Move along, move along now. Nothing to see here. That was very much the subtext of Rishi Sunak’s speech to open London Tech week. Rather he was just talking Tech Bro to Tech Bro. He was the man who really got AI. Understood both its risks and potential. Stick with him. The Tories were the party of the future.
Only it wasn’t long before the past caught up with him. It turned out that not everyone was quite as interested in what the prime minister had to say about AI as he was. Almost inevitably, first came a question about Boris Johnson and the resignation honours list. Just what had gone on that had led to Johnson standing down as an MP?
Normally Rish! is one to duck confrontation. To say something bland and placatory. In between reeling off his five priorities to anyone who will listen. As if he believes that saying so will make them true. But this time Sunak chose to get stuck in. Fed up with Johnson undermining him from a distance, Rish! fought back.
Johnson had asked him to do something with the honours list that felt wrong. That made him uncomfortable. He had wanted him to either overrule the House of Lords appointments committee (Holac) who had turned down peerages to eight people, including Nadine Dorries, or to give an assurance that their names could be resubmitted at a later stage. But Sunak had refused. He didn’t have many principles, but this crossed a line. He wanted to do things differently. A new politics.
Here was the first sign of the honesty, integrity and accountability we have heard so much about in the past eight months. It even drew some applause from the audience. The rest of the country is even more fed up with Johnson than the prime minister. But just how ethical had Rish! been? Was it not possible that he too was being a little casual with the truth?
Hold that thought. Forget for a moment that Sunak and Johnson had a meeting about his honours list about 10 days ago. So that even if Rish! later refused to bend the rules he was prepared to have a meeting to talk about breaking the rules. Hardly Mr Integrity in action. Remember that although No 10 has denied ever doing a deal, Johnson was confident enough to message Dorries to tell her that her peerage was going through. Alas poor Nadine! All that time and money spent on commissioning a coat of arms. No ermine for her.
Now consider this. Let’s assume Sunak is telling the truth. That he made no bargain with Johnson. That he passed on the resignation honours list to Holac unamended and it was the committee alone that struck names up. In which case, it can only mean that Rish! had been entirely comfortable with all the other names that had appeared on the list. Peerages for two Downing Street insiders who had barely finished work experience. Knighthoods for Jacob Rees-Mogg and Michael Fabricant. For services to what exactly? Nannies and syrups?
Those may stick in the throat but may be no worse than some other undeservings who have featured in previous honours lists. But what of some other gongs? An Order of the ‘Champagne on Ice’ in the Bath for Martin Reynolds. The Party Marty who actually organised some of the illegal parties in Downing Street.
OBEs for at least two of No 10 communications team who were around during Partygate. Plus a host of minor gongs for Carrie Johnson’s friends and other members of the Downing Street team that knew about the parties. Jennifer Arcuri must be gutted to have been overlooked. Then it looks like this honours list is a celebration of illegality. A confident two fingers to all of us suckers who bothered to obey the rules. And guess what? Sunak is happy about that. Enough for him not to have lifted a finger to stop it.
Strangely, it was Michael Gove, as the government’s spokesperson on the morning media round, who had been the more conciliatory towards Johnson. Then the Govester is a complicated man these days. He can scarcely be bothered to get out of bed for himself, let alone anyone else. His midlife crisis is deep and prolonged and his interest in the activities of his government are minimal. He’s basically just looking forward to the next thrill. The next adventure.
There again, perhaps Gove genuinely feels ambivalent about Johnson. He’s certainly changed his mind about him enough. Comrades in arms on the Vote Leave battlebus. Deadly enemies in the subsequent Tory leadership campaign. The on-off relationship has continued ever since, but on Monday he was keen to not rock the boat. Johnson’s resignation honours list was a private affair on which it was right for no one to intrude, he told the Today programme.
Er, right, said the BBC presenter Mishal Husain. But surely precedent doesn’t apply when you’re talking about a prime minister who was forced out of office for lying about his own rule breaking during lockdown? Who lied in parliament to the committee investigating him for lying to parliament. Johnson at his most meta. Surely it would have made more sense to take a view on any honours list until such time the committee had actually submitted its report? Rather than look like you’ve got something to hide by pre-empting the committee.
Gove lapsed into familiar Gove speak. All fake politeness and pretend modesty. Everything had been done for the best. Precedent was precedent. And couldn’t we just concentrate on all the things Boris had done well. The war in Ukraine and the vaccine rollout. Though you’d have expected nothing less from any prime minister. For his appearance on Good Morning Britain, the Govester added Getting Brexit Done. Hmm. We’ll be the judge of that.
Then it looks like the game is up for Johnson. Nowhere left to hide. Not even a fridge. Jake Berry did say that Boris had been removed by the establishment – that’s Sir Jake, the former chairman of the Tory party: you don’t get much more establishment – but he stopped short of calling for his darling to make a comeback. There’s friends and friends. Even Micky Fab has gone quiet on that. His loyalty to be resold to highest bidder.
So Johnson is left to rage against the dying of the light. He will not go gentle into the night. He let it be known that Sunak double-crossed him. But really no one cares. He has been exposed as the charlatan and the fraud he is. His resignation honours list contaminating Sunak and the Tory party to the last. So on brand.
