Britain is used to crises now. But this widespread hopelessness is new – and frightening | John Harris

In market towns and suburbs, people are expressing the fear and exhaustion once associated with post-industrial neglect

In 15 years of on-the-ground political reporting, I don't think I have ever experienced a more forlorn and frustrated public mood than the one that looks set to define this year. Some of people's grievances are only too familiar: low pay, insecurity, a sense of being hopelessly cut off from power and influence. Others - inflation, impossible mortgage payments, rents, and the overlooked effects of the pandemic - have arrived comparatively recently.

What also seems new is the sheer reach of these problems, into parts of the population we might have previously considered to be relatively affluent. All this points to a question that now feels inescapable: what is the politics of complete exhaustion?