The Prime Minister's Week in Hell: "The Walls are Closing In!"
One of the media clichés in the build-up to the 2020 US presidential election was the phrase, ‘the walls are closing in’ - on Donald Trump - and of course they did eventually close in when he lost the election to Joe Biden.
This article isn’t about Trump, however - it’s about Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
This week could be Johnson’s last and indeed, the walls very much feel like they are closing in on the Prime Minister.
There are four stories that could end him:
Story #1 - The various Christmas parties from last year.
Story #2 - Conservative backbenchers are likely to vote against the Prime Minister when a largely symbolic vote on Plan B measures is brought to Parliament; with health officials imploring the government to enact Plan C.
Story #3 - Either the re-opening of an investigation regarding a refurbishment of the Prime Minister’s flat, or the resignation of Lord Geidt as independent standards adviser - following the revelations that the Prime Minister misled the investigation.
Story #4 - North Shropshire by-election where currently, things are looking rather bleak for the Conservatives indeed.
Story #1 - “It’s the BBC’s fault,” says the Prime Minister
This isn’t likely to abate - for a start, the public are interested, which means for the purposes of selling newspapers, print media will continue with the story until consumers essentially are sick of it.
New dimensions to this story are exposed on an almost daily basis; while new revelations come to the fore such as:
Party No. 6 - involving Rishi Sunak’s treasury staff
Party No. 7 - involving the Department of Work and Pensions staff
Party No. 8 - the Prime Minister himself hosted a quiz on December 14 when Tier 2 restrictions were in place and non-business related indoor gatherings were banned [with pictures of the event, no-less]
Incidentally, on all of the above, the Daily Mail and Boris Johnson have taken to blaming the BBC almost entirely for the matter of literally reporting the news as they are supposed to.
Although it is hard to see how the Prime Minister can apportion the blame to the media when it appears his own words - and specifically in the case of the quiz - are most incriminating of all.
Last week at Prime Minister’s questions, Boris Johnson stated:
We can obviously see that this is not true - and the Prime Minister not only ‘knew’ of the party but subject to the corroborating evidence put forth to the Sunday Mirror was actively participating, albeit from the safety of a Zoom conference.
His statement in the Commons - exposed here quite evidently as a lie - is a flagrant breach of ministerial code; a second in addition to that spoken about in my previous article.
It's also a dereliction of duty - on December 15 last year, as the Prime Minister was allegedly hosting the quiz, Sir Keir Starmer had written a letter to the Prime Minister asking him to convene a COBRA meeting to discuss the worsening situation relating to the Christmas wave of infections that saw thousands more in the following weeks and months sadly lose their lives.
This, along with a myriad of other stories that have been developing in the last few weeks and months, have culminated in a drop in support for the Conservatives that some commentators and pollsters [such as Opinium’s Chris Curtis] have stated would see the beleaguered party lose over 100 seats at the next election - albeit with the caveat that there would still not be a clear majority for any one particular party and notably, that the Prime Minister would lose his own seat in Uxbridge and Ruislip South.
With stories continuing to be fed into the melting pot - and especially when talk of more draconian restrictions is being suggested - it is very difficult to see how the story can be perceived as irrelevant, and will likely continue for the remainder of this Parliamentary sitting until recess.
Story #2: Parliament is theatre; the real work happens in the Portcullis House toilets
Indeed, ‘draconian measures’ are serving as the debate that is scheduled for this week on the matter of Plan B and its implementation [subject to vote] on Wednesday.
As noted before, the vote is viewed as being largely symbolic and is expected to pass - however, it is worth noting that it appears, based on the initial reports, that the Prime Minister is relying on the votes of opposition for it to pass.
There is a fundamental weakness, then - in Boris Johnson’s grasp of power with a level of disdain shown by backbenchers towards the Prime Minister that some are comparing to the final days of Theresa May’s premiership.
One Conservative MP told iNews:
“Two years on almost to the day from Boris’s biggest triumph he has, not to put too fine a point on it, f***ed it. His chances of making the next election have slipped well below 50-50. He is treating the British public like he has his previous relationships and it’s not an edifying sight.”
While another adds:
“The trouble is, no one likes him. He has never been an MP who gets along with people, so it means he has no support base inside the Commons.”
The debate on Plan B restrictions, however, pales in comparison to the growing threat of the Omicron variant, which only Saturday health officials were stating - in contrast to the views of the libertarian elements within the Conservative Party - that stricter Covid isolation and testing rules were needed [or “stringent national measures”].
Alarm bells rang when, embarrassingly, the Department of Health and Social Care posted and then subsequently deleted a tweet showing guidelines on mandatory vaccine passports, paving the way for a week of uncertainty on just how the Prime Minister’s own backbenchers are going to react in the coming days - and at least before recess is due to take place.
