Ah, Boris Johnson – such a safe pair of hands for any eventuality or crisis, national or international, but where you can really rely on him is in matters of discretion, judgment and not taking the biscuit. No, no, we’re not idiots, and that is not what any of us think. We know our way around this man and his traits: we know there are question marks over his truthfulness, but never any doubt as to his self-interest and brass neck. So come on, the fact that the former prime minister has managed to surprise, even shock, anyone with his resignation honours list is surely cause for some grim admiration. How is it possible for Johnson to disappoint anyone, when our expectations were already so low? It’s like a superpower.
His list was revealed by the Times, although it has yet to be officially confirmed, presumably because officials are still speechless. It is said to be exceptionally long: 100 names, set against 60 nominations from Theresa May and 62 from David Cameron. There are four sitting MPs on it, which, being unprecedented, raises a few questions about the long game: is the plan that they sit in the Lords and the Commons, just for the thrill of upturning the constitutional matrix? Or will they step down from their elected positions, so that someone else, maybe some charming, floppy blond rascal, can stand in one of their seats, should his own start to look dicey?
As bizarre as it is to be asking those questions at all, the most pressing is, of course: what on earth is Stanley Johnson doing on this list? He stands in the shadow of two accusations (that he denies) of “inappropriate touching”, one from Caroline Nokes, the chair of the women and equalities committee; it is a matter of public record that he hospitalised his wife in a domestic violence incident in the 70s. It’s not a lovely CV; it doesn’t scream: “Honour me, underlings, for my distinguished and upstanding performance.” But surely more salient to the case for words such as “sordid” is the fact that he is Johnson’s father.
Jo Johnson, one brother, has already been handed a peerage, along with friends or allies or tennis chums or whatever the hell you want to call them, Evgeny Lebedev and Zac Goldsmith. You have to feel for Leo, the other brother; when’s he gonna get his beak wet? What terrible feud lies between the two men to warrant his exclusion? When you’re handing out peerages like wedding invitations – your blood relatives plus anyone who might give you a nice present – leaving out any family member seems a little pointed.
To disappear down the rabbit hole of the Johnson family’s internal emotional dynamics would be to accord them too much respect and national importance. One of the many upsides of Boris Johnson’s demise was that we’d no longer have to care which designer Carrie was wearing, or what she thought of badgers; it would be a shame, now, to be sifting through the wreckage of the second chamber’s reputation, looking for clues as to whether this clan will vote en bloc or not. The whole thing is so loudly disreputable that I suspect an ulterior motive: Boris Johnson must suspect that some of his kites will not fly, that the honours committee will be bound by propriety to reject at least some of his harebrained suggestions. He may have included his father as low-hanging fruit for rejection, so that Paul Dacre and Nadine Dorries can slip through.
The alternative is that he really believes that the UK and all its offices are just fiefdoms waiting for their rightful overlords, and what could be righter than all those lords coming from his very own family? Again, this was meant to be our prize when he left office: that we’d no longer have to anticipate or care where his lavish egocentricity would drive him next. Instead, we’re left with our hopes pinned on bashful committees and a limp prime minister, the political equivalent of the Maginot line, to block an army of cronies.
Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist
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