Tony Blair must be the most reviled politicians in the UK. He has amassed a personal fortune since standing down as prime minister – often acting as an adviser to controversial businesses and regimes, while notionally trying to sort out the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (achieving zero). He signed a secret contract with a Saudi oil company for £41,000 a month and 2 per cent commission on any of the multi-million pound deals he helped broker, stipulating that the details should be secret. He made another large (undisclosed) sum advising Kazakhstan’s autocratic president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, on how to manage his image after the slaughter of 14 unarmed civilians. He is reported to have a property portfolio of 31 homes worth at least £25 million and to charge £150,000 a speech, in addition to a deal advising investment bank JP Morgan and Swiss insurer Zurich International. All this cloaked by a charity whose finances and activities are not clear.

Blair is not alone. The Clintons are under fire for profiting rather too obviously from their former advantagious position. The former President of Yemen, a pitifully poor country, salted away billions during his term in office and is reported to be the man funding the Huthi rebellion at present. And so it goes on. This is why Epicurus advised us to have nothing to do with politicians. It wasn’t always so crudely self-interested and obvious. Can you imagine Disraeli and Gladstone filling their pockets in massive conflicts of interest and greed? These were people who believed in public service.