Gordon Brown began the week inquiring after the health of Susan Boyle, the “emotionally exhausted” runner-up of Britain’s Got Talent. By the end of an extraordinary week in politics a refreshed Ms Boyle was walking out of the Priory: it was Mr Brown’s Labour party that was on the brink of nervous collapse.

Mr Brown’s government is on the edge. Battered by weeks of remorseless revelations about MPs’ expense claims, the political life force is draining away. Poison is swirling around the Labour party, pumped through the system, some MPs believe, by Number 10 itself.