Shirtsleeves Starmer plays his cards right in Essex

No gimmicks, Keir Starmer kept on saying as he launched Labour's latest, er, gimmick: a reboot of Tony Blair's gimmicky 1997 pledge card.

- JOE MURPHY

Abso-blooming-lutely no gimmicks here! Which is why Starmer was standing tieless with his shirt sleeves rolled up, while all the men in his shadow cabinet were forced to wear smart suits and ties fastened up to their Adam's apple. 'Cuz he’s the boss, innee, giving a team talk in the dressing room to the junior management!

No gimmicks, but lots of very serious subliminal messaging. Like the way all the shadow ministers, even Rachel Reeves, had to follow an autocue (look how controlled and on-message they are!), whereas Starmer just had a few bullet points on his screen, filling in the speech from memory. ‘Cuz ‘es speaking from his heart, innit!

So here we all are, at a theatrical production hall in Purfleet for Starmer’s 16th relaunch, four days after Rishi Sunak’s seventh relaunch. How on earth will they keep this momentum up until an election day that is not likely to take place until somewhere around bonfire night? You knew Labour was getting serious when Angela Rayner trimmed her My Little Pony red tresses for a smart executive hairdo. The would-be DPM posed for a selfie with the neatly bobbed Reeves and the pair looked, for the first time, like members of the same tribe.