Peter Rhodes on a herbal mis-hearing, the fight for the centre ground and the language of the Lefties

Jeremy Corbyn has been ridiculed for declaring after his epic election failure: “Our time will come.” This may be unfair. I suspect he was looking ahead to spending quiet afternoons among the flower beds and herb patches of his cherished allotment and actually said: “Our thyme will come.” Followed soon afterwards by the parsley.

The election result disproved the cherished theory that a political party's success depends on a massive number of members. With about half-a-million paid-up members, Labour is the biggest political party in western Europe. So what went wrong? We are accustomed to being door-stepped at election time by one or two familiar old councillors brandishing wilting bundles of leaflets. We admire their quiet, lonely dedication. When the street suddenly fills with a posse of wild-eyed Momentum zealots denouncing their enemies as fascists and chanting their leader's name, we are turned off. In politics, as in so many things, less is more, and more is positively chilling.

Meanwhile, Tony Blair's old spin-doctor Alastair Campbell is supporting a plan to persuade 100,000 moderates to join the Labour Party and drag it back from the Left into the centre of British politics. Somebody lend that man a map. Just look at the territory now held by the Tories, from the former coalfields of the North-East to the pastures of the South West. A revolution has happened, thanks to the votes of folk with flat vowels whose parents wore mufflers and ate tripe and never dreamed of voting for anybody in a blue rosette. Things may change but for the time being the Conservative Party is the centre party and you can no longer tell, by accent, dress, address or heritage, who voted for Boris.

On the other hand it is dead easy to spot the Lefties. By their language shall ye know them. One Guardian lady columnist makes an impassioned plea this week for Labour to “talk to Leave voters” (at this point I have a mental image of her delicately holding her nose) and “that means challenging nativist rhetoric.” Perfect. Can you not picture the scene in the terraced streets of the North? “Ayoop, our Eric, there's a lady at t'door who wants to challenge your nativist rhetoric.” Monty Python would have loved it.

One puzzle remains. Before the election, Boris Johnson forecast what the normally staid Daily Telegraph described as “a bonanza of bonking” once the European issue was settled. What the PM actually said was “Cupid's darts will fly once we get Brexit done.” So when is it good form for the nation to dive under the duvet and get started in the Cupid-dart department? Is it immediately after the election, or on the official Exit date of January 31? Or is etiquette satisfied simply by waiting until after the Queen's speech?