Image starting work at 5 in the morning and your first task is to clean up Charles Kennedy’s vomit from the floor of the bar. Then you have to collect the stained tissues scattered around Tony Blair’s office. Followed by sweeping up the intoxicating powder left in the toilet by David Cameron. This is the reality faced on a daily basis by the House of Commons cleaners.

To add insult to injury they are paid shit wages without any holiday or sick pay or pension provision. The chief executive of the agency that employs them is on six figure salary. The cleaners went on strike for the second time on Wednesday.