The British political system is in chaos. That much is clear from the variety of outcomes in the recent local elections in England.
There were also dramatic shifts in the political landscape in the devolved elections in Scotland and Wales.
Many conscientious and hard-working elected representatives will have lost their seats, along with other, less admirable ones. This shows how little of the old fabric of British politics remains.
Political parties do not die very often. But they can much more easily become marginalised.
This is one of the features of the recent elections.
The former giants of the political scene, Tories and Labour, can no longer dominate. We are witnessing dramatic changes in party politics.
Polarisation, rapid surges and slumps in support, shifting allegiances and political uncertainty are the norm.
One thing that will have to change to keep up will be the voting system itself.
At the last general election, my party, the Labour party, got about one-third of the popular vote but won an enormous landslide in parliamentary seats.
On the other side, we now have councillors winning seats with a tiny fraction of the vote, because they came top in a field of seven, eight or nine candidates.
Our first-past-the-post electoral system was supposed to provide stable government. It has not done that for some time.
But now, in kaleidoscope politics, it produces winners who can have minimal support. We will need to move to some system of proportional representation before too long.
There is also the wider question of why our politics has become so fractured.
Tony Blair lasted over 10 years in office as Prime Minister and Margaret Thatcher over 11 years.
We have had six Prime ministers in the last 10 years, which will rise to seven if Keir Starmer does not make it beyond July.
This is political turmoil is caused by the economic and social crisis that began after the global financial crisis in 2008.
Living standards have been flat are falling for the longest period in over 200 years. This has led to multiple crises for public services, poverty, well-being and social cohesion.
This is what we are living through.
The list of Prime Ministers of the last 10 years is simply a list of failures, people who wanted high office but had no idea how to reverse the crisis.
Until that changes we should expect the political turmoil to continue.
- Diane Abbott is Independent MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington.
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