Sue Gray, Keir Starmer and the centre-left’s self-righteousness problem 

‘Could you write a piece,’ my colleague wondered aloud, ‘saying come back Jeremy Corbyn: all is forgiven?’ Ha ha ha, said I. No. We most certainly are not there yet. And it is hard to conceive of any sequence of events, up to and including an asteroid strike on SW1 or a Day of the Triffids style mass blinding, which would leave us thinking that a return of Jeremy Corbyn to the Labour leadership would be a step in the right direction. 

And yet and yet. Keir Starmer has been squandering at quite startling speed the goodwill of those of us (I know that will not be all Spectator readers) who had some goodwill towards him in the first place. The resignation of Sue Gray will be spun, no doubt, as Sir Keir showing ‘grip’ and ‘steel’. It strikes me as a prime instance of him showing quite the opposite.