I
t was a rainy September evening in Liverpool. The Labour Party, gathered for their 2016 conference, were in an unhappy state. Jeremy Corbyn had become leader and a wedge of the party were out of sympathy with him. His Momentum supporters were holding a rival gathering of their own elsewhere in the city.
I, meanwhile, was walking back to my hotel. Two young chaps going the same way recognised me as a Times columnist and we fell into conversation. Dressed in suits, I guessed they were not from the Corbynite wing; and one of them (aged about 18, though he looked younger) was heading to Oxford University. He impressed me. His fluency, confidence and command of an argument stood out; and beyond this he struck
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