Sentimentality is the enemy of good governance, as the spectacular mismanagement of modern Britain proves. Our politics are now dominated by emotive manipulation, deceitful propaganda, invented grievance and assertions of victimhood. Too many decisions are now taken, not in the national interest but in response to spasms of outrage or self-pity.

This pattern can be seen in the escalating mental health crisis, which owes its growth more to social fashion and the hope of state support than real medical problems. The same is true of claims about worsening poverty in our country, despite massive, unsustainable recent increases in welfare spending. This week a report from the Children’s Commissioner Dame Rachel de Souza stated that many children in Britain are facing “real hardship and almost Dickensian levels of poverty,” indicated by rat-infested, over-crowded accommodation and inadequate or rotten supplies of food.

Her report is designed to tug at the heart strings but she undermines her case by exaggeration. It is an absurd hyperbole to pretend that our society is gripped by the same kind of destitution and neglect that characterised parts of 19th century urban England during Dickens’ time. when there was no social security system at all.

Here is a passage from his great novel Oliver Twist, which describes the grim rookery inhabited by villain Bill Sykes: “Rooms So small, so filthy, so confined that the air would seem to be so tainted even for the dirt and squalor which they shelter; dirt-besmeared walls, and decaying foundations, every repulsive lineament of poverty, every loathsome indication of filth, rot, and garbage.”

If some children are unfortunate enough to live in such grim conditions today, then that is down to inadequate parenting rather than inadequate state funding. The Children’s Commissioner argues that there are 4.5 million British children now living in poverty, a shocking figure if it were true. In fact, it is based on the dubious concept of “relative poverty” which defines any household as poor if its income is less than 60% of the national median.

On that basis, even millionaires in Monaco could be classified as poverty-stricken if their wealth is more than 40% below the Principality’s average. But sentimentality, not reality, drives the campaigners and politicians. Unconcerned about Britain’s colossal debts, they howl for greater benefits spending, as typified by the demand from the Children’s Commissioner for an end to the rule – introduced by the Tories in 2017 – that tax credits should be restricted in any family to the first two children.

The abolition of the two-child limit would cost the Treasury around £3.5billion at a time when the public finances are riddled with black holes, not least because the Government has been forced by a series of internal rebellions to dump its plans for welfare reform. Once again, this revolt was fuelled by emotional blackmail, as MPs wrung their hands over hard luck stories, while ignoring the damage caused by the cultures of dependency, fraud and entitlement.

Sentimentality is wrecking our national integrity. British officialdom is now the softest of touches when it comes to upholding our borders, deporting foreign criminals or tackling the small boats of illegal migrants. While the Border Force acts as a quasi-ferry service across the Channel, the Government tries to make the public feel warmer towards the new arrivals by pretending that most of them are women and children, when the overwhelming majority are young men of military age.

Indeed, dishonesty is the constant partner of sentimentality. So the public is constantly spoon-fed myths such as the claims that most migrants come here to work, that diversity is our strength, that our human rights stem from Europe, and the NHS is “the envy of the world”. Professions of faith in community sentences or in rehabilitation programmes belong to the same school of mushy leniency. The entire spirit of the state is flabby, enfeebled, always looking for the line of least resistance, unwilling to stand by tough decisions or live within its means. In 1957 there was a famous newspaper editorial which called for the “smack of firm government.” That need is more pressing than ever.