Okay Mrs Burnham, aka Marie-France van Heel, known to your chums as Frankie, now is the time to come to the aid of the party (with both a lower and an upper case P). I know you are a successful marketing executive, steering a career entirely independent from your old man’s. I know you are a beautiful brainbox who collided with Andy when you were both studying at my own alma mater Cambridge. I know you are a private person, not simply a plus one to be trotted out as an addendum to your husband. You are not his chattel, much less the United Kingdom’s. I get it. It’s just that your lifelong sweetheart is about to be Prime Minister and this green and hitherto pleasant land needs all the help it can muster.

Marie-France, I hope you won’t mind if I feel we’re on first name terms, couldn’t you find it in your soul to go a bit traditional for a couple of years and put all hands on deck? The nation is well aware you didn’t much fancy Number 10 but, now you’re almost over the threshold, couldn’t you have a rethink and get on board? Think of all the busy working wives (and occasionally husbands) who have toiled tirelessly to help their spouses set up businesses and run parishes or farms.

My own mother read history at the London School of Economics but, when my father was ousted from the family business and had to set up on his own, nobly abandoned academia and kept the family afloat working in a wool shop. She abhorred every second but sacrificed herself for the greater good. At least throwing yourself into the role of PM’s consort wouldn’t have to be stultifying. You could channel Michelle Obama – not Hilary Clinton, that would be too much for any of us – and make it your own.

Please don’t do a Norma Major on us. Remember she was forever tending her herbaceous border back home in Huntingdon. We need a level-headed, business-minded, intuitive, sensitive, insightful and above all, gentle – the adjective your chums use most often to describe you – person to give good counsel, sound pep-talks and puncture hubris plus bring their own brand of wit, warmth and wisdom to politics. I’m not asking you to dim your light and become a simpering clothes-horse, snipping ribbons and patting babies. I’m asking you to help out in what feels to me very much like a crisis. Please reconsider. You faced Cilla on Blind Date without flinching. Marie-France, you’ve got this.