Addiction to crisis is a very real condition; adrenaline can be as seductive a drug as any. In the last six years the British public have reeled from crisis to crisis, from Brexit through Covid to political scandal and ultimately the sacking of their prime minster.
Boris Johnson was the common factor in all. But for the obstacle mounted by the Conservative parliamentary party – not forgetting the void left by his “campaign” partner, Dominic Cummings – he would almost certainly have been heading to No 10 Downing St this Friday.
Because, just as the body craves that to which it is allergic, despite his toxic tenure, much of the British public is addicted to Boris Johnson.
Some 14 million people voted for him in the 2019 landslide, making him the only leadership candidate who could claim to have had a mandate from the British people. During last summer’s leadership contest – and only one month after he was forced from office – the YouGov polling company lobbed his name in with those of Truss and Sunak; he emerged the runaway winner.
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Boris is box office. At most, there are only two years to Britain’s next general election. The question is will two years of Rishi Rehab guarantee a withdrawal from the dizzying highs and lows of the Johnson/Truss era?
The Tories today find themselves between a rock and the edge of a cliff. They have a new prime minister who has no choice but to implement a hard austerity, for which electoral defeat will be the likely reward.
Because – never mind that six weeks of Liz Truss saw the markets spooked and the pound fall to its lowest ever level against the dollar (that can recover) – it’s the lethal legacy for the next generation that will do the deep damage: the soaring borrowings; the collapse of consumer confidence, the massive mortgage repayments.
Average monthly mortgage repayments in Britain have increased by £530 in that short period. And the political price is always paid at the ballot box. If any country learned that lesson, it was Ireland during the years of austerity.
But for the last seven years, since Micheál Martin took Fianna Fáil into the confidence and supply government, we have had a stability which is the envy of all Europe. Now a cyclical populism, which ironically manifests itself when times are good, threatens to sweep that away. It was, after all, what fed the Brexit/Boris obsession.
A wilful nihilism, a desire to shake everything up for no reason other than to shake everything up characterises modern populism. This restlessness is clearly reflected in the massive support for Sinn Féin with its “change” message in the polls.
Yes, we have a terrible housing crisis, but everyone knows Sinn Féin can’t solve it in a term in office. And a dangerous adrenaline rush into the unknown (what do we know of their policies?) will, as we have seen in Britain, only make things much worse.
Things might have been different in Britain if, seven short weeks ago, Sunak had won the leadership. He should have won – the MPs wanted him – but he fell at the membership hurdle. He was undoubtedly the best candidate. He’s smart, capable and hardworking. Despite his immense wealth, he has shown empathy and compassion. And of course, he understands money. Something Liz Truss didn’t.
So why didn’t he succeed then?
Given Liz Truss’s woeful performance on those leadership hustings, the answer can only be found in what Basil Fawlty called “a mastermind special subject – the bleedin’ obvious”.
Somewhere just under the surface of England’s green and pleasant Tory heartlands lingers a toxic hangover from the days of Empire: the denigration of Indian and Hindu civilisation and culture. Racism in short.
The Tory membership, unlike the MPs, was clearly not ready for a prime minister whose parents were migrants from India, who would – as he did before – take his oath of office on the Hindu Bhagavad Gita.
The Tories have paid dearly for their lapses into populism and racism. Sunak came to last week’s contest with one great advantage: running straight after the Truss disaster. He could have said “I told you so” but he didn’t. He was wise; his ascent to office is not entirely pristine. Despite getting the support of over half of Tory MPs he is seen as a divisive figure, the man who wielded the knife against Boris. And that still counts.
Because the irony is, no matter who won, Boris Johnson dominated this leadership contest. The relationship between him and the British public is still that of “love junkies”. It resembles nothing as much as the explosive romance of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, who met, married, divorced and married again two years later.
They scandalised the world, partying non-stop. But theirs was a very real passion. For the 15 years they were together, they fulfilled each other’s needs. So what needs of the British people did Boris fulfill?
Besides those enumerated in Rishi Sunak’s generous tribute on Boris’s withdrawal – the Covid vaccine, leading the world in support for Ukraine or as defence secretary Ben Wallace described it, “keeping the country safe,” there is the eternal optimism. He is a national anti-depressant.
He also created a huge number of Tory MP jobs, many of which will be lost in the next general election. Something he has almost certainly calculated. He isn’t going away.
“I believe I’m well placed to deliver conservative victory in 2024,” was his parting shot. Exactly what kind of shot is up to the electorate.