Jonathan Freedland does well to rubbish four of the main “spurious arguments” advanced by Tories for Boris Johnson to stay in office, but strangely fails to mention the one that is possibly the most damaging for the Tory party (Johnson to stay because of Ukraine? Nonsense. The war makes it more urgent that he go, 15 April). Many Tory MPs have openly acknowledged that there is no one in the party ready to take Johnson’s place, so the first prime minister ever found to have broken the law in office has to stay. What an admission.
Presumably from this we can assume that no other Tory MP would be able to persuade voters that the party is committed “both to the observance of the law, and also to the rule of law”, in the words of Lord Wolfson? Furthermore, is there nobody with better, more humane ideas for dealing with asylum seekers, or ready to impose fair taxation policies after facing scrutiny of their own tax records? Even more importantly, does no one better than Johnson exist in the party with the necessary empathy to help the millions of people suffering in the cost-of-living crisis?
