I’ve found a lovely new home – in Russia

Staraya Russa. About two thirds of the way from Moscow to St Petersburg, in the historic Novgorod Oblast, once the eastern outpost of that much preferable European union, the Hanseatic League. Beautiful cathedral square, lakes and forests, timber-clad museum where Dostoevsky wrote The Brothers Karamazov. There’s a rather grand house for sale — about 5,000 sq ft, five beds, nice garden — for £143,416. From where I’m sitting, as terrified Tories insist the polls are narrowing and Magic Grandpa is within inches of winning, you’d be mad not to. From where you’re sitting, too, a little later in this awful week, if the Tories were right to be terrified. Staraya Russa. No infantile gender wokeist faddism there, believe me. No genuflections to the identity politics maniacs. No jihadis. No hipsters. No Rebecca Wrong-Daily or Diane Abbott or Barry Gardiner.

Income tax? You’re wondering about income tax? Go on, have a guess. Top rate, 13 per cent. Even as a non-resident, it’s 30 per cent. And I’d be a resident. OK, there’s Vladimir Putin instead of Abbott and Gardiner. But I am beginning to warm to the Asian model of democracy, a velvet glove enclosing a claw hammer and perhaps a small phial of polonium-210. The Asian model of democracy vs European liberal democracy: the tyranny of the majority vs the tyranny of the elite. For me, it’s a very close call. And you can have a nice big house for a third of the price of a shared ownership studio flat in Tower Hamlets.

Because whatever the outcome — and you have a distinct advantage over me here — this election has proven beyond all reasonable doubt that the system we have is not working, and has not been working for some years.