It’s a Christmas miracle. Thank the Lord. Just over a week ago at the Covid inquiry, Rishi Sunak was struck down with near total amnesia. He really couldn’t remember a thing. Who he was, what he was doing. Not even if he had even been present. It could have been a doppelganger throughout the pandemic.
On Tuesday lunchtime, though, there were clear signs of improvement. Not total, mind. That will take time. But certainly glimpses of a partial recovery. At one point he could even locate two warships in the Red Sea. Though mostly he chose to answer the questions he wished he had been asked. The ones for which he had prepared. Spontaneity is still well beyond him. Small steps and all that.
While most MPs had long since scarpered home, Sunak found himself taking questions from the liaison committee – the supergroup of select committee chairs – on the last day of parliament before the Christmas recess. He breezed in cheery enough but, as so often, his bonhomie was only skin deep.
In every smile there’s the trace of contempt. He really does not like having his time wasted by people questioning his judgment. It’s beneath him. The little people – that’s everyone but him – should accept his perfection and be grateful for it. But hey, Rish! didn’t need to get too tetchy about his appearance before MPs. He’s not going to have to do it much more often. His farewell tour is well under way. He’ll miss us when he’s gone.
The committee chair, Bernard Jenkin, started proceedings gently. What were the greatest global challenges? Rish! deliberated for a minute before telling everyone that the world had some dangerous places. That’s the level of insight we’ve come to expect from our prime ministers. The ability to cut through the bullshit and deliver home truths about which we were in denial.
Top start. Labour’s Sarah Champion then asked Sunak if he considered himself to be a leader on the global stage. Rish! hesitated, suspecting a trap, but was unable to resist. Who was he to quibble with all those who waited on his every word? Because, yes, he was here to tell the truth, and the truth was that he was pretty amazing. People looked at him and thought: there’s a guy bossing it on the international scene.
“That’s odd,” replied Champion, evenly. “So how come no one really takes much notice of you?” This was a line of investigation followed up by the Conservative Alicia Kearns. How much notice did Israel take of the UK’s interventions in the Middle East? An enormous amount. Prime Minister Netanyahu called him every day, last thing at night and first thing in the morning. He’d be lost without Rish!
It was just unfortunate that so many civilians were dying in Gaza. One of those things. And whose fault was that? You couldn’t possibly attribute blame. It was important to understand that many bombs and airstrikes could just spontaneously happen. In the same way, machine guns had a mysterious habit of opening fire by themselves.
We then moved on to Rwanda. Labour’s Diana Johnson wanted to know when the small boats would be stopped. By now, Sunak was at peak tetchiness. Quick to take offence. Quick to tell everyone they were asking the wrong questions. “I’ve never said I would stop the boats,” he snapped. This was the man who has bobbed in front of a “stop the boats” lectern on many occasions throughout the year. He had only said he was stopping the boats, he insisted. Another major triumph. Apparently.
Rish! clammed up. He couldn’t say which airline would be prepared to trash its reputation by laying on deportation flights for refugees. It’s odds-on the UK will be using the prime minister’s own plane. At least he hasn’t got any goodwill to lose. Nor could he possibly tell anyone how much the Rwanda scheme would cost.
It was all strictly commercially confidential. Because if other countries got wind of how much we were wasting not to deport a single refugee, they would all want to sign a deal with us. And no, he couldn’t say if other countries were interested in ripping us off because that was also commercially confidential. He was very sorry but he couldn’t tell the committee anything. If he did, he would have to kill us.
There were groans when Bill Cash chipped in. It was our Brexit birthright to leave the European convention on human rights. The only good German was a dead German. The same went for the French. And the Belgians. Probably the Scots too. Definitely the Scots too. It was momentarily tempting to feel sorry for Sunak at this point. This is the kind of idiot that is left in the Tory party these days. The halfwits whom Rish! is obliged to take seriously. Then you come to your senses and remember the prime minister is quite at home here. Love-bombing the Italian fascists. His darling, darling Giorgia.
While all this was going on, Craig Williams, Sunak’s parliamentary private secretary, dressed like an extra from Last of the Summer Wine, was nodding his head furiously behind the prime minister. Quite what he was doing here was anyone’s guess. Even his close friends don’t try to hide the Craigster’s immense stupidity. So maybe it was Take Your Village Idiot to Work Day. Still, he provided more entertainment than his boss. Gave everyone in the room a good laugh.
The session ended with a quick run through the economy. And it turned out that every committee chair was a complete moron for not realising how well everything was going. The country had never been in better shape. The doubters could go fuck themselves. Rish! wasn’t going to lose a moment’s sleep over people living in poverty. The food bank economy was booming. And it was a massive Brexit bonus that we were no longer economically competitive.
And that was it. All wrapped up in an hour and a half. Jenkin likes to think of himself as a loyal stooge so never lets anyone interrogate the prime minister for long enough to inflict serious damage. So Rish! can bullshit his way through relatively easily. As ever with Sunak, the truth and the world can be whatever he wants it to be.
On the way out of Portcullis House, Sunak was waylaid by the seven-year-old son of the Tory MP Tracey Crouch. What was his favourite Star Wars film? Rish! thought for a while. “The Empire Strikes Back,” he said. Spoken like a true nerd. The first genuine answer of the day.
• This article was amended on 20 December 2023. An earlier version referred incorrectly to “President Netanyahu” when Benjamin Netanyahu is Israel’s prime minister.
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