Timing is everything.

I bet Sir Keir Starmer needs a beer after the week he’s had. As the Tories suffered the loss of almost 500 local councillors, he watched the Liberal Democrats take the lions share of the gains. In truth, however dissatisfied the public are with the current government, they just can’t stomach giving their votes to Starmer’s Labour Party.

That word “Party” keeps cropping up too, as Durham police have now announced they are investigating whether Sir Keir broke lockdown rules on a visit during which he was pictured drinking beer through the window in an MP's office. Don’t they have curtains in MP’s offices? I’m sure they can be claimed on expenses.

Anyway, I digress. The local force initially proclaimed that no offence had occurred last year, but said since then, it had since received "significant new information". It then felt the need to add that it had delayed announcing the investigation until after Thursday's local elections. How convenient for the Labour Party!

One wonders how many gains, if any, they would have made if that news had come out any earlier. The Metroplitan police made no such concessions to our beleaguered Prime Minister. With further fines likely for the Downing Street “Wine Fridays”, a drip-drip-drip of bad publicity is ready to be aimed at blundering Boris.

The delay of the announcement about the Labour leader’s alleged offence was a deliberate political decision and just shows what a left-leaning establishment is in charge of this country. Locally and nationally, the country is becoming ever more controlled by an unelected civil service, with elected politicians becoming no more than pawns in the game of power.

Is it any wonder that turnout in elections has dropped to levels of apathy that mean very few elected “representatives” have any validity whatsoever?

Martin Day – Party Secretary