Here’s why the Independent Group launch was a massive success

At the end of John Steinbeck’s novel Of Mice and Men, one of the two main characters, Lennie, has got himself into big trouble. Rather than tell him that there’s no way out, his friend George describes once again how they’re going to live on a beautiful ranch and tend rabbits, before shooting Lennie in the back of the head. Which is about where we are right now as a country.

The government that promised Brexit would improve our lives now count it as a major success that they’ve stockpiled enough body bags for everyone. Car manufacturers are fleeing the country faster than a billionaire Brexiteer in pursuit of a tax break, and in the event of no deal, fresh food might become more scarce than accuracy in a Daniel Kawczynski tweet.

At this point the main thing we’ll be using our blue passports for is to go visit tomatoes or jobs.

Right now we need the heroes more than ever to fight the bad guys, which is why Labour have chosen this very moment to land a killing blow on the Tories start vigorously punching themselves in the testicles. It’s as if, at the end of Avengers Endgame just when it looks like all hope is lost and Thanos can’t be defeated, Iron Man swoops in at the last second and starts twatting Thor.

The press conference announcing the new party started off OK, if you ignore the sound of a reporter muttering “between this and Brexit we’re actually fucked” off mic. But let’s face it, at this stage most people would have a hard time noticing the words “we’re actually fucked” wasn’t their own internal monologue.

Angela Smith, one of the seven “splitters” gave a speech in which she said that she didn’t think any of the major political parties were fit for power and cited antisemitic racism as one of the reasons she left Labour. It was good. Luciana Berger also made a solid, heartfelt speech. Things were back on track.

Now what the new non-racist party in town needs is celebrity endorsements, which they soon got when Katie Hopkins briefly stopped frothing at the mouth in order to praise Chuka Umunna.

“So far so good,” they probably thought to themselves. “As long as nobody goes on national TV and does a racism then everything is fine. Oh. Oh no. Oh no, no, no.”

Because just two hours after launching the new non-racist political grouping, Angela Smith, one seventh of everyone’s new favourite non-racist political grouping, went on live TV and appeared to refer to people from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds as having a “funny tinge”.

I know you think it’s bad, but look at it this way: after one morning they’d already chalked up their first racism scandal – just like a real mainstream party. Angela even apologised for “any offence caused” rather than the remark itself: proper, statesmanlike, frontbench stuff.

It wasn’t long before the smears began emanating from outside of the group, too. Corbyn-supporting Skwawkbox, well known for crying “conspiracy” when there isn’t one, surprised everybody by yelling “conspiracy” when there wasn’t one. They did some digging and found that the “new” website was actually registered in 2015. A “fact” they discovered by misreading the date.

The day almost over, the new party’s MPs responded to calls from Labour’s John McDonnell to stand for re-election in their constituencies by refusing to do so.

“They said we wouldn’t be a major force in British politics,” they probably thought to themselves. “But here we are on day one and we’ve got a racism scandal under our belt and have already ruled out a people’s vote. Just like the big boys.”

Nor did the Independent Group rule out MPs accused of sexual harassment being allowed to join. Less than 12 hours after launch, then, and they’ve already made it clear they’re an incompetent bunch of catastrophes that most of the population would feel extremely conflicted about voting for.

In other words, they bear all the hallmarks of a mainstream political movement – in their own terms, at least, a resounding success.

As far as political launches go, my only major concern is that they may have peaked too soon. Or that the fear of being seen as institutionally racist will mean it’s only a matter of time until the splitters split.

On the other hand, it has been a tough few days for anyone who is vaguely interested in the prospect of not having a sociopathic group of Tories rule the country until the end of time itself.

To cap it all, like a toddler who craps its pants to distract from the fact it has wet itself, the Labour party chose this moment to let it slip that Derek Hatton is back in the party.

People on the left are now spoilt for choice. We can either vote for a party beset by racism accusations of racism who look like they won’t get into power (you Corbyn cultist!) or a party beset by racism accusations who definitely won’t get in power (you Blairite melt!).

Meanwhile the Tories probably spent the day stockpiling something sinister like orphanages or double-decker coffins. We were too busy watching the only viable alternative attacking the real enemy – fellow lefties.

• James Felton is a TV and radio comedy writer.