Russell Jones's Week Moment

In an exclusive new column, the bestselling author of 'The Decade in Tory' reflects on a week in which Keir Starmer offered a vision for government as 'hollow as a chalk outline around a corpse'

For as long as I can remember, an unspoken law of mainstream British political reporting has granted Conservatives an automatic voice, while Labour have had to earn theirs.

By this law, left-wing theories are inherently questionable, whereas right-wing truisms are as inarguable as gravity. Immigration is always bad, tax cuts are always good, and Brexit must never, never be mentioned. Those are the rules. Before Labour can challenge the rules, they first have to persuade a sceptical press that their opinions even have the right to exist.

So hats off to Keir Starmer for trying such an uncharacteristically radical solution to this problem. Rather than attempting to reframe the political debate, he has chosen to demonstrate why the Conservatives were so detested by copying all their best moves.

And it’s worked! In just two short months the new PM has managed to make himself even less popular than Rishi Sunak.

It’s not as though we weren’t warned. Starmer, the precise physical intersection of John Major and an Easter Island statue, sold us a vision for government that was as hollow and soulless as a chalk outline around the corpse of socialism. Yet somehow, despite promising us absolutely nothing, he has still managed to disappoint.