There’s nothing new in governments suffering “mid-term blues”. It happens often. Halfway through a term in office – especially in their first term – a leader or a political party seems unable to connect with voters and fails to fulfil the hopes and promises that allowed them to be elected in the first place.

It happened to Margaret Thatcher. She was first elected UK prime minister in 1979, and her popularity quickly plummeted. She was rescued by winning the Falklands War in 1982 and became one of the most consequential prime ministers of the 20th century.

It happened to Bill Clinton, too. He was first elected US president in 1992 but within two years was faced with a hostile “Republican Revolution” – a landslide victory for his opponents in Congressional elections in 1994. Fearing he would be a one-term president, Mr Clinton changed course. In his January 1996 State of the Union address, he promised that “the era of big government is over”, aligning himself with the “small government” ideology of his Republican opponents. Mr Clinton won re-election handsomely in November 1996.

Now it is the turn of Keir Starmer in Britain. He rode to a landslide victory last year only to see support eroding on all fronts this year. The most recent of Mr Starmer’s many woes came in Wales last week in the once-solidly Labour area of Caerphilly. In a byelection for the Senedd, as the Welsh Parliament is called, Mr Starmer’s Labour party lost a traditionally ultra-safe seat to the Welsh nationalists Plaid Cymru.

Plaid Cymru Leader Rhun ap Iorwerth (centre left) lifts the arm of Plaid Cymru's newly electe