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Today saw a shift in rhetoric from Chancellor Rachel Reeves as she moved to promise the Labour conference a more optimistic vision for the country.
But quietly there also appears to have been a shift in approach, which could mean a markedly different landscape for public spending come the budget on 30 October, allowing far greater scope for Labour to borrow and spend.
Politics live: ‘More optimistic’ Budget could be in store
The easiest way to see the change is to compare the chancellor’s actions before and after the summer.
In July, when Ms Reeves created the £22bn “black hole”, she gave us a taste of how she intended to fill it.
Not only was there the means testing of the winter fuel allowance, but she did something the Treasury have been wanting for years – to cancel a whole load of investment projects, including road building with the A303 down to Cornwall, as well as delaying the hospital building programme.
This was as striking as it was confusing. Such projects would be the cornerstone of any government’s growth plan.
Yet in the eternal tension in Labour between fiscal discipline and growth, the former had won out seemingly at the expense of the latter.
And Treasury mandarins at the time were clear. The best way to fill an immediate £22bn black hole would always be to delay or can these investments – or capital projects.
Now fast forward to the Autumn and £16bn of the black hole remains to be filled on 30 October.
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