Good riddance, Keir Starmer. No sooner had the toppled prime minister wiped away his tears than the solemn guff began. The Labour leader is “principled” and “driven by a deep sense of public service and duty to this country”, said deputy prime minister David Lammy. He showed “the great dignity and integrity that is the mark of the man”, said energy secretary Ed Miliband. “A devoted and dedicated public servant” said home secretary Shabana Mahmood.

No. This was not a decent man defeated by circumstance, a man of duty and integrity who was simply in the wrong job, a principled leader undone by events. This was an unprincipled politician who abandoned promises with as much enthusiasm as he trousered freebies from rich donors.

Labour was “politically and morally bankrupt” when he took over, Starmer declared in his resignation speech. Yet here was a man who not only served in Jeremy Corbyn’s shadow cabinet, but declared himself “100% behind” him. When Starmer stood for leader, he praised his predecessor for bringing “radicalism” to Labour, declared we are not “going to trash the last four years”, repeatedly called Corbyn a “friend”, and denounced the “terrible” media attacks on him.

But Starmer was a frontman for a Labour-right operation whose purpose was clear: persuade a leftwing membership to hand the party back to those who despised everything it had just stood for. At the centre of that plot was Morgan McSweeney, career fixer for the Labour right, and his Labour Together thinktank. It was generously funded by the undeclared donations of wealthy donors, leading to an eventual fine from the Electoral Commission. When journalists investigated those donations, McSweeney’s successor, Josh........

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