Sir Keir Starmer: Labour leader is wrong - we are not apathetic, we are simmering with incandescent anger

He will have seen readers’ letters calling for some of the very promises he made in his speech made in Bristol, when he spoke of ditching pointless populist politics and cutting out embittered cynicism from the thinking of Government.

These things are music to the ears of good, honest people. People who work hard to provide for themselves and their families, but can’t begin to dream of a nice holiday or a new car. Paying the bills alone has become an endurance test that never ends.

So, yes. Mr Starmer can, with authority and authenticity, state that he has in those matters judged the mood of the nation accurately, but he couldn’t be more wrong about one thing. People are not, as he said, apathetic. The electorate is not weary. The people of this country are incandescent at having been gaslighted for so long by a Government packed to the gunwales with tinpot Ministers for whom lying is in their DNA. We’re mad-as-hell at being patronised; stop it, please, with the three-word, jingoistic nonsense. It isn’t clever earworm rhetoric, it’s a disguise for yet more flawed thinking : Stop The Boats. Build Back Better. Stay At Home. The list goes on and on. Well here are three words for Mr Starmer, and any other politician who is looking to secure our vote ahead of the General Election: Must Do Better.