Why was everyone fooled by Rachel Reeves?

It is some time since I could claim any close acquaintance with the daily skirmishes of workaday Westminster. From risers and fallers on the stock exchange of parliamentary esteem I stand somewhat aside these days: no longer a war correspondent sending back dispatches from the battles between tribes in the febrile atmosphere and smelly carpets of that suffocating fake-gothic palace. Such warfare needs to be reported, but in this I yield to colleagues better placed to report.

It seemed Starmer and Reeves had allowed themselves to be persuaded that what they were not was enough

If I’ve had any useful contribution – if as a commentator I’ve shed any light these past 15-odd years – it has been in spotting new instances of our curiously English readiness to impute talent and virtue in the absence of any evidence for it.

My commentary did wonder aloud why in Gordon Brown a sulky disinclination to communicate should be interpreted as still water that ran deep. It did question what – when the conference backdrop of green trees and scudding clouds was pushed aside – ‘modern’ Conservatism actually meant. It did from the start warn that Boris Johnson was a capering clown with a talent only to amuse. My commentary was early to advise readers that Liz Truss was nuts, and explained urgently that to fillet Robert Jenrick of raging ambition would be to be left with a boneless heap. As a journalist with little talent for fashion in political couture, I hope I can at least spot the absence of clothes.

Which brings us to Rachel Reeves.