Rachel Reeves and David Lammy show how rubbish politicians have become

Just what is happening to our political class? Fifteen people, including ex-PM Rishi Sunak's former aide, have been arrested in connection with alleged betting offences over the date of the last election. Bangladesh has issued an arrest warrant for Tulip Siddiq, though both deny any wrongdoing. And disgraced former is currently subject to a suspended sentence for common assault.

How could standards have fallen so low? Of course there has always been political wrongdoing (the Profumo affair, for a start) and many MPs remain extremely decent people. I'm fortunate to count a number of them as friends. But there is a sense that many are all in it for themselves, cannot be trusted, if they said it was sunny then you'd grab the nearest brolly and so on.

Then there is the incompetence shown by the rest of them. didn't understand that, if you put a tax on jobs, as she did in her abysmal budget, then there are clearly going to be fewer jobs. We have a Foreign Secretary who, when asked who succeeded Henry VIII, replied Henry VII.

Birmingham seems to be turning into some sort of rat-infested hell-hole because no one in either local or national politics has the courage to take the striking dustbin men on. And on the international stage we're regarded with a mix of pity and contempt.

It's all part of a wider degradation of society, in which everyone seems ruder, more selfish and even more aggressive than we used to be. But until fairly recently, there was at least respect for the political class, even if you didn't actually like the individuals involved.

Many loathed my heroine Baroness , but absolutely no one thought she had a corrupt bone in her body. You might not have liked what she did (in my view, she saved the country), but everyone knew it came out of conviction, not a quality that many politicians seem to possess these days.

If any political leader could break through the morass of disillusionment and cynicism with which so many view our politicos, they'd clean up. But it's not looking good is it? While international political crises may have saved Sir Keir Starmer's skin for now he'll soon be back to looking like the weak and indecisive leader he really is.

Kemi Badenoch has yet to make any breakthrough with the public and Nigel Farage has too many eccentrics in his party to make the necessary change.

We can only hope that cometh the hour, cometh the (wo)man. But I wouldn't hold your breath.