September 30, 2024 - 10:00am
What is it with Tory ex-prime ministers and their wretched memoirs? We’ve already had Liz Truss and her deep state conspiracies. Now it’s Boris Johnson’s turn to promote his opus — also by means of headline-grabbing nonsense.
Consider the claim that, while at Number 10, he considered a raid on the Netherlands. The idea that the UK would launch a military operation against a fellow Nato member is entirely implausible. But the mischievous suggestion does make for great publicity. He also reckons that the Covid pandemic resulted from a lab leak, which was “the result of some botched experiment”. That is quite possibly the case, but why wait so long to float the theory when, as prime minister, he could have had it properly investigated? Reminding us of his record of inaction is not a good strategy for him.
He exposes himself again when he tells a tale of a colleague’s enthusiasm for transgender ideology. According to the Telegraph, he recalls Penny Mordaunt telling a meeting of Theresa May’s Cabinet that it was the “most important issue of our times”. Apparently, Boris struggled “to contain his amusement”, but if it was all so absurd, why wasn’t this agenda expunged from Whitehall when he became leader?
It may be that publicising his memoir is all he wants to achieve right now — in which case, he’s succeeding. But if he wants to get himself back into frontline politics, then he’ll be waiting some time. The current Conservative leadership race hasn’t settled much so far, because the candidates have gone out their way to minimise division.
However, one thing has become clear: the party is moving on. Power has shifted, if not to a new generation, then to a new team. Significantly, the first contenders to be eliminated — Mel Stride and Priti Patel — were those most associated with the past (Stride by dint of his age, Patel because she was Johnson’s home secretary).
That’s not the only factor working against a Johnson comeback. The 2024 election result was bad enough to tarnish the reputation of every Conservative leader since 2019, but not so bad as to compel the Tories to turn to Boris out of desperation. Then there’s Keir Starmer’s astonishingly poor start as Prime Minister. This does not guarantee a Tory revival, but it does put them back in the game. When you’re in with a chance, there’s no need to hanker after past glories.
Next we come to the barriers to revival. New research from the Onward think tank asks former Conservative voters what is stopping them from voting Tory again. By far the most common response was that immigration is too high. So in what way is Boris Johnson, the prime minister who let net immigration rip to record levels, the answer to that one?
Of course, politicians can reinvent themselves, but all Boris has done so far is double down. Where’s the regret? The self-examination? The quest for the solutions he failed to find in office? He has given his party no reason to turn back — and, to its great credit, it shows no sign of wishing to.
Peter Franklin is Associate Editor of UnHerd. He was previously a policy advisor and speechwriter on environmental and social issues.
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SubscribeNot yet. There is a vacuum of talent and credibility in the party, which is entirely obvious given the current leadership debacle.
I’ve no doubt Boris will be leader again, and PM.
BJ is a great example of character over content and I genuinely don’t know whether he is a good guy or not. He is typical, modern politician who relies on sound bites and advisors at his elbow….but there is some steel behind his facade and he is truly concerned about the way the country is going. The other Tory leadership candidates have nothing.
Deep down I know that the Party won’t dare to take the risk and I am sorry… in one way.
In one key way he was more honest in application, but never said it – legal immigration. He instinctively recognised the UK will continue to rely on significant immigration and that the idea it can be vastly reduced in a country with our aging population ‘for the birds’. He well knew this from his time as London Mayor too. Which is why it increased under his Premiership. He just failed to be honest about that reality, continuing to suggest otherwise if he thought politically expedient, thus trying to face both ways. But his grasping of the essentials – it will and must continue – was correct. (As an aside the issue is much more about what we need to do on assimilation rather than the twaddle about stopping it).
The ideology has failed, electorates across europe are rejecting it. The only remaining advocates for mass immigration are loony utilitarian lefties and rent seeking capitalists.
How stupid do you feel for believing in an ideology that has seen a massive transfer of wealth from the poorest in society to the richest.
You can’t admit to youself that you got played but are happy to double down on this nonsense.
Yeh Boris talking about the lab theory is like 3 years behind it being any use. Pretty certain the Biden administration were saying lab leak was more plausible than wet markets at least 1 or 2 years ago. Not sure what Boris hopes to achieve by publicising the Netherlands raid thing. Maybe will sell books, but the fact it was even discussed suggests he’s mental.
The current Tory candidates are, in wrestling terminology, pure jobbers. But BoJo was ultimately an awful PM and he’s done a lot more for Ukraine by becoming a defacto lobbyist for them than he did for Britain.
I have no particular wish to defend Boris, but I can think of a few good reasons to hold one’s tongue regarding unproven theories in international politics when you are in the office of PM.
Knowing what we now know about the untested vaccines he would need the SAS to ship them to the Netherlands.
Bojo telling more lies, even if this time to sell a Book is hardly a stunning revelation is it. Remarkable fact that the only leader the Tories have liked in the last 10 years, (and the Right more broadly because they loved him too although now try to disown him), congenitally unable to tell the truth. And all of this was well known before.
Still some will lap it up again. Some remain suckers for life.
The only memoir relating to the political world I’m interested in reading at the moment is Melania Trump’s – mainly because she has been sphinx-like and smart and stayed quiet for long enough on the gripping issues of the day that everyone wants to know what she thinks.
Truss and Johnson, on the other hand, have spent a number of years rabbiting on and on and just when the very last person has lost interest in them and they promise to shuffle off into irrelevance, back they come with a blooming memoir.
I’ll politely decline twice.
Typical KS self engrandissment, ego driven, conceit from a visible charlatan, snake oil salesman of the most transparent type. His contempt for detail, not least in the EU leaving ” agreement” displayed how the naivitey and lack of judgement and education of arguably the stupidest electorate in the first world, is there for the most dangerous, self motivated and cynical manipulation, so well aided by that ” cretin’s lantern, soshul meeja…
Regret? Self examination? Boris went to Eton, dear boy. Old Etonians don’t suffer lapses of self-confidence like that, don’t you know?
Boris has never been “the answer to the Tories’ problems”. He was, however, the only one who was able to sell the idea of Brexit to the majority of the nation. It’s a shame he then came unstuck with the aftermath, such that we have still not taken advantage of the opportunities it offered.
Brexit didn’t need “selling”. It had already been voted for in the Referendum.
It needed implementing. He said he would do it. The others wanted to reverse the Referendum result, having previously said they would abide by it.
Only in the UK could an upper class moron become Prime Minister. I use the term moron not as a slur but rather to prompt debate were he, as he so fondly wished to be compared to 19th Century Tories, to be diagnosed in the taxonomy of dull, above idiot and below imbecile.
The Tories are finished for a decade, maybe a generation. Reform is the future for people who consider themselves conservative.
Another sneering dismissal of the leader who actually cut through the anti-democratic obstruction of the elite and made sure the EU referendum result was respected.
‘Levelling Up’ was also exactly the right idea.
Johnson was derailed by Covid, the tyranny of ‘following the science’ and a hostile media and civil service.
Incidentally whatever happened to that Sue Gray whose scrupulously fair and unbiased inquiry finally did for him? I imagine that someone of such obvious integrity is now chairing a charity or Chancellor of a university somewhere.
In politics a month is a long time.