Starmer certainly put more welly into it at PMQs

Last week, Sir Keir was monstered by his critics after a feeble performance at PMQs saw him he fail to trouble a wounded Boris. Even his closest allies were in despair. ‘Put some more welly into it,’ advised his deputy Angela Rayner.

Today we saw Sir Keir transformed and unleashed. He was flinging wellies in all directions. The search for his inner populist began with a reference to a film released 45 years ago.

‘The prime minister thinks he can perform Jedi mind-tricks on the country …. The force isn’t with him any more … He’s Jabba the Hut.’

He called Boris ‘the ostrich’ and said he was busy massaging the figures to pretend that our flat-lining economy is surging ahead on magical rocket boosters. In fact, we’re growing slower than anyone in the G20, bar Russia.

Boris’s Jesuitical explanation was that Britain had roared out of Covid so fast that our initial growth-spurt had temporarily eclipsed our rivals, but they were now catching up and taking over.