After weeks of aggressive briefings from anonymous Labour MPs, party employees, trade unionists and the City of London, Keir Starmer has whimpered away. Standing behind a podium outside 10 Downing Street on Monday, a poisoned-looking premier announced his resignation. His only comfort was his role in transforming the party itself, or rather neutralizing its previous leadership: he declared his pride in turning Labour from a “politically, financially and morally bankrupt” party under Jeremy Corbyn to one that “once again, stood proudly with, not against, our national flag.”

Some had still wanted Starmer to keep going. Following May’s local elections, which saw Labour’s vote collapse under the cloud of the repeatedly disgraced party grandee Peter Mandelson’s latest scandal, performatively flag-waving MPs such as Samantha Niblett and Mike Tapp vigorously defended Starmer in the media. Morgan McSweeney — Starmer’s former chief of staff, who resigned over the Mandelson affair — returned to offer strategy to the Starmerites. Supportive aides were briefed regarding Starmer’s intention to fight any leadership challenge by drawing on his record. In fact, this track sheet made him the most unpopular prime minister since polling began.

Such magical thinking finally evaporated this weekend after Andy Burnham, mayor of Greater Manchester, won an overwhelming victory in Thursday’s Makerfield by-election. With placards and leaflets encouraging a vote “for Andy — for us,” Labour Party branding was difficult to spot in the former mining area. In fact, the Labour candidate’s offer couldn’t have contrasted more with Starmer’s. In speeches, Burnham demanded the reindustrialization of northern England and public control of major utilities. In the constituency that housed George Orwell as he researched The Road to Wigan Pier, Burnham attacked Labour’s distance from working-class communities and called for an end to “forty years of neoliberalism.”