Sir Keir Starmer’s holiday plans have been put on hold as rioting sweeps the country. Fair enough. But there are some who are extremely eager to deny the Prime Minister a holiday at all.

“I think it would be completely wrong for the Prime Minister to go on holiday whilst parts of Britain are burning,” Tory leadership hopeful Robert Jenrick told GB News. Another contender, the former home secretary Dame Priti Patel, deployed the virtue signalling usually reserved for the Liberal Democrats and demanded that Parliament be recalled so that MPs can debate the Government’s handling of the disorder.

If Parliament were recalled, it would be just another forum for the blame game. The Government would have to listen to criticism that it has been slow to solve the rioting crisis, despite having been in office for only a month. Meanwhile, the Tories and Reform UK could duke it out to sound the toughest on migration.

The trouble is that there is never a good time for a break if you are the Prime Minister. Britain’s sprawling constitutional arrangement means that it has never been quite clear who is in charge if the premier is away or indisposed. This has led to Downing Street tying itself in knots over the years, including when Tony Blair was under general anaesthetic for heart surgery, or when Boris Johnson was in hospital with Covid.

Somehow, they try to argue, the Prime Minister is always in charge – even if it is clear to every rational observer that this isn’t true. If plans were put in place so that the premier could take a break every August without a political sideshow, without forced moral indignation, everyone would benefit.

The Tories used the charade of presenteeism during the election campaign when they argued that Starmer’s assertion that he would carve out time for his family on a Friday evening meant he was........

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