Call me old fashioned, but I’d rather Boris Johnson wasn’t prime minister when Russia invaded Ukraine. Serious times call for serious leaders and Johnson is a profoundly unserious person. This isn’t about the lies and the parties: it’s about being led by someone who doesn’t aspire to be more than a music hall act. Albeit one with a limpet-like narcissism that keeps him clinging to the top job.
That said, Johnson has had a goodish war so far. Partly because he has been so distracted by filling in police questionnaires that it’s only recently he seems to have noticed there was a situation developing in eastern Europe. But also because he has got some of the basics right. OK, so he looked a total wreck at the Munich security conference, arriving with the toddler haircut all over the place, his eyes stuck half shut, his tie askew and his shirt crumpled. But the content of his speech more or less hit the right mark. At least, he didn’t lose his place or ad lib about Peppa Pig World. Small victories and all that.
And when he came to update the Commons on Monday night’s invasion of Ukraine by Russian tanks, the Suspect at first looked as if he would again pull off the required trick of sounding like a grownup. He was heard in near silence as he ran through Vladimir Putin’s crimes and the failed attempts of western allies to talk him down from invading Ukraine. But now a line had been breached with Russian troops entering the self-proclaimed republics in Donetsk and Luhansk.
It was time to make Putin really sweat with sanctions that would hurt him, said Johnson. Only the sanctions he came up with – five relatively small Russian banks and three oligarchs – didn’t sound as if they would cause the Russian leader to lose a moment’s sleep. If that was the best the UK could come up with in response to the invasion so far, then Putin might as well make a bee-line for Kyiv. Compared with Germany’s decision to cancel the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, the UK’s response looked like pissing in the wind.
Don’t panic, the Suspect, continued. Because this was just a graduated response. It was best to start with little sanctions. Sanctionettes in response to what was still only a minor invasion. That way we could build up to proper sanctions later. It didn’t seem to have occurred to Johnson that even as he spoke, Russian oligarchs were already moving their money out of UK assets that could be the subject of sanctions in the coming days and weeks.
No matter. It was only friendly to give Russia ample warning. And he could be tough if he wanted to. If he could persuade Liz Truss to give up the tank she has on permanent call for a photoshoot, he would send it to the Ukrainian defence force. It could make all the difference.
Still, this was a day for parliament to put on a united front and it did so. Though not quite in the way Johnson might have expected. There were no MPs on the Labour left to suggest that Nato might have been a bit provocative and it was time to give Russia the benefit of the doubt. It’s possible that Jeremy Corbyn had just that argument in mind but he arrived in the chamber too late to be called to speak and sat morosely on his own for about 15 minutes before leaving. So we’ll never know. Maybe he would have surprised us all by launching a blistering attack on Russian aggression.
Instead that was left to Keir Starmer, who along with many other Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs, not only deplored Putin’s brutal authoritarianism but demanded stronger action. It was clear that Russia had invaded Ukraine so what was stopping the UK government from imposing tougher sanctions now? Sequencing sanctions was all very well but surely the baseline response should have been to exclude Russia from financial mechanisms like Swift and to ban trading in Russian sovereign debt?
Labour’s Ben Bradshaw observed that the three individuals who had been sanctioned had all been put on a US sanctions list four years ago. So they were all old lags at this kind of thing and the new penalties imposed on them wouldn’t make the slightest difference. Surely there must be some others among the dozens of oligarchs close to Putin who were worthy of some kind of sanction?
Johnson hummed and hawed. He was fairly sure Roman Abramovich had been sanctioned. If only. As it turns out – Abramovich has never been sanctioned. Pity, as the thought of Chelsea being stripped of its assets and relegated to League Two could unite the entire country. All but 45,000 of it. And they don’t count. Besides, you had to remember that if you used up your sanctions all at once then you might not have any left for later. Then again, if you didn’t – as countless other MPs pointed out – you merely encouraged Putin to go for broke.
Caroline Lucas and Labour’s Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi cut to the chase. Was the prime minister sure that weak sanctions had nothing to do with Russian Tory party donors, oligarchs playing tennis with Tory ministers, appointing Russians to the House of Lords or Russian interference in UK elections? Absolutely not, the Suspect insisted. Perish the thought. One mustn’t get carried away by Russophobia. He only played tennis with the very nicest and very richest Russians. As you do. With that Johnson scarpered for the exit, wondering how he had managed to let himself be outflanked by the entire Commons.
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