For all his problems, Keir Starmer has never been a victim of high expectations. When he entered Downing Street in 2024, voters did not throng the streets as they did for Tony Blair in 1997. There was little talk of new dawns. Britain was too battered by Brexit and its aftermath, and by a series of dismayingly inadequate Tory prime ministers, to feel optimistic about its next leader.

Starmer’s reversals stem from a staggering lack of forethought about how to run the country he had just spent three years campaigning to govern

Then there was the leader himself, a man almost incapable of inspiring warmth or excitement. Voters accepted him as the least bad option. But there was also a sense that he was solid, dependable and competent.  And after Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, these qualities had acquired a charisma of their own. Starmer might be short on ideas and personality but he could do the job. He was serious

That was, broadly speaking, my assumption too. And yet, having settled in for a government of reassuring mediocrity, I’ve been amazed at how far beneath that level he and it have operated. In September 2020 Starmer criticised Johnson for making 12 U-turns. ‘To correct one error, even two, might make sense’, he said. But 12? ‘The only conclusion is serial incompetence’. A fair point, but what are we up to now with Labour? Add ID cards, business rates, and jury trials to an already long list and Starmer has now exceeded that number.

Johnson at least had........

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