No. 233- Bullying, Blackmail, Operation Save Boris Morphs into Operation Red Meat and Our Nation is in Chaos.

Dear James,

Boris is hunkered down at Chequers. The phone lines are hot. The whips are working overtime. Even the Downing Street cat is wondering why they’ve forgotten his milk this morning. Poor Pussy, the reason is that Boris really is in his last chance saloon. This week, Sue Gray, the Senior Civil Servant tasked with delivering her report on ‘partygate’, will slap it onto Boris’s desk. Which is why your Prime Minister James is going, in short shrift, from despair to hope and back to despair.

Boris is hunkered down at Chequers. The phone lines are hot. The whips are working overtime. Even the Downing Street cat is wondering why they’ve forgotten his milk this morning. Poor Pussy, the reason is that Boris really is in his last chance saloon. This week, Sue Gray, the Senior Civil Servant tasked with delivering her report on ‘partygate’, will slap it onto Boris’s desk. Which is why your Prime Minister James is going, in short shrift, from despair to hope and back to despair. Yet even if his ever more desperate actions this week succeed, the man and the party he leads are permanently damaged.

You have a part in this drama, James. As a Junior Whip, you’ll be this weekend intent on ‘persuading‘ your red wall MPs and others to vote for Boris once the report is delivered. I’d like to think that threats of withdrawal of local funding or future ministerial appointments will not be part of your ‘persuasive efforts’. However, after your fellow MP, William Wragg’s revelation that such tactics are common and promising to take them to the police this week, I’m afraid I’m not too hopeful.

Westminster has rarely been in such chaos. Your Tory Government, has moved from being the laughing stock of the world to the rapidly decomposing corpse of those values of integrity, honour and good behaviour for which we were once admired worldwide. Our reputation for democratic honesty lies in tatters. Boris Johnson and his team have dragged our nation into an abyss. The ‘Save Boris’ fight back campaign has been both pathetic and ineffective. Intimidation, smeers, blackmail and threats to political futures are clearly acts of desperation more suitable to the mafiosi than to our political system. Yet under Boris, they have become the norm.

This week we’ve witnessed the well worn populist principle of doubling down on previous errors, in overdrive. Last Monday, 'Operation Save Black Dog' or 'Operation Red Meat', depending on your preferred ‘distraction', were launched. Nadine Dorries told us that the government would be freezing the BBC License Fee for two years. Priti Patel announced that the Royal Navy would be brought in to stem the flow of cross channel immigrants. The Police and Crime Bill was pushed forward with its clauses banning ‘noisy’ demonstrations. All red meat for the ERG.  But by the end of the week, Dominic Cummings had re-entered the fray accusing his one time pal and master of lying to parliament. Ferrets in a bag? More like hyenas on the stinking carcass of a buffalo.

Last Tuesday, Boris appeared before the cameras to say sorry for allowing a party to take place on the eve of the Duke of Edinburgh’s funeral. His eyes were dead. The man looked defeated. Not even his mask could hide his despondency. He was the schoolboy before the headmaster. The grovelling bully called to account. He was clearly in pain. His head sagged in an act of contrition. One suspects however, that it was sorrow at having been caught red handed rather than genuine remorse. The next day he rallied. At PMQ’s he called up the remnants of his old bluster. But by then, his pistoning arm and pleading eyes - those old Borisian substitutes for actual policy - had become the empty eyes and nodding head of an inmate of an asylum.  

James, Boris’s credibility is shredded. The Boris fight back has petered out. The cornered beast could not sustain its snarls for more than a day. Even if he limps on for a bit longer, the damage is permanent: for him, for his government, for the nation as a whole, for democracy throughout the West. Last week, Christian Wakeford, MP for Bury South, crossed the floor to join Labour. Then, from the back benches, David Davis called on the PM ‘In the name of God, Go!”

This week, Sue Gray will deliver her report. Countless ‘partygoers’ in the government and civil service risk being exposed to similar fines to those of ‘ordinary people’ who were exposed to the full force of the law last year. ‘One rule for them, another for us’, may at last be replaced by, ’One rule for us, the same rule for everyone’. Now, wouldn’t that be justice indeed, James? 

Enjoy your week! 

BH- Your Concerned Constituent