THINGS are bad. Things are really bad.

We’re heading for a disastrous Brexit, which will see a cut in EU funding to some of the UK’s most poverty-stricken areas, and a long period of uncertainty.

The North-East will see not only the loss of almost £100m a year in subsidies, but as a major exporting region, a hit to our businesses we can ill-afford.

I never thought I’d be sad to see David Cameron leave Downing Street, but when we are faced with some of the alternatives, and an opposition party which is on its way to hell in a handcart, I sensed what almost felt like a lump in my throat when he resigned.

Our football team (the English one – at least the Welsh have mustered some fighting spirit) is a national disgrace, and there quite a high probability that Donald Trump will soon be the leader of the free world.

And in keeping with the series of national disasters, on Friday, while walking my children home from school, weighed down by bags and coats, I dropped my keys right down the drain.

I had no phone, no money, no way to get into the car, or house, and three hungry children. I borrowed a withered-looking bamboo cane from a kind neighbour and spent at least five minutes pathetically prodding around in the drain. I had a visual on the keys, but they stood a dangerously high chance of sliding further down, into oblivion.

By this time a small crowd had gathered.

Small children asked awkward questions.

Adults looked on in mild amusement. My bestockinged knees were growing sore from leaning on the tarmac. The bamboo cane wasn’t cutting it.

Just then, a golden car stopped. A father from the school, with what looked like a halo of light around his head (that might have been my imagination), stepped out.

He assessed the situation, then pulled something out of his boot that looked like it had been specifically invented for retrieving keys from drains. A metal stick, a hook on the end. It may have had something to do with golf, but I could be wrong.

He leaned down and scooped the keys out of the drain in one movement. The small audience of parents and children gazed at him in total admiration, I with unbending gratitude.

Sometimes, we just need a hero. I’m not talking about women needing rescuing by men from key and drain-related dramas – that would raise my feminist hackles.

But our nation is scrabbling around in the dirt, looking for the keys, while the world watches. We need a sensible, safe pair of hands, to come in with their strange-looking golf implement. (Okay,I’m aware I might be labouring the point slightly here).

I’m no Conservative voter, but Theresa May looks the best of a bad bunch. Let her steer us through the next few months at least. Momentum should set itself as a leftwing party in its own right for Corbyn to lead and allow Labour to vote in someone who actually stands a chance of winning, after a little flirting with the unions. We need to bring back politicians with substance and a little style – statesmen and women.

Let them lead us out of this shipwreck, with confident, practical, decisions.