Vernon Bogdanor has a peculiarly generous view of Boris Johnson’s premiership (Boris Johnson broke all the rules, but history may be kind to him yet, 5 September) . Despite listing Johnson’s assaults on the constitution, his willingness to flout due process to save his friends, his disdain for parliamentary procedure, his financial improprieties and his lying, Bogdanor believes that “loss of the premiership is enough” for a man whose questionable moral judgment so regularly outraged a nation.
Somehow, Johnson is to be commended for “his public optimism, so valuable in raising the nation’s spirits during lockdown”, despite presiding over arrangements distinguished chiefly by their managerial incompetence. Somehow, the inclusion of a handful of MPs from minority ethnic groups means that Johnson has “done much to raise the status of people from ethnic minorities and women”, as if the elevation of individuals makes one iota of difference to the lived experiences of those whose unidentified “status” he presumes it can raise. Somehow, the empty promises of “levelling up” are magically redeemed by a white paper produced in February, which even Bogdanor admits was issued in the “dying days” of Johnson’s government, as if this commitment was free of the whiff of desperation.
