At the start of a week when the Conservatives face the prospect of two byelection defeats – possible tasters of the general election wipeout to come – voices on the party’s right calling for Boris Johnson to return in some form are growing louder.
On Sunday they came not just through renewed pressure from the Tory-leaning press but from the former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, who said that Rishi Sunak “should swallow some pride” and bring his rival back into the fold.
For many who recall Johnson’s fall from grace after an investigation found he had misled parliament – and the bitter 1,000-word statement accompanying his resignation as an MP last year in which he attacked Sunak’s government – such a course of action is unthinkable.
Yet the prospect of a return has lingered since Johnson himself planted the seed during his 2022 departure speech from Downing Street when he likened himself to Cincinnatus, the Roman political leader cum farmer who “returned to his plough” but staged a comeback to Rome to lead as a dictator.
The former prime minister also continues to enjoy a hardcore following who yearn for the man who delivered the party’s best showing in a parliamentary election since Margaret Thatcher’s 1987 victory.
David Campbell Bannerman, chair of the Conservative Democratic Organisation founded by the ex-PM’s allies to rally grassroots support, told the Guardian that bringing back Johnson would send a strong signal to Brexiter Conservatives swinging to Richard Tice’s Reform party.
“But why should he help Sunak when Sunak allegedly threatened to bring him down again if he stood as leader last time – and Boris would have won the leadership. Sunak would have to go down on both knees and beg Boris to help save him,” Campbell Bannerman said.
For the Mail on Sunday, which carried an editorial calling for the political return of the man who is now employed by its sister paper, he is the “star striker” sitting on the bench.
Days after Andrew Griffith, the science minister, said Johnson was a “great voice” who would be welcomed back to the Tory election campaign, the Mail and Sunday Telegraph reported that it would take a personal phone call from Sunak to secure his return.
But what difference would Johnson make beyond the Tory grassroots yearning for the “Boris brand”?
One thing he would be unable to change is the stark economic reality, which the Treasury concedes will be underlined this week when data shows inflation rising again, a fresh blow to a key Sunak pledge.
Nevertheless, Johnson loyalists insist he is a proven vote winner with the ability somehow to appeal to voters in so-called red wall seats taken from Labour in 2019. Johnson was an “electoral force” who should be weaponised, suggested Kwarteng, who urged Sunak to turn to the man with whom he badly fell out.
“And if that means swallowing some pride and you’re suppressing a bit of ego by reaching out to someone who’s an approved campaigner then, yeah, then he should do that,” Kwarteng told GB News.
Of course, such a scenario assumes that the ruthless ambition always associated with Johnson has somehow dissipated and that he would be content with anything other than wearing the emperor’s wreath.
It’s a stretch but still not an insurmountable obstacle to imagine a Tory MP falling on their own sword to pave the way back to parliament for Johnson.
Even then, and were he to pull off a truly Roman palace coup, polling last month by Ipsos UK gave him a favorability rating among 2019 Tory voters of 43%, while at 34% his unfavorability rating was higher than that of Sunak.
For now, at least, enthusiasm among Tory MPs for a Johnson rerun appears limited to a handful of outliers and retiring parliamentarians.
No 10 sources say that “Boris and everyone else” will be welcome as part of the “whole Conservative family” coming together to take on Labour.
Expect Sunak to repeat variations on that theme through gritted teeth.
