I was on Sunday Politics at the weekend reflecting on Labour’s victory in the Wakefield by-election and the collapse in Conservative support in Tiverton, which saw a 24,000-majority overturned. This was a devastating double defeat for a Tory Government whose default answer to every crisis is to seek to divide people; instead we saw people unite in their determination to send Boris Johnson a message.

It’s clear that people are sick and tired of the internal squabbling that is preventing the Government from addressing the cost-of-living crisis and supporting our public services.

Yet the Prime Minister’s response to these humbling defeats was to insist he won’t undergo “some sort of psychological transformation”. As many in his own Party and the voters in the by-elections have made clear; they don’t want a moral redemption story – they want him to go!

As Wakefield’s new Labour MP Simon Lightwood MP said – “𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑒𝑜𝑝𝑙𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑊𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑓𝑖𝑒𝑙𝑑 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑠𝑝𝑜𝑘𝑒𝑛 𝑜𝑛 𝑏𝑒ℎ𝑎𝑙𝑓 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝑟𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑠ℎ 𝑝𝑒𝑜𝑝𝑙𝑒. 𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑦 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑠𝑎𝑖𝑑, 𝑢𝑛𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑒𝑑𝑙𝑦: ‘𝐵𝑜𝑟𝑖𝑠 𝐽𝑜ℎ𝑛𝑠𝑜𝑛, 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑚𝑝𝑡 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑡𝑟𝑦 𝑖𝑠 𝑛𝑜 𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟 𝑡𝑜𝑙𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑑.'”