I was at the Labour conference – the shift in mood was palpable

The disbelief in the conference hall, the fringes and the hotel bars grew steadily all week

An even more seasoned veteran of Labour conferences than me put it like this: “I’ve not been to one as optimistic as this since ’97.”

The vibe in Liverpool this past week has been electric in two ways: electric with excitement but also crackling with nervous energy. This is a group of people who – if you set aside the shrinking group of Corbyn faithful – have not really, truly believed they could properly win an election (aka a workable majority) since 2005.

That’s a long time to wait. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that a decent number of activists, delegates and even members of Starmer’s staff are too young to properly remember the glory days of Blair’s third sweeping victory.

Government has, for many, not been much more than a noble ambition. Something to reach for, but something that was always just a stretch too far. Sometimes a lot more than a stretch. And that has now changed, and probably changed for a good while.

If this week’s Labour conference had been held a week ago it would have been a nice, bouncy, optimistic affair. Keir Starmer’s speech would have been well-crafted, hopeful and warm. Looming over the top would have been a tickle of concern that Liz Truss might somehow connect with the British people, deliver a modicum of managerialism, and threaten Labour’s slightly tenuous polling lead.

But it wasn’t last week, it was this week, and such is the nature of how news and current affairs in Britain in 2022 exist in some kind of hideous fast forward mode, the context is completely different to last Wednesday. In the days between, Truss and her chancellor Kwarsi Kwarteng have set about an extraordinary mission of national vandalism. Friday’s appallingly nicknamed “mini-Budget” could not have been better designed to benefit Starmer’s particular brand of sensible, sober, civil-servant-in-a-rosette brand.

And, sure as day follows night, the polling leads have blossomed – to an extraordinary degree. YouGov reported the largest lead (17 points) in their 20-year history – on the very morning of Starmer’s conference speech. I can’t have been the only person at Labour ‘22 who couldn’t get “one day like this” by Elbow out of their head all day.

The disbelief in the conference hall, the fringes and the hotel bars grew steadily all week. But it wasn’t just disbelief, it was a sense that things were about to get wholly serious. That government was not more likely not less.

For too long under Corbyn, Labour had essentially turned itself into a niche interest. A cult for believers or a hobby for leftists. No longer. Now a sensible, moderate and intelligent shadow cabinet are on the cusp of taking power, of running big departments, of making very big policy decisions.

This transformation has happened remarkably quickly: it is extraordinary to think that the Conservatives crushed Labour less than three years ago in perhaps the party’s most humiliating defeat since the war.

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Starmer and his team should take much credit (alongside Rachel Reeves and Wes Streeting and Bridget Philipson), but make no mistake Truss and Kwarteng have contrived to hand it to them on a plate with an experiment in lunatic libertarian free marker economics hitherto unthinkable.

This, then, is why the politicos and shadow ministers in Liverpool were – while high on the euphoria of being genuinely, convincingly in the political ascendant – were all too obviously nervous. Government looms large – government in incredibly challenging circumstances. Their political destiny has now moved beyond than their noble mission of defeating corbynism, it is running the country.

For a generation of Labour politicians, s*** just got very, very real.