I was tear-gassed last weekend while on holiday. I was watching a protest against a left-wing leader who had failed to get a grip on crime and the tear-gas used on the brave protestors wafted on to our hotel balcony in Mexico City. It stung like hell and Lord knows how the people below could stand it as they pulled down the steel barriers in front of the presidential palace.

It reminded me of the recent Unite the Kingdom march that filled London with tens of thousands of protestors raging against a left-wing government unable to get a grip on uncontrolled migration and the crime that comes with it – but without the riot at the end thankfully.

Much like our own Prime Minister, the socialist Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum claims she can do little about the crime crisis ravaging her country.

The trigger for the Mexican protest, which filled the whole of Zocalo Square – one of the largest public spaces in the world – was the assassination of regional mayor Carlos Manzo, killed during a Day of the Dead festival on November 1, for protesting against drug gang violence.

An enormous banner in the square called for an end to the Narco state in which cartel gangs corrupt the system and many young protestors have just disappeared, murdered by the drug gangs.

The thousands of demonstrators who filled the square wore white shirts and straw hats in memory of the courageous mayor. It started off peacefully, but the police squirted tear gas as the protestors closed in on their lines and the young people begun to tear down the steel screen in front of the Palacio Nacional to huge cheers.

For most of the afternoon, the police were on the back foot, rushing in armoured reinforcements to protect the president’s residence, but finally exhausted the crowd withdrew and that was when the clouds of tear-gas turned against us and we fled the balcony.

But the abiding memory of that day is how a largely peaceful movement can suddenly snap when it is pushed too far by a government that seems to have little grip of the nation’s crime wave.

The same peaceful flag-waving demonstration that brought thousands of ordinary British citizens on to our streets in September in London, to protest against uncontrolled migration and its assault on our national way of life, could easily turn to violence if our left-wing government continues to ignore the very real impact on our daily lives.

All around the world, there is a pushback against priviliged and out of touch elites. While no one can or should condone violence, it’s easy to see how frustration can reach boiling point when ordinary people feel too long ignored.