General election speculation feels different this time

Civil servants, advisers, MPs, you name it - there is, not for the first time this year, a swirl of chat within government and beyond that the prime minister might be about to call a general election, or at least have something to say about it.

Cards on the table: I am usually not that excitable about this kind of stuff, because it is usually quickly debunked.

This time, at least as I write this, it feels different.

Since yesterday , I have been seeking a straight answer to whether Rishi Sunak is about to call an election and no straight answer has come.

Calls that are normally returned haven't been.

It's not a complete wall of silence, but the only question that matters isn't being directly addressed.

Mr Sunak appeared briefly in front of a camera this morning to welcome the fall in inflation, but stuck to his formulation that the general election would be in the second half of the year.

And at Prime Minister's Questions, a combination of the return to Parliament of Tory MP Craig Mackinlay and a discussion about the infected blood scandal gave the exchanges a far more consensual feel than usual.

It took Stephen Flynn, the SNP's Westminster leader, to address it head on.

Downing Street know the swirl of chat that is, well, swirling.

And Rishi Sunak's answer will do nothing to ease that swirl, even though he merely said again what he has been saying repeatedly for the last six months, that the election would be in the second half of the year

If he did call an election soon-ish, it probably would be - because July is, just, in the second half of 2024.

As I type this, it is all folk are talking about.

Plausible cases are being made about why he could go for it now, and why he might not - by MPs of every political colour.

Over to him, and those around him, to clear it up.