In nearly 50 years of reporting on Westminster, our lobby correspondent has never seen all the United Kingdom’s political institutions in such disarray

It must say something about the state of our country, this extraordinary state we are in, that it has been solemnly announced – and in the pages of The Daily Telegraph no less – that the actor Laurence Fox, who played the sergeant in the TV drama series Lewis, has decided to launch a new political party because of his belief that politicians “have lost touch with the people”.

As it happens I had been planning a party myself, although mine was of the more personal sort, albeit with a political dimension. I don’t think either is likely to happen. The idea for my party came to me at one of the last receptions I attended in the House of Commons, just before the world was turned upside down. It was at the end of February and the event marked the centenary of women reporters being admitted to work as parliamentary political correspondents. When someone asked me that evening how long I had worked there myself, I realised to my astonishment that it has been for nearly half of that time. I went to work at Westminster in 1971 and, well, the excuse for a party next year was immediately obvious. Events, of course, dictated that I had forgotten about it within a fortnight.