Peter Taylor: The Clacton by-election nobody wanted

This referred to the weeks in the summer months when there tended to be fewer serious news stories and so the media would cover frivolous, trivial, or eccentric stories.

You don’t hear the term as often these days.

Perhaps that’s because we have important news stories all year, or maybe it’s the result of seeing unusual news stories every week.

It can feel like every season is silly season these days.

I’m not sure if the recent news of a by-election in Clacton would meet the criteria of a silly season story.

Peter Taylor says that public trust in politics has not been helped by Nigel Farage triggering a Clacton by-election (Image: Peter Taylor)

Nigel Farage, the leader of Reform UK, has been under investigation from Parliament's standards commissioner for not declaring a £5m gift he received from a billionaire who lives in Thailand and is a cryptocurrency investor.

Now opposition parties are calling for a further probe, following revelations that George Cottrell, who is known as ‘Posh George’ and was jailed for eight months in the US after pleading guilty to a charge of wire fraud, has provided funding for the Reform UK leader – for staffing, security, and housing.

To try and move on from all of this, Nigel Farage has said he will quit as MP for Clacton and stand in the subsequent by-election.

The other parties believe that this is a waste of time and money and so at present only Nigel Farage and Count Binface have declared that they will be standing in this election.

With trust in politics and politicians low, episodes like this do very little to help.

Politicians need to spend more time focusing on the issues that matter most – growing our economy, helping people with rising household bills, and investing in better public services.

• Peter Taylor is the Liberal Democrat elected mayor of Watford.