Dear James,

How the mighty fall! Last Monday Boris, with his 80 seat majority, needed the Labour Party to push through legislation to contain Omicron. Ninety-nine – or almost a third of his MPs - voted against the motion. Boris is gravely wounded. This puffed up ball of hyperbolic fluff is deflating before our very eyes. There is no way back for him and, in the long-run, the wounds are probably fatal. Confused? Well the other story is that in that vote, the Tory party also revealed its own massive splits.

Dear James,

It was simple. Boris’s response, at PMQs yesterday, to the now infamous Allegra Stratton question of ‘What’s the answer?’ was true to character. ‘It wasn’t me gov! I was just passing by when the burglars smashed the windows and grabbed the jewellery! I’m mortified. The poor owners! To lose such precious sparklers! I know how they feel! It must have been awful!’

No one believed him. It was pure humbug.

Dear James,

What’s the answer, James? What’s the answer, Prime Minister?’ Today the Tory Party disaster continues along its inevitable track towards doom and destruction. Last night a video was revealed showing Allegra Stratton, Boris’s one time Press Secretary, practising handling questions from a hostile press, in the union flag bedecked, ‘never to be launched’ Downing Street News Centre. The date was December 18th 2020, just a week after the country had been placed in Tier 3 lockdown and on the day that 514 of our compatriots died of Covid 19. People who were breaking lockdown rules were being arrested. But in Downing Street, the mood was relaxed, even jocular.

Dear James,

I can imagine the scene in your whips’ office before PMQs last Wednesday. After the Boris disasters of the last few weeks, dejection must have been the order of the day. In the gloom, your brave warriors were doing their best to lift spirits. ‘The Injuns are at our gates and we’ve got to come together’. Man the guns. Stir up the troops. Throw up the barricades. We’ve just got to believe that the boss is indestructible even if he attempts to autodestruct almost every day. Is this what this week’s Tory ‘circling the wagons’ exercise looked like, James?

Dear James.

Negotiation by megaphone. It’s a classic populist gambit. Or to put it more clearly, shout from the parapets what your supporters want to hear at the cost of outraging your negotiating partners. The ensuing fury has the additional advantage of distracting from your own troubles. What you don’t get however is a serious negotiation. In fact you can end up with no agreement at all. But that’s the beauty of it. When the negotiating partner says, ‘No’,

Dear James,

Last week we watched Boris cancel the eastern spur of HS2. This week the train crash which is your government, continues its inevitable rendezvous with political catastrophe. Yesterday Mr Johnson delivered a speech to the CBI in which he stumbled, deviated and lost control of both his subject and his own personal behavior. Rail crashes can happen in many different ways, James. I would characterize this one as a high-speed derailment. In deliciously slow motion.

Dear James,

Go to France, go to Germany, go to Spain. Each of those nearby nations enjoy fast, efficient high speed rail networks that straddle most parts of their respective nations. For the last forty years, the French have had their TGV by which any traveller can set their watches and travel between Paris and Lyons city centres in comfort and at speed. In Germany, at Frankfurt Airport, you can quickly get onto their ICE network and travel to any part of that nation. Yet in Britain, the nearest we get to a fast and efficient rail system is the high-speed line from the Channel tunnel to central London

Dear James,

Surely, even you must be feeling uncomfortable? The last fortnight has been a self-inflicted disaster for your leader and your party. Yesterday, at PM’s Question Time, Boris was castigated not just by the Opposition but also by the Speaker of the House. When Boris refused to offer an apology for the mess he’s made and then questionned Starmer’s own second job, the Speaker pointed out that Question Time is meant to be Questions to the PM, not by the PM. ‘Sit down!’ he shouted at the Prime Minister. ‘In this House I’m in charge!” Many will have applauded the Speaker

Dear James,

"Where's Boris?" shouted the Opposition in June 2018 when Mr Johnson, then Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, failed to turn up for a vote on the expansion of Heathrow’s third runway, something he had once said he would lie down in front of the bulldozers to prevent from happening. The answer was that he was on a last minute yet ‘unavoidable' trip to Afghanistan. Boris had bottled it. And now he’s done it again.

Dear James,

Your party is in serious trouble. So are you. So also, is our country. The party’s problem is Boris Johnson. Your problem is that you’re now personally and demonstrably complicit in last week’s catastrophic vote to protect Owen Paterson by removing the current Parliamentary Standards Committee and replacing it with a Tory majority alternative. The country’s problem is that our reputation for fairness and competence in our democratic system has been trashed yet again. The government has once more been revealed as corrupt, venal and incompetent. Boris has damaged your party, dented our parliament and dealt another egregious blow to our nation’s reputation for fair trading and honesty.

Dear James,

It was hard to believe. An amendment - supported by you in your new role as Junior Whip - to blow up the existing House of Commons Standards Committee (and conveniently suspending the 30 day suspension of Owen Paterson MP from the House) astounded the Commons and the nation beyond. The backlash has been immediate and, once again, your government is splattered in the mud of self-serving sleaze. Add to that today’s screeching U-Turn and what have we got? Another typical day in the life of government by Boris!

Dear James,

It was Boris the entertainer. Boris the clown. Boris the stand-up comedian. Joke followed joke. While those outside the Tory bubble looked on dumfounded, the audience at the Tory Party Conference’s closing speech clapped and laughed allowing the entertainment to drown out their doubts. Boris is living in some parallel universe where problems don’t exist and where opportunity sprouts like flowers on a desert landscape after the first rains.

Dear James,

This morning, on the BBC’s Today programme, Nick Robinson told Boris to ‘stop speaking, Prime Minister’. In other words, ‘Shut up, Boris!’. Boris was on a high, his verbosity on steroids as he forced his latest list of slogans upon the listeners. At this week’s Tory Party Conference, he is surrounded by fans and the oxygen of publicity without which our PM fades and withers. Boris needs applause to survive. He hates being alone in No.10. Look at his childish glee as he runs through the Tory conference of a green bike. He desperately needs to be liked