Keir Starmer’s dizzying fall shows the UK is now becoming ungovernable

These are dark days for Keir Starmer, for Britain, and for democracy. If the prime minister resigns over the appointment of Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the US, what will it tell us about the state we’re in? Even if Starmer stays and presses on, he will be a mortally wounded figure – and it will only be a matter of when, not if.

We are in a bad place as a country. Our governance is rotten; our political class is fragmenting before our eyes. Of course, Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage will argue that this is not true, that it is merely a Labour problem – and one that their respective parties can resolve. But should we put our faith in a Conservative successor to Boris Johnson and Liz Truss? Or in someone who lied about Brexit and accepts money from donors with no obvious allegiance to this country?

Contrary to what they maintain, it is not a single-party issue. There were plenty of figures from across the political divide who applauded Mandelson in his role, Farage included.

No, this is about a nation that no longer holds its leaders in esteem – one that has changed prime ministers at breathtaking speed and thought nothing of it. Arguably, Johnson and Truss were not fit to govern, but that misses the point. Where its ruling class is concerned, Britain is in the grip of a deep malaise that goes far beyond the occupant of No 10.

Possibly, it is not so recent: our troops and their families paid a terrible price in the Great War for being lions led by donkeys. Perhaps it goes further back and was always present – that those in charge looked after themselves while those less fortunate lumped it, or, if they were not prepared to, suffered an awful fate.

Yet there were also sustained periods of relative calm – when politicians enjoyed respect, and Britain, in contrast to today, was reasonably well run. If it wasn’t, reforms were made; things got done. Not now. This government was elected on a thumping majority, but is no nearer resolving the housing crisis, the poor condition of the NHS, the creaking infrastructure or the lack of social mobility than were its recent predecessors.

We have ground to a halt. Nothing is moving, apart from ministers swapping seats or making way for another lot. With every departure and arrival comes a period of bedding in and bringing people up to speed – then, no sooner are they equipped than they leave. It is madness, and it steadily erodes our trust.

The breakdown began with the MPs’ expenses scandal in 2009. Before then, there had been corruption and scandals, but they were one-offs, centred on individuals. The fiddling of receipts and the arrogant disregard – the sense of entitlement, verging on contempt, for those who elected them – was pervasive and cut across the political divide. The episode laid bare a schism that may well have existed all along, but we had chosen not to see.

We saw it, but nothing changed. Some MPs went to jail and lost their seats, but the attitude at the top remained untouched. It was the same with the financial crash that began in 2008. Bankers, the City – they retained their places.

MPs’ expenses was followed by phone-hacking and the Leveson Inquiry in 2011, which badly weakened another pillar of our society. Others fractured, too – the Church, the BBC, the royal family, the police, even the elite schools that produced those we once trusted to lead us. One by one, they were torn apart.

Then came Brexit – falsehoods plastered on buses and repeated in newspapers and broadcast studios. When the lies were exposed, they were met with shrugs and smirks. There was Grenfell. There were the Post Office sub-postmasters and the contaminated blood victims’ relatives, forced to fight, fight for recognition and compensation. There was the flouting of Covid rules – meant for everyone, applied only to the little people.

All the while, the quality of those entering politics and public life diminished, and with it the belief we cling to. We always hope the next one will be different. But it may be that Starmer’s successor is someone forced out of office for fiddling with their tax affairs. It may well be that the prime minister after them is Farage. Accounts of his school days at Dulwich College ought to be enough, but they won’t be – just as Johnson’s past behaviour wasn’t enough.

By then, it will be too late. Possibly, it already is – that all of this, allied with social media that does nothing to encourage considered debate, has brought Britain to a standstill – a country no longer capable of being properly, fairly and effectively governed.

Starmer, we are repeatedly told by those around him, is a good man. He is a lawyer, trained in forensic analysis and the maintenance of scrupulous standards. A public prosecutor, no less. That is what we were encouraged to believe – that he really would be better.

Yet he went ahead and appointed someone who had twice been forced to resign over his dealings with wealthy businesspeople. Starmer ignored perfectly capable career diplomats – sending a signal to them, and to us.

We should shed no tears for Starmer. But we are left crying for our once great nation.