There were surprises afoot on Wednesday – or privileges-committee-publication-day eve as we should call it – Nadine Dorries was planning to delay her exit from parliament in order to cause maximum embarrassment for Rishi Sunak, though she is frankly spreading her embarrassment so liberally and gaily that it’s hard to discern a target more specific than “her entire party”, or at a push “the species”. Sir Bernard Jenkin, meanwhile, had allegedly himself attended a party in December 2020, and should therefore recuse himself from a job that had already finished, according to Boris Johnson and his allies, so desperate that they were dredging up ideas that started, “first, go back in time”.
On Thursday morning, however, there were no surprises. The former prime minister had lied to parliament and nobody, anywhere, dropped their marmalade. There had just been so many spoilers: Johnson’s resignation letter at the end of last week, a howling and at times hilarious rebuttal of the lying he was about to be found guilty of; the many attacks on the personal probity of Harriet Harman, committee chair; and last but not least, Johnson’s long history of lying; so ceaseless, so well-documented, that if he hadn’t been lying about the parties, you’d have wondered whether he was feeling OK.
To be fair to the committee, they weren’t tasked with writing a thriller. And to be doubly fair, they did have a few eyebrow-raisers, the greatest of which is probably that, were Johnson still an MP, he would have faced a 90-day suspension rather than the 10-day punishment he already found “egregious”. Committee members were miffed about his resignation letter, in which – adjusted for brevity – he said everyone was a liar one way or another, apart from him. This itself was “a very serious contempt”, they found, but they had seen nothing yet.
By mid-morning, another powerful tirade had dropped, anyone would think Johnson was getting paid by the word. “A load of complete tripe,” he called their report, “a charade”. “The terrible truth is that it is not I who has twisted the truth,” Johnson wrote, like a man with concussion trying to tell you a riddle. “It is Harriet Harman and her committee.”
This screed was a little unhinged – he called this a dark day for democracy, labelling the committee a “tiny minority” with a vendetta. But how can a committee be anything other than a minority? And if finding a person guilty is a “political assassination”, a “final knife thrust”, then what would a good day for democracy look like? Gigantic committees, 350-people strong, who find everyone innocent, yup, that sounds good, that doesn’t sound at all like a pantomime directed by an autocrat. Relax, though, I don’t believe he has actually lost his marbles: this is just the opening of his second act, where he roars back as Trump-without-a-tan, daring you to laugh at his nonsense because he knows the only-half-listening will mistake this for fun.
There were some plucky interventions from opposition MPs, the Liberal Democrat Daisy Cooper suggesting that Johnson should have his ex-PM stipend of £115,000 a year removed, and Labour’s Thangam Debbonnaire saying he should repay the £245,00 spent on his legal fees. But really this is a blue-on-blue moment. Penny Mordaunt announced mid-morning that Monday’s vote in the Commons, whether to accept the report and its recommendations, will be a free one, which was not so much an invitation to Conservatives to consult their consciences as a starting gun; let the carnival of crazy begin.
Johnson supporters took to the socials to make dark threats to MPs voting in favour of the report; nice seat you’ve got there. It’d be a shame if you were deselected. Sure, if the past year has taught us anything, it’s don’t put anything past a Conservative constituency party. Where you see a risky old idea, they see a dare. But it’s debatable whether such a tactic can work any more, on MPs who, quite reasonably, see themselves as mainly keeping these seats warm for the next guys.
Nevertheless, the Boris Chorus had a demonic energy by the afternoon, with Brendan Clarke-Smith helpfully providing a shareable graphic – I’m Backing Boris – and Jacob Rees-Mogg referring to Boris “doing very well against the marsupials”, which is how you know he’s cleverer than you, because do you see what he did there, no really, do you?
Johnson himself was next sighted, presumably because he had told a load of photographers where he’d be, just guessing here, out running: fists clenched lightly, chest forward, apparently wearing swimming trunks, the mighty silverback was ready for his enemies and could outpace them all. Though there seemed to be a minder keeping pace with him quite easily, and he was clearly walking.
Will Johnson’s loyalists bring down this report, destroy their party, force a general election, and sweep him back to power on some new ticket, leader of the Truth Party? Nope. Don’t be silly. How have they got the energy to be so silly, in this heat?
