The Prime Minister is wounded; there’s no question about it. The question is whether the wound is mortal. Today the resignations continue to trickle in — a PPS here, a junior minister there — but by comparison with the bombshell Cabinet resignations yesterday they simply add to the sense of crisis. And yet here the Prime Minister is, still in office and in power, going nowhere. If he can survive today and then the next two weeks, then he may yet have a chance to redeem himself.
Today is challenging enough. There’s a session with the Commons Liaison Select Committee and what will be a bruising PMQs. Getting through these will stretch even this Prime Minister’s aptitude for rising to the moment, whatever the moment is.
But plainly the difficulties stretch further into the distance. In the next few days the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers will elect members to its ruling body and it is they who may decide to amend the existing rule whereby a challenge to the party leader cannot be repeated before a year is out.
Mr Johnson has survived one vote, which found that over 40 per cent of his MPs do not have confidence in him; a change in the rules would mean he could face another before his new Cabinet has a chance to prove itself. Then there is the spectre of another by-election if Chris Pincher resigns as MP for Tamworth. It could be an unwelcome encounter with the electorate.
Resilience
Much of the PM’s career has amounted to surviving a succession of crises in turn, a pattern that now repeats itself. If he can get through today, the 1922 process, the next week, then he can take refuge in the parliamentary recess and the start of most people’s holidays.
After some time out he may hope that his colleagues are in a more forgiving mood when they return.
He may also be hoping that the police decide to fine the Opposition leader, Sir Keir Starmer, for breaking lockdown rules, a move that would also take out his deputy, Angela Rayner. Yet he should be careful what he wishes for; Sir Keir may in fact be his best hope of re-election.
Resilience is a necessary quality in a Prime Minister. But what is he surviving for, beyond the instinct of the man to hold onto the highest office for its own sake?
Scandals apart, this is a uniquely challenging time; the cost of living crisis is largely attributable to factors outside his control. So much of the answer depends on the question of character, a matter that has emerged repeatedly in resignation letters.
Many of the difficulties he now faces could have been dealt with at the outset by speaking the truth and confessing to wrongdoing. He is brilliant when he does deal directly with voters and he may still be able to appeal to the people, but only if they think he can be trusted.
He must, for instance, be honest with us about the dire financial straits we now face when it comes to government indebtedness and our limited capacity to spend ourselves out of trouble. Tax cuts may be popular with Conservative and Red Wall voters, but will they make the underlying problem worse and fuel inflation?
No one has a better capacity to communicate with voters than Boris. He has already told us he is not going to change fundamentally; the Boris we have is the Boris we’ll get. But the Boris we get must find it in himself to be honest with us if we are once again to be able to trust him too.
