Star comment: In politics, a year is an absolute age

The continuing Covid pandemic. The performance of the Prime Minister. Christmas parties in Downing Street. And who is fit to lead us.

At this time last year we ran an online survey to gauge the mood of our readers, and today we’re doing the same again.

Unfortunately Covid figured largely last year and hasn’t gone away, and in fact has come back with a vengeance with the highly infectious Omicron variant.

But we are not in the same place thanks to the rollout of the vaccinations, which has been so successful that we are now on our third jabs, the boosters.

Boris Johnson isn’t in the same place either. A lot of tonic water, sparkling water, and cheese and biscuits has flowed under the bridge since Christmas 2020, although he took flak then as well for not, in the view of some, locking down fast enough or hard enough.

And who, a year ago, could have conceived that traditional Tory voters would become so disaffected that in a bombproof Tory seat like North Shropshire a Liberal Democrat would be elected as the MP?

If, as Sir Harold Wilson said, a week is a long time in politics, a year is an absolute age.

The coming year is going to be crucial for Boris Johnson personally, with critics more or less unanimous in that he will need to pull his socks up, and also crucial for the nation generally as it seeks to turn the corner on the pandemic and build a sustained recovery which will not be derailed by any further upsets, like further variants.

It will be fascinating to hear our readers’ views. So do take part. Apart from anything else, it’s a chance to get stuff off your chest.

Today our print editions bring you eight pages of pictures from Christmas Past, a scattered delve into the archive to provide a snapshot of years gone by.

This Christmas – as last – will be known in history as the year Covid got in the way. Let’s hope we have better luck next year.

Of course we have faced difficult times before. Christmas in wartime was difficult, with loved ones away or lost, rationing and the risk of attack and even invasion looming.

Like now, the British people did the best they could and got on with it.

The common theme in all the images we reproduce today is the need for us all to be with loved-ones – and often to find comfort in the crowd.

Covid may have robbed some of us of the chance to be with extended family this year, but we must move forward in the knowledge that this crisis, like others, will pass.