No.241 – Boris Fined for Breaking the Law

Dear James,

I’d like to think you might feel a little embarrassed this morning? Or even experience a smidgeon of shame? Because yesterday, the Metropolitan Police issued FPNs (Fixed Penalty Notices) on Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak for breaking the laws of the land that they themselves had created and passed. Time and again Johnson has insisted in the House of Commons that he has followed the Covid rules and that there had been no parties. That is now proven to be false. In other words, our Prime Minister has lied. His latest excuse is that he ‘unknowingly’ misled parliament and therefore had not technically broken the ministerial code. Poppycock! Yet, despite all the evidence, Johnson refuses to resign. Embarrassed James? I doubt it!

You James, will, no doubt, hide behind the smokescreen of not sacking a leader during a war crisis. Or that we ‘need to get this minor misdemeanor into perspective’. Either way you will be proving yet again that you are a tribal MP rather than an MP who thinks for himself or for the country as a whole. In a true democracy under the rule of law, any minor digression by its leaders is critically important for the maintenance of such a democracy. Boris’s was a not a one-off misdemeanor. It is part of a well established pattern of rule breaking by your government and its leader. Anyone with a scrap of self respect or honour would have resigned immediately the fine landed on their doormat. Boris is wilfully deaf to any such idea. A condition that seems endemic in the current Tory Party.

Like a persistent migraine then, Boris Johnson refuses to even contemplate resignation. He still believes he’s done nothing wrong.  Soon after yesterday’s announcement, he appeared – disheveled, reading from a prepared script and disassociated from reality - telling the BBC’s Vikki Young that he had paid the fine and sincerely regretted attending his ‘ten minutes’ birthday bash that his colleagues had kindly arranged for him in June 2020. With the false innocence of schoolboy remorse, he used the word humility at least three times during this painful Apologia. ‘Johnson’ and ‘humility’ must be one of the most stunning semiotic oxymorons of all times. Almost simultaneously families, bereaved in the pandemic, said there was "simply no way either the prime minister or chancellor can continue" in their jobs, calling their actions "truly shameless". How right they are. Boris’s staged humility is belied by his track record. Remember, how he falsely prorogued parliament, how he blatantly warned the EU that he would break international law, how he has since broken a solemn international treaty about the post-Brexit regulations in Northern Ireland and, of course, how he has continuously lied to parliament over the last years when questioned about ‘Partygate’ as it has become known. Johnson is the ultimate liar and the majority of the British public know it. He has to resign. But, of course, he won’t.

James, the great majority of the British people is fundamentally fair minded. It’s in our DNA and as such is recognized around the world. The British people know a bounder when they see one and Boris Johnson is the classic embodiment of such a type. He is so embedded in his patrician notion of being above the law that he has seriously damaged our international reputation for fair play. He is the first serving Prime Minister to have broken the law of the land. That in itself should be enough to preclude him from any further role in politics.

But James, our nation is trapped in its antediluvian system of first-past-the-post voting which allows a government to be elected by a minority of the voting population (Boris won only 30% of the eligible vote in 2019). The final outcome of such systems is that a government can unflinchingly inflict its values or lack of values on a non-consenting majority. Your government has imposed a leader and a politics on the British public that fundamentally offend the true values of our island including those of fairness, decency and the need for honesty, probity and integrity in its politicians. Boris Johnson is the epitome of our current crisis.

We still await Sue Gray’s Final Report on the whole ‘partygate’ saga and of course, there is still the possibility of further fines on Downing Street and Whitehall. The public however is stuck, unable to prise your unrepresentative leader from office. Only you James and the rest of the Tory Party have the power to do that today. If you fail to do that you will be seen as ever more deeply complicit in the tragedy now facing our nation.

There are local local elections on May 5th James. Let’s hope the results will help you understand the depth of the British public’s disgust with your leader and government. Shame and embarrassment may be beyond you but election results may just hit the mark. Here’s hoping? 

BH – Your Concerned Constituent