Watching UK politics at the moment is like witnessing a slow motion multi-vehicle pile up on a motorway incline covered in black ice. You can see what’s coming and you know that all the participants are powerless to prevent it happening. The first collision occurred in November during the Owen Paterson affair which then careered straight into partygate. Since then there has been a succession of issues developing and of varying seriousness which Johnson is wrestling with.
Top of the list is probably Ukraine with Russia poised to invade within days, something I personally think is now inevitable. Johnson and Truss are perhaps the pair least able to influence events since nobody thinks they are anything other than featherweights out for their own ends.
The NIP
The DUP and the ERG are said to be working together to get article 16 triggered as if this would somehow remove the Irish Sea border. If they get their wish we will see a damaging response from the EU, with the suspension of the trade and cooperation agreement one possibility. It will not be good news for UK-EU trade whatever happens and our relations with Brussels, bad as it is, will only get worse.
Fracking
With soaring energy costs, Johnson is coming under pressure from his right wing, including Lord Frost, to restart fracking operations as if that’s a solution to the present crisis. I think supporters of fracking underestimate local opposition and also its impact on prices. There is a global market and private companies will sell it at world prices anyway. Why would they do otherwise?
Also, in both Yorkshire and Lancashire opposition is extremely strong and adamantly opposed to it.
Smaller state
The new No 10 chief of staff Stephen Barclay is writing in The Telegraph about Johnson’s political ambitions for a smaller state with lower government spending and even lighter regulation. This is like asking someone who wants to go to London to get on a bus carrying a sign for Glasgow.
How they hope to square this at a time when (after 12 years of Conservative government) taxes and spending are at a 70 year high with the levelling up agenda and the demands of red wall MPs is a mystery to a lot of Tory MPs.
Knighthoods for sale?
There is a suggestion in some quarters that Johnson intends to “win back” rebels by offering them all knighthoods, which is likely to prompt calls for another inquiry. Peerages are already available for £3 million if you’re rich enough and want to swell Tory coffers, now it appears knighthoods are too.
It all adds to the stench of sleaze surrounding No 10 these days.
Did Johnson break anti-bribery laws?
When Lord Geidt’s report came out it emerged that Johnson had appeared to link Lord Brownlow’s funding of the Downing Street flat refurbishment with Brownlow’s proposal for a new ‘Great Exhibition'. This resulted in a meeting with Oliver Dowden, the Culture Secretary, a month later.
Although nothing eventually came of it, there are now demands to see minutes of Dowden’s meeting since it looks like an offence may have been committed.
Solicitors for the Labour Party have written to the police last week, suggesting they were “duty-bound” to begin a formal investigation, because there was a “reasonable suspicion” that the law had been broken.
Lifting covid restrictions
The lifting of covid restrictions by Johnson earlier than most other countries and while cases and deaths are still worryingly high looks political rather than epidemiological with some scientists condemning the move.
It does seem to be a massive gamble especially if another variant comes out and cases begin to rise again.
The Arcuri affair resurfaces
The Arcuri affair has had new life breathed into it by the news last year that Arcuri herself is now cooperating with the Greater London Authority about her relationship with Johnson. Everybody thinks Johnson, when he was Mayor of London, diverted £126,000 of public money to her company while he was having an affair with her. She also mysteriously managed to get on various promotional trips.
This could ultimately result in a charge of misconduct in a public office.
Brexit delays
New Brexit rules for exporters and importers are starting to cause serious delays and queues at both Dover and Calais. The MP for Dover, Natalie Elphicke, a Brexiteer herself, even raised this in the Commons but claimed it was due to Brussels bureaucracy. There are claims that the UK is still waiving trucks through to minimise queues in Calais because the infrastructure and staff aren’t available.
Whatever is happening is clearly not good for trade and it must eventually result in there being less trade, which remainers have always said.
Scotland
Another problem, possibly one of the biggest, is the break up of the UK with the SNP and Green parties working together to get a second referendum on Scottish independence next year. The prime minister is their biggest asset in this endeavour.
Johnson travelled to Scotland yesterday but was only there briefly and didn’t actually meet anybody important or members of the public, not even the leader of the Scottish Conservatives who has called for him to resign because he’s political kryptonite north of the border.
This was from the BBC's chief political correspondenr in Scotland on Sunday:
The Prime Minister of Scotland is to actually step foot into Scotland for an hour tomorrow. As the Scots Tory leader won't talk to him, I understand the PM is instead going to discuss the ongoing Ukraine tensions with a couple of trees in South Inch park in Perth.
— Natalie Hunter (@NatHunter_1) February 13, 2022
Partygate
All of this is separate to the partygate scandal with news that Johnson has now hired a lawyer and will argue he was at all these events in a work capacity. The Times reports that "Boris Johnson will argue that he attended a series of lockdown-breaching parties in Downing Street as part of his working day."
How this will go down with those who worked closely with the PM and won't be able to argue the same thing will be interesting as will the excuse his wife Carrie intends to use.
Of course other world-leaders face problems every day too, but with Johnson what's surprising is the sheer number which are entirely self made and connected with the character defects that have long been his hallmark.
