In a development that surprised absolutely no one and yet somehow still managed to disappoint, ITV's Sunday night exposé documenting widespread racism and misogyny within Reform produced a curious phenomenon on Monday morning: silence. Not a single Reform MP appeared on the airwaves to defend the party's honour, presumably because "our bigotry is endemic" is a tricky thesis to spin before 9am.

Every Reform MP was, we're told, otherwise engaged. Having breakfast, perhaps. Nigel Farage said nothing. Robert Jenrick said nothing - a notable restraint given that just days earlier he had suggested the whole affair was simply one of those things, one of life's little mysteries, in the manner of a man explaining that the BBC was riddled with paedophiles and Reform was awash with racists, but really, every organisation has its crosses to bear. Honest Bob, as John Crace dubs him, had already crashed and burned on that particular hill.

With the party's elected representatives conveniently indisposed, the unenviable task of defending Reform fell to Matt Goodwin - a failed byelection candidate - who dutifully stepped into the breach while the MPs hid behind their cornflakes. It was, in the grand tradition of political damage control, the dog that didn't bark in the night, except this time the dog had sent out a substitute to bark on its behalf.

The exposé itself documented racism and misogyny that the party would presumably prefer viewers regarded as the fault of journalists who simply couldn't stop themselves from investigating Reform, rather than evidence of a problem that is, in Crace's framing, endemic. The party's response - or rather, its conspicuous lack of one - suggested it was still working on a more persuasive version of that argument.