Forget the public vitriol and use the next four years to get things done – first and foremost, whatever it takes to stop ReformWhat hell is the life of politics. Look around that cabinet table: each person is confronted with near impossible-portfolios without the means to do what they know is needed. After another nightmare week, many in the dark watches must ask themselves why the hell they gave their lives to this brutally thankless task.Their inheritance was even more ruinous than feared: they were bequeathed landmines, dishonest traps and gaping holes. Brexit is emerging as even more economically crippling than expected, now losing the exchequer £80bn a year. They are blighted by bad luck: the Trump destroyer landed on their watch. What worse mishap than a prison officer setting free a refused asylum-seeker sex offender? Small boat arrivals feel unstoppable. An unfortunate deputy leadership election right now was bound to give Keir Starmer a bruising. The 11% vote share at the Caerphilly Senedd byelection might not even be their nadir.Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
Tuesday 28 October 2025
.theguardian - 15 hours ago
Yes, Keir Starmer is Britain’s most unpopular PM ever. That could liberate him | Polly Toynbee
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