Johnson’s downfall would give Labour a whiff of blood in its nostrils and enhance Keir Starmer’s stature as one of its main authors
Source - Daily Telegraph 19/01/22
Ditching a proven election-winner should never be done lightly and often brings lasting misfortune to a political party.
Just ask Labour’s “curry house plotters”, who forced Tony Blair out earlier than he wanted to go, how their conspiracy has turned out – four successive general election defeats later.
The latest move by Tory MPs against Boris Johnson has been dubbed the “pork pie plot” in recognition of the alleged involvement of the member for Rutland and Melton. It could see 20 Tory MPs newly-elected in 2019 submit letters of no confidence in the Prime Minister as early as today.
Given the gravity of such a move, it is hard to see why the group would wish to embark on it with incomplete information. Because the impending Sue Gray report into Downing Street partying is a very important missing piece of the jigsaw when it comes to working out the optimal course for the Conservative Party.
If it is damning of Johnson and casts fundamental doubt on his honesty then he will have to go at once. But if the criticisms are mild enough for him to tough out then, for a whole array of reasons, it would be daft for his MPs to try and remove him now.
For starters, the probable date of the next general election is more than two years away; the next year is going to be difficult on the economic front and an early successor could therefore be instantly tarnished; the identity of any successor is unclear and so is that person’s capacity to sustain the newly-minted electoral coalition of shire Tories and Red-Wallers that delivered the Conservatives their crushing 2019 victory.
As someone who showed he could reach parts of the electorate that no recent Tory leader had been able to touch, Johnson has surely earned himself a year to try and reconnect. If he is unable to do so and the Partygate furore really has left him a broken figure in the eyes of voters, then the polls will show that and at least he will be able to soak up blame for the living-standards crisis as well.
Letting a year pass before wielding the axe would also enable Tory MPs to make a far more thorough assessment of the merits of potential successors, including Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss, both of whom are still inexperienced in great offices of state, with the latter not well known to voters at all. What are the chances of either of them being able to win in Leigh in Greater Manchester, Leigh-on-Sea or Wigan, as well as Winchester? At the moment nobody has the first idea.
Throwing away the benefits of the major political realignment which took place in December 2019 and has the potential to keep their party in power for many years yet, just because of two months of lurid headlines about partying and a booze culture, would be an extremely rash move.
One set of people it would certainly delight would be Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer and his key strategists, such as Lord Mandelson. Does the new intake of Tory MPs really think that replacing Johnson at Labour’s behest will throw the opposition attack dogs off the scent? It is far more likely to encourage them by giving them a whiff of blood in their nostrils and enhancing Starmer’s stature as one of the main authors of Johnson’s downfall.
Make an unforced change now and the Tories will further boost Labour morale and unity, throw a novice successor in at the deep end at a very tricky time and risk plunging their own party into long-lasting post-regicide bitterness, such as engulfed it after the ousting of Margaret Thatcher.
The only solid argument for dumping Boris immediately is that it may mean slightly less disastrous local election results in May. But is saving some councillors now – something that is clearly in the minds of local associations – a good enough reason to harm the party’s prospects at the next general election? Surely not.
Back when I was a UKIP MEP, I listed some examples of media bias against that party during a TV appearance. The veteran Lib Dem MP Sir Menzies Campbell, a fellow panellist on the same programme, shot back with the remark: “Welcome to Test match cricket.”
His point was that politics at this level is a ruthless and difficult business and there is no point in expecting it to remain a cakewalk just because you’ve been on a good run. He was right. It is a lesson that the 2019 Tory intake, from the Red Wall and the shires alike, should also take to heart.
They’ve been extraordinarily blessed to have their party ahead in the polls almost throughout their time as MPs until the last few difficult weeks. What they are going through now – including being inundated with condemnatory emails no doubt mainly written by Left-wing constituents who will never vote for them anyway – is what a mid-term incumbent party would normally expect.
Peremptorily replacing a larger-than-life character who has been able to beat Labour first in London and then in its former working-class heartlands with a conventional Tory in a suit brings various old-fashioned phrases to mind. Namely: “Act in haste, repent at leisure” and “you made your bed, so lie in it”.
So long as the Gray report makes it a viable option, Tory MPs should give Johnson a year to try and repair things before they make a cool and calculated decision about who to present to voters as t
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