It’s official: Boris Johnson is in office but no longer in power.
On Monday night, 41 per cent of Conservative MPs voted “no confidence” in the British prime minister, delivering what will ultimately provide a fatal wound to Johnson’s premiership. Johnson now commands the confidence of just 32 per cent of the House of Commons. Try passing some legislation through that bog.
It was never going to end well for Johnson once it went to vote. A supposed serial election winner forced to ask his party for the right to carry on? Those parties don’t typically go on to win future elections. So his party moved against him.
In the end, a whopping 148 Conservative MPs — possibly some ministers among them (the vote was anonymous) — voted to stab their leader in the front. They decided it was time for change, even if that change might now take time. And while Johnson insists he will carry on, calling the 59 per cent support “convincing,” the fact is the man who delivered an 80-seat majority in December 2019 is now a dead man walking. A student of history, Johnson will know he’s done worse than Margaret Thatcher, John Major and Theresa May did in their respective confidence votes when their parties moved against them, and they all went. It is therefore a question of when, not if, BoJo will go.
How did it come to this? That’s something Canada’s own politicians might wish to take a moment to consider.
For some rebels, it was Johnson’s serial obfuscation over “Partygate” that sent them plotting.
First, there were no parties at 10 Downing—this was the story Johnson first told to Parliament. When that didn’t fly, they became essential “work gatherings.” Then came the ends issued by the Metropolitan Police: confirmation that the prime minister — the maker of laws and imposer of lockdowns — had broken the law and violated lockdown policy.
Even then, Johnson stubbornly refused to admit blame, saying he was “obligated” to raise a glass at his staff’s various “going-away” parties, the ones where staff barfed on the walls and broke his kid’s swing set. In other words, Johnson drank to say goodbye to disposable political staff when ordinary citizens couldn’t say goodbye to their irreplaceable loved ones in hospital. It was never going to be a convincing justification, even for the people paid to drink the Kool-Aid.
For other MPs, however, it was the lack of a compelling vision for Britain. The PM might have finally delivered in 2020 the Brexit that a slim majority of Britons voted for in 2016, but he didn’t appear to have much of a clue about what to do with Britain once it had broken its bonds with the European Union. As former minister Jesse Norman, a one-time Johnson ally, put it in his missive urging the prime minister to go: “(Your) Government seems to lack a sense of mission.”
It was to this sense of mission Johnson ultimately pleaded as he tried to save his skin. Johnson begged his team from him to stick with him to deliver on the “priorities of the British people.” To whip inflation. To build roads and hospitals. He begged them to stick with him because of the Ukraine. I have promised any other leader would be worse. In the end, I have chosen for loyalty.
Of course, the problem with a serial liar begging for loyalty is obvious, or at least it should have been to Johnson. But the man who never seems to suffer lasting consequences for his many mistakes — whether personal or professional — simply assumed he would escape another. However, even the most average of voters understand hypocrisy, and certainly understand it when the man who put them in their lockdown cages preaches that hypocrisy.
More importantly, MPs know when their leader is a busted flush with the public, as poll after poll is now saying about Johnson. A leader with an ounce of self-awareness would take the clue and leave graciously. Here’s a clue: Johnson doesn’t, and won’t. Rumor has it he’s already planning a major cabinet reshuffle, even though all of his cabinet publicly pledged their loyalty ahead of the vote. It doesn’t take Kreskin to predict a shuffle s–t show. A few cabinet resignations during the process would certainly quicken Johnson’s fate.
Having recently experienced their own series of defenestrations, the various conservative parties across Canada — and their leaders — should be taking detailed notes. To start, personal integrity matters. People are fed up to their back teeth with politicians, and even more fed up with politicians who take them for fools. You now have to be 100 per cent correct in everything you do, both in motive and action.
People also dislike politicians who can’t get anything done, or keep their word about they will do, so don’t go making any promises you can’t keep. You think the Governor of the Bank of Canada is a donkey? Well, you’d better whip that ass on day one, partner. Certainly don’t do what Johnson did and fail on both counts.
Returning to Britain, Johnson’s lifetime of poor habits and ethical lapses manifested themselves in office at the precise time the electorate needed to see their leaders setting a sterling example. He let them down when it mattered most.
This dynamic will not change post-COVID. The issue set now facing the advanced western economies — inflation, low growth, high cost of living — requires real political leadership and a whole lot of follow through. Woe be to any leader who thinks they can bluster their way through the coming storm.
Just ask Boris Johnson.
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