And with ‘Plan C’ being spoken about, too, the libertarian apparatchik will once again be asking many questions of the Prime Minister’s viability.
Added to the mix is the Theresa May camp who - according to the Times - are already preparing letters of ‘No Confidence’ pending the result of the North Shropshire by-election.
Story #3 - Revenge of the Geidt
The Prime Minister’s ‘viability’, however, may be taken out of the hands of the Conservatives in any case if the revelations of the Prime Minister’s misleading of Lord Geidt’s investigation are to be taken further.
As of today, Lord Geidt has remained very quiet on the matter.
Several days ago it was being reported that Geidt was set to resign citing freshly revealed WhatsApp messages that suggested the Prime Minister had misled him regarding the investigation over who paid for Downing St. flat refurbishment.
In May, Johnson told Geidt that he knew nothing of those involved in funding the flat refurbishment until February 2021.
It was revealed through an additional investigation by the Electoral Commission that Johnson asked for more money [in addition to the £52,000 approx he’d already received] in November 2020.
Then reports suggested he wasn’t resigning.
This is a far more pressing concern for the Prime Minister because the implications carry a weight that goes beyond anything voter support or party support may have previously burdened, each of which is either dwindling in the case of voter support, and as noted above, virtually non-existent in a party political sense, respectively.
If Geidt resigns, for example, it would be the second ministerial adviser in short succession to have resigned from the position following Sir Alex Allan’s departure last year.
To lose one adviser is unfortunate. To lose two is… well.
The optics in this case are awful for Johnson, and especially so when considering that Sir Alex Allan resigned after Johnson - the ultimate arbiter - overruled Allan’s judgement on Priti Patel having broken the ministerial code.
If Geidt decides to reopen the investigation, it could [and almost certainly would] factor in the findings of the Electoral Commission that ultimately fined the Conservative Party £17,800 for improperly declaring donations by Huntswood Associates; which essentially served as a trust from which Johnson could request funds to pay for the refurbishment.
If it is found in both cases that he misled the investigation with regards to funds but also Parliament for saying all of this back in April:
…Then Geidt may find that Johnson’s role is untenable, and following this, it will be left up to the ‘ultimate arbiter’ to tender his resignation to… well, himself.
Story #4 - An Ouroboros in Oswestry
One of the biggest tests of the Prime Minister’s premiership is the upcoming by-election in Owen Paterson’s former constituency of North Shropshire.
Things are looking rather perilous for the Conservatives at the minute with internal Liberal Democrat polling in the area suggesting the contest is ‘tight’; and others - as noted by The Times earlier this article - suggesting the difference to be around 500 votes.
People in the area are already turning from the Conservatives, as suggested by this account in the Telegraph:
Having learned nothing from their failings in Chesham & Amersham, the Liberal Democrats are hoping to replicate the result and capitalise on the disjuncture.
The wider the margin of success [for the Liberal Democrats], the more likely [and more damaging] the fallout for the previously unassailable Boris Johnson.
It’s quite possible that we could see an internal Conservative war developing from Friday onwards - albeit with a convenient, near serendipitous break for recess before Parliament returns in the New Year giving the Prime Minister time to do one of two things:
Resign in the interim; sparking a power vacuum that no clean-cut candidate is ready and/or trained to occupy. [Sunak/Truss/Patel/Hunt/Gove/Raab/Baker - and in that order, but don’t discount Matt Hancock either, who is currently engaged in a ‘Bouncing Back’ tour fresh from his trip to Dundee in bare feet snaffling on Toblerones]
Or
Hubristically [and figuratively] visit The Winchester and assume the outrage will have abated by the New Year.
On the latter point, Boris Johnson will most likely find out shortly afterwards that where the Conservatives’ reputation is concerned, they will act in the interest of their party first before the country.
It is, after all, what they have always done.
No easy way out
The allusion to Donald Trump at the beginning was deliberate.
First because obviously, this same fall from grace [by way of disgrace] has been charted before by a man in similar populist stature to Boris Johnson. It was inevitable that the same would happen to the Prime Minister, too.
The second is more obvious and shines a path to where this country envisions itself in a year’s time, if it has a vision or direction at all; if at this stage it hasn’t been left totally numb or desensitised to the political mismanagement of this charlatan.
Boris Johnson at this point may elicit the same national feeling as Donald Trump did in the US just over a year ago. Likewise Johnson’s removal is in a similar and immediate national interest.
How it happens - and as a consequence of which mistake - has yet to be determined.
It could happen for one, two, three, maybe even all four reasons noted above, but whichever it may be should come with consequences, and an apology for it will not be enough.
For now, we can only wait and see.