Todays i newspaper has an excellent, if rather depressing, analysis of recent political events involving our P.M and his beloved aide by one of the paper's leading columnists, Ian Birrel:
Boris Johnson relies on Dominic
Cummings as a comfort blanket because he has few ideas of his own
The Prime Minister's pathetic
appearance at the Commons Liaison Committee shows that he is a hollow, shallow
Prime Minster
Clearly Dominic Cummings has
little respect for rules. So he must be delighted to have shattered one of the
most oft-heard maxims in Westminster: when an adviser becomes the story, they
must go.
Never mind that he has been
exposed as a fraud – the populist who believes he can behave differently to
lesser folk; the data guru unaware changing a blog could be easily detected;
the “superforecaster” who failed to see the furore.
Nor indeed that the entire nation
could observe the pomposity being pricked of a man who sneers at many other
mortals, squirming to keep his job with an absurd story about driving to test
his eyesight.
This diminished character stays
in Downing Street to serve as a perpetual symbol of the political elite he
claimed to despise. His behaviour has reinforced the most corrosive image for
the Conservatives as a party out of touch with ordinary people. The furore
could not have come at worse time for his boss as questions arise over the
Government’s dire response to deadly pandemic. The big question is why was
Boris Johnson so desperate to retain his toxic pal in defiance of much of his
party and the public?
There are a slew of suggested
answers. Johnson has long been a rule breaker in both his personal and
professional life. He dislikes lockdown as someone intuitively sceptical about
the state (almost certainly one reason Britain was fatally slow in its response
to the virus). Like every incoming prime minister, he is determined not to be
pushed around by the media. These are valid explanations. The key reason,
however, was exposed when Johnson was forced to finally appear for a grilling
by the Commons Liaison Committee.
We know the Prime Minister is a
politician who tries to evade tough questioning. This 100-minute session showed
the reason for his reluctance. From start to finish, Johnson was floundering –
repeating mantras such as the need to “move on” from the Cummings farce,
waffling almost incoherently, woefully sluggish in reply to tough questions,
admitting he did not read scientific advice “except in exceptional
circumstances”, and, most alarmingly, lacking grasp of basic political detail.
Dodging questions over Cummings
was demeaning but predictable. Johnson was also fortunate some interrogators
sought to grandstand rather than probe. But when urged, for instance, to help
hitherto overlooked self-employed workers reliant on dividend payments from
their own firms – which the Tory MP Mel Stride rightly called a gaffe in the
strong fiscal response to pandemic – Johnson ended up boasting about “a pretty
awesome package”.
Darren Jones then raised issues
on the self-employed income support scheme, only to be met with blathering
about “generous” universal credit. “Prime minister, universal credit is not
generous,” the Labour MP replied acidly.
There were several more
toe-curling moments. Caroline Nokes, chair of the equalities committee, fired
off a series of strong questions on childcare and female representation in
decision-making. First came some flannel about female advisers. Then Johnson
patronisingly told a woman he fired from senior ministerial office that she
might end up the third Tory prime minister. Finally he had to be reprimanded
for laughing by the chair with a warning that gender equality was “not a joking
matter”.
Mostly it was rather pitiful,
like watching a talentless comedian wilt on stage. Yet one moment was terrible.
Labour’s Stephen Timms raised the case of a struggling couple in his London
consistency with leave to remain in the country but no recourse to public
funds. “Hang on,” he replied. “Why aren’t they eligible for universal credit or
employment support allowance or any of the other benefits?”
Bear in mind this is a politician
who won highest office at the helm of a movement exploiting fear over foreign
workers. He has given speeches about migrants treating Britain “as their own
country”. He plans to reform the immigration system to make it “fairer”. Yet he
was baffled when asked about a key plank of policy introduced in the last
century, extended by the Tories and debated dozens of times in Parliament.
Alarmingly, Johnson claimed to
have prepared. He was trying to be on his best behaviour. The questions were
not even that tricky. Yet he ended up showing that while he can be an engaging
and witty performer of set pieces, he lacks many skills demanded of a top
politician – from verbal dexterity, beyond mumbling and bumbling, through to a
firm grasp of detail and policy. Perhaps this should not be a surprise. The
broadcaster Jeremy Vine revealed how much of his act is based on artifice after
seeing two identical speeches with the same messed-up hair and gags. But it is
depressing to witness in a prime minister, especially amid a pandemic.
For all his showboating success
in winning elections, Johnson has a poor record in office. As mayor he rode the
coat-tails of his predecessor, his landmark policy of a garden bridge turning
into a costly flop. As foreign secretary, his inattention to detail was
disastrous. As prime minister, he seems to have no driving cause beyond a
hollow brand of patriotism and self-preservation. So it is obvious why he wants
the comfort blanket of a trusted aide who poses as someone with bold solutions.
But Britain faces extremely
challenging times. A pandemic is raging. People are dying. Flaws in society lie
brutally exposed. We face a savage economic downturn, possibly the worst for
three centuries. Now we have seen again, harshly exposed in the spotlight of
parliamentary accountability, the person in charge of our country. It is not a
reassuring image.
