Keir Starmer’s foolish attempt to smoke out his rivals backfired so badly that his only choice now is whether he wants a quick or slow political death. The Prime Minister is one of the most unpopular in history with voters but is also widely disliked by his party. Some Labour figures are calling for his chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, to be sacked for the damaging briefings to journalists that fuelled this crisis. That might buy Starmer a little time but it will not keep him in office. Starmer is McSweeney’s invention. He picked Starmer, not the other way round.

Without his chief of staff telling him what to think and how to behave, there is even less to this Prime Minister than meets the eye. Even if he brought in a new hot shot team, the rot has set in so badly that it is now unsalvageable.

Starmer promised stability and integrity but he detonated an unexploded bomb by allowing Health Secretary Wes Streeting to be attacked as a plotter from within No 10.

Everyone knew the bomb was there and was tiptoeing around it, which is not a great place for a prime minister to be. But that was a far better option than blowing it up two weeks before a Budget that is going to be one of the biggest assaults on the striving classes in recent memory.

It left Downing Street engulfed in utter chaos and complete panic. As a result, it emerged on Friday that the PM and Reeves have bottled it on raising income tax. The only reason they had softened the ground for such a major breach of their manifesto promises was because they were completely desperate.

But the leadership crisis means Starmer is also too weak to ride out the backlash. Instead the Chancellor, who cannot cut spending because the party will not allow it, will have to impose another round of damaging tax rises in a series of other areas.

We are still suffering the consequences of that approach last year when the jobs tax and attack on family farms caused huge damage. Reeves has lost control of her Budget and the markets are spooked. It’s checkmate. There’s no good way out of this.

The PM and Chancellor promised growth but a Budget that has become a farce before it has even been delivered will not lead to prosperity. Starmer is now the hostage of his backbenches and has so little power, despite having such a huge majority, that he has to give in to their demands.

The irony is there was no plot to oust him before Christmas. But the overreaction and paranoia from No 10 this week has given wings to an idea that was yet to get off the ground.

Barring praying for a miracle that forces his party and the country to rally around him, there is nothing Starmer can do to turnaround his fortunes.

The meltdown is consuming Westminster but it is the country that is suffering. A formal challenge to Starmer needs at least 80 MPs to back one challenger candidate. Party members and affiliated trade union members will then get to vote.

Streeting’s cool and calm response to being accused of plotting won him a lot of supporters.

On Friday he dodged questions about wanting the top job. But he is generally seen as too much to the right for the tastes of most Labour MPs and certainly most party members.

If ministers start quitting or a delegation of serious figures tell the PM he is damaging the party, Starmer may finally realise he has lost his authority and ability to get things done so fall on his sword. That would clear a path for a much wider field of MPs to run. Angela Rayner, Bridget Phillipson and Andy Burnham have all been waiting in the wings.

Even Ed Miliband, who has been rejected by the electorate before and insists he harbours no ambitions, is being talked up as a leading candidate.

It would be the ultimate insult to democracy to be landed with a prime minister the country had made clear ihttps://www.facebook.com/t did not want by the back door.

Either scenario would leave voters with a premier they had not elected, which a number of Tory leaders can testify never ends well.

It is unclear exactly when Starmer will be ousted but there is little doubt it will happen. The only control he has now is over just how bloody his exit will be.