It's been a week dominated by family time, interrupted by two massive political earthquakes that captured my imagination and set off a whole series of aftershocks in my memory.
Despite the fog of dementia, the strength of these events has kept them fresh in my mind.
Both have proven catastrophic for Keir Starmer and will continue to shake his leadership for some time.
First, Angela Rayner, Starmer’s Deputy Prime Minister and the elected Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, was exposed in the Press for failing to pay the correct amount of stamp duty on the flat she bought in Hove.
In response, she referred herself to the PM’s independent ethics arbiter, the guardian of the Ministerial Code. He found she had cooperated with candour but had breached the Code by not seeking proper expert tax advice.
He didn’t believe it was a malicious attempt to do wrong. Nonetheless, she resigned just hours after Starmer had publicly expressed his support for her at PMQs, proudly sitting next to her.
Her departure led to a wider-than-expected reshuffle. David Lammy, recently in the press for fishing without a license, became Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Secretary.
Alastair Stewart: These were my first signs of dementia
| GB NEWSShabana Mahmood, his predecessor, moved to Home Secretary, with Yvette Cooper, the current holder, taking Lammy’s place as Foreign Secretary.
A couple of other changes followed, though nothing of much substance.
Rayner's role as Deputy Leader, however, is a different matter; it's in the democratic gift of the party membership.
As usual, the left presented several candidates, while from the right came Emily Thornberry.
I've always liked Emily, she’s a good lawyer and the wife of a senior judge. I once bought her lunch during the fuss over her St. George’s flag post, as I believed (and still do) that she was simply warning Labour about what they were up against.
In the 2014 Rochester and Strood by-election, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson and Lucy Powell were strong contenders.
It’s likely either will win now, though party members might opt to bloody Starmer’s nose and elect someone from the left. Thornberry withdrew from the race early.
This whole situation reminded me of the 1981 Labour Party deputy leadership election, when Tony Benn unsuccessfully challenged Denis Healey.
Healey had been elected unopposed as deputy leader the year before. What struck me most was the might of those two giants, one from the left, one from the right, both of whom no one in the current Labour Party could hold a candle to.
Over the years, Benn became a close friend, and his family invited me to his memorial service at St. Margaret’s Chapel in Westminster, the MPs’ church next to Westminster Cathedral.
Healey, too, was a favourite interviewee. We often visited his lovely house in Sussex, where he and his beloved Edna shared a fabulous library. Both were deeply literate and loved books.
Healey’s autobiography, The Time of My Life, is full of references to poetry and prose that influenced him throughout his life. He was also an accomplished photographer and, like Mo Mowlam, had a wonderful ability to make you laugh during interviews.
My goodness, I’ve been blessed to know these greats. Now, we are left with these ‘also-rans’. We all deserve better.
The second political shock came from Lord Peter Mandelson’s long-standing friendship with convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. This cost him the Ambassadorship to the USA.
Like Rayner, what became the real issue, thanks to the press, was Starmer’s judgment, especially regarding senior appointments. Kemi Badenoch put Starmer on the ropes and hung him out to dry in both cases. Unlike Benn and Healey, I never liked Peter.
He was a powerful bully, and it was nauseating to watch how he made people fawn in his presence. He rewarded this sycophantic behaviour with access to the influential. But from passports to mortgage applications, he was far from squeaky clean.
In her new role leading a chain of international schools in the Middle East, my daughter Clem has to grill a wide range of candidates. She’s faultless in her research and probing.
As I’ve long thought, public life would be better if more people like her were in service to the public. While here, she also spends heaps of quality time with her beloved nephew, our grandsons Tom and Jimmy.
From eating out to riding and shopping, there's so much love between them, and it fills me with pride to see it.
One worrying thing this week: cold calling from alleged debt collectors. Do be careful who you give your name and phone number to, whether entering competitions, draws, or general enquiries.
Often, these details are sold on to unscrupulous people, and I had to deal with one such case this week.