Jeremy Quin entered the Commons with a smile on his face. A smile that widened to a grin when he looked up towards the press gallery. He appreciates an audience. Besides, the minister for the Cabinet Office has a new job. The thinking man’s Michael Ellis.
Ellis was the go-to minister sent out by Boris Johnson to defend the indefensible. A job that Mikey was more than happy to do as he is impossibly needy. Not to mention obsequious. There is nothing he wouldn’t do to position himself a millimetre closer to power.
So time and again, he would be sent to the Commons to humiliate himself by insisting that Boris hadn’t lied about whatever it was we all knew he had lied about. The best that could be said in Ellis’s defence was that it was a shit job but someone had to do it. And he didn’t have the self-worth to say no.
Jezza is an altogether different character. A man who understands the inherent absurdity of his job. When he’s called upon to take a hit, he does so in the expectation of failure. So he treats his Commons’ appearances as 40 minutes of surrealist theatre. Where the only thing that really matters is the passing of time.
There again, Quin has so far been blessed with slightly more credible defendants than Mikey. Certainly nothing on the scale of a Boris. And all Jezza had to contend with on Tuesday was the continuing saga of the home secretary’s speeding fine. Which, in the wider scheme of things, even the opposition would concede was a relatively minor breach of the ministerial code. A betrayal of entitlement, certainly. Suella Braverman clearly believes that speeding awareness courses are for lesser humans. But not on a par with Partygate or bullying.
It was a slow day in the Commons. For a government that claims to be delivering on the people’s priorities, it is hell-bent on doing remarkably little to tackle the country’s problems. So, for want of anything better to do, the speaker had granted an urgent question to drag out Braverman’s breach of the ministerial code into a third day.
Angela Rayner looked as if she couldn’t believe her luck but even she couldn’t get really worked up about this one. So she rather just went through the motions. Voters expected ministers to do the right thing. To take their punishment like the rest of us. Probably untrue. Most people have become so cynical about politicians they expect them to try to cut a more advantageous deal for themselves. So when did the prime minister find out about Suella’s latest brush with the law? Why had her special adviser lied? And when would there be an inquiry?
All of which Quin just urbanely brushed aside. Hardly worthy of his attention. He did his best to stifle a yawn, before running through the basics of the ministerial code. The ministerial code was a code to which ministers were expected to adhere. No shit.
The prime minister was the sole arbiter of what was and what wasn’t a breach of the code and any sanctions were entirely up to him. He couldn’t comment on any specifics of the Braverman case as … as he couldn’t really be bothered to. It was all rather beneath him. This could have been left to a duty solicitor in the No 10 press office. But he was sure the prime minister would announce something sooner or later.
Tory Jeremy Wright was first to chip in. When he had been chair of the committee on standards in public life, he had always thought it would be best if the ethics adviser was independent of the prime minister and could initiate his or her own investigations. Quin didn’t seem to think this was a good idea. Everything was working perfectly smoothly as it was. And if Rishi Sunak could get away without an inquiry then so much the better. Delay was never to be underestimated. There was strength in his weakness.
Braverman might have been disappointed to see just how few other Conservatives were prepared to waste 40 minutes of their lives by coming to the Commons to defend her. If this is the level of support she attracts, then she may want to pause her leadership campaign. There were Miriam Cates and Danny Kruger. Her fellow National Conservatism lunatics.
Of course there were. Only Suella could probably have done without them. Neither is overgifted in brains. Cates argued that it was an affront to democracy that Braverman should be held to account for her actions. The home secretary should be allowed to get on with her job of excluding refugees and having more babies. Shag for Britain! Still, she was more coherent than Kruger. He didn’t know why he had been sent to defend Braverman other than that someone had told him to defend her.
Charles Walker admitted that he wasn’t on Suella’s Xmas card list but even he was struggling to understand all the fuss. What was wrong with getting your civil servants to get you a more convenient sanction? Hell, what was the point of being home secretary in charge of policing if you couldn’t wangle a few perks? And why had the BBC flown its political editor to Japan only to ask the prime minister about speeding fines? Er … because it was a more interesting story than watching paint dry at the G7.
The real cri de coeur came from Edward Leigh. He was sick to death of hearing about Suella evading sanctions for a speeding fine. Why couldn’t she have got herself involved in a proper scandal? Like being caught shagging someone other than her husband while doing 90mph on the M4. Like taking part in a random killing spree. Where was Dominic Raab when you need him? And if Suella couldn’t be bothered to organise a decent scandal then could we find a cabinet minister who could?
As for the opposition, they too were all rather lacklustre. Not even half-hearted. Quarter-hearted at best. It was all totally bloodless. Just going through the motions. No real anger. Just smiles as generous as Quin’s. It was a game. Sure, they punched the Suella bruise repeatedly – implicating Sunak in his failure to act – but they would much rather be talking about the home secretary’s real crimes. Her disregard for international law. Her indifference to suffering. Her failure to act on crime.
The SNP did try to up the ante by mentioning Braverman’s links to a Rwandan law scheme as another potential breach of the ministerial code. But no one took it too seriously. After all, it had been before she had even become an MP. Yes, she had been prepared to do deals with countries with doubtful records on human rights even then.
As for Quin, he just took everything in his stride. The government’s Mr Loophole. He would love to help. But he really couldn’t. Was that the time? He had a lunch date. After all, there was nothing else going on.
