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If there is a sentence capable of summing up the new dystopia of 2020, it is these five words. “Arise Sir Iain Duncan Smith”.

All millions of us wanted for Christmas was to see IDS lose his seat, as political karma for years of brutal welfare policies.

Yet here he is –rewarded with another five years representing Chingford and Woodford Green and a knighthood.

Hasn’t Her Majesty suffered enough in recent weeks? What twisted “services” a grovelling Prime Minister must have scrabbled with.

Waging war on disabled people? Wrecking the welfare net beyond repair? Turning the country against single mothers and people whose carers sleep in the spare bedroom?

(Image: Getty)

And where will this ennoblement story turn next? Will he become Lord Duncan Smith of Easterhouse, the Scottish community where he once wept for the plight of the poor?

This scene of “Damascene Conversion” that saw him invent the Bedroom Tax and Universal Credit. A conversion that left millions in grinding poverty.

I can think of no man in these times who has done more to blight the life chances of poor children, damage communities and even cause loss of life through his stubborn pursuit of cruel policies.

Yet Prime Minister Boris Johnson cares nothing for this.

IDS is being rewarded for his loyalty to the Brexit project, his loyalty to the Boris project and his future silence on the direction of the country, bought off for life.

If this is one of the first actions of Prime Minister Johnson we should all fear where his government goes next.

The image of IDS kneeling before the Queen should be seared into our collective retina like a dieter’s photo on the fridge.

Never, ever again, must these people be in charge of things.

The cost to our nation and our national dignity is too great.