it is to increase the number of jobs on offer over the coming years, according to two cross-party MPs.

Another teenage scribbler?

Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, says next week's budget will focus on the "deep-rooted problems in the UK economy".

Outlook Here is is how Vince Cable – then just a humble Treasury spokesman for the Liberal Democrats – described the voluntary tax avoidance code for the banking sector when the Labour government first launched it last December: "A terribly limp-wristed response to a serious abuse". By yesterday, that same code had become the centrepiece of the Government's latest effort to reassure people that banks will take their fair share of the pain as we pay down the deficit.

Former Labour ministers were handed more than £1 million in severance pay at the General Election, official figures showed today.

DCB

Ms Lesley Ann Strathie. Permanent secretary, HM Revenue and Customs. (Hornchurch, Essex)

Outlook: Let's be clear. Britain is not Greece. We may currently be running record budget deficits, but our total debt as a proportion of GDP is less than half that of the Greeks.

If we had an election for Chancellor of the Exchequer, Vince Cable would win it. Despite the best efforts of some in the media, he remains the Peoples' Chancellor, and in the Channel 4 debate last night he showed why.

The Institute of Directors today offers tacit support to the Conservatives with a business manifesto calling for immediate steps to cut the deficit. One demand will cause problems: the IoD wants the next Government to agree to a third runway at Heathrow, to which the Tories are implacably opposed.