Please excuse the grazed knees, bruised elbows and crouching stance … it’s just that I have been hitting the ground running in hot pursuit of proper fiscal and monetary policies.

This unlikely calling for one who couldn’t even keep up with an ever-growing number of failed maths exams at school comes in the exciting shape of an invitation from the Nips (Norfolk Independence Party)

They want my homespun guidance as a product of the Thrifty Fifties (that’s the last century) to help fashion their “moanifesto" for a fresh tilt at full autonomy before the Canaries return to Premier League action. Perhaps the possibility of a Norfolk MP as prime minister for only the second time in history may have something to do with my selection.

I was not around when Whig politician Sir Robert Walpole, born into the landed gentry and educated at Eton and King’s College, Cambridge, filled the top job from 1721 until his retirement in 1742. He spent 13 years building Houghton Hall, the biggest country house in the county completed in 1735.

Legend has it in some scandal-sheet quarters the project took so long because Sir Robert “Whirlpool”, as he was dubbed by cheeky opponents and a few brave locals - hired famous French designer Jacques Coozi to install latest bathroom luxuries in every room. Critics claimed it was money down the plughole - but important visitors from all over the world were tickled pink.

Sound housekeeping and full value for limited resources during a cost-of-living crisis are at the heart of my financial masterplan for early delivery to Nips leader Kirby Cane and his deputy, Lt Col Stratton Strawless, party elder and defence spokesman who still favours a Norfolk Home Guard rather than a South-East Rapid Response Force independent of Nato.

It’s clear a single Norfolk currency will feature strongly in the latest ”moanifesto” with top brass still favouring The Coypew to find its own level in the markets at Aylsham and Swaffham while the pound will be retained only for stray cattle in rural areas. Other members of a new front bench like the idea of feathering local nests with The Great Bustard as long as all divergence criteria can be met. The Delia has also been touted as best recipe for long-term financial security.

“We will talk to any respectable political figures left or bank managers as long as long as they recognise Norfolk’ inalienable right to complete autonomy. As is abundantly clear in our constitution, we want the chance to govern ourselves – yes, a sort of sugar-beet republic if you like – although having the Royal Family at Sandringham certain times of the year will keep us alive to our wider responsibilities,” emphasised Mr Cane.

He claims Norfolk has the perfect package of natural resources to make a resounding success of self-determination. “We are blessed with much-envied geographical isolation nurtured by ample supplies of water, wind, woodland and wonderful areas of agricultural land to help combat the terrors of climate change and support ourselves into a home-made fertile future.”

Bullish sentiments from the Nips despite most political commentators hinting home rule for Norfolk is about as likely as Jacob Rees-Mogg turning up in jeans, T-shirt and baseball cap at a foodbank in Hackney. Perhaps my economic pointers can add timely weight to a defiant agenda for independence.

An ancient Norfolk adage about careful housekeeping requires our vibrant vernacular to give it full value: “When yew’re got plenty yew’ll hatter use it sparingly, so when yew hent got nun, yew’ll allus hev sum.”

Indigenous remnants with cocoa tins full of white fivers under the bed nurse memories of other tough eras and nod eagerly to suggest that is exactly where the world has gone wrong. Living beyond our means. Putting too much tick into the borrowing time-bomb. Failing to give enough credit to multiplication tables in schools. Forgetting how the best way to keep bills down is to use a paperweight.

Counting my monthly allowance diligently and wondering again why there’s so much month at end of the money. I make my way to Norfolk’s leading exponent of fiscal enlightenment. Ethel Halfpenny divides her time between clearing houses in Ten Mile Bank and Quidenham. Her first bit of advice is so staggeringly obvious that most seekers of improved situations are left feeling both gullible and guilty: “Never lend people money,” she purred. “It gives them raging amnesia.”

She proved her feet are well and truly planted on Norfolk ground with a tip to frequent only those public houses replacing the Happy Hour with a Misery Month. “That really helps you prepare for a long period of old-fashioned austerity. It is beneficial to share a common theme. Something all can moan about for quite a while without fear of going out of fashion.”

Ethel offered to take me to such a hostelry if I treated her to a candlelit supper of Granny Polly’s Late Riser Surprise (with chutney) and a pickled egg washed down with a vintage bottle of Vimto (circa 1929).

Thankfully it was the tipsy violinist’s night off. “Money isn’t everything” I offered as Ethel beamed. “No,” she agreed before adding in her best hedge-fund voice. “But it’s a long way ahead of whatever comes next.”