Yesterday, the British conservative party (the Tories) lost a by-election in the North Shropshire constituency. In the normal ebb and flow of politics, these things happen. But North Shropshire had been a conservative seat for over 200 years. It would have been as if the Democrats won Alabama‘s 4th district — which twice gave Trump over 80% of the vote.
Initially, the Tories worried that while they would retain the seat, their margin of victory would be significantly smaller. Then polls showed the Liberal Democrats had a chance of winning. In the end, they did win - in a landslide. A Conservative margin of 23,000 votes became a Lib Dem margin of almost 6,000. This crushing defeat has left British PM Boris Johnson’s future clouded in doubt.
Boris was already on the ropes suffering from accusations of sleaze leveled against many British MPs, the vast majority of whom were Conservatives. The fact that the seat was open was due to the resignation of MP Owen Paterson after he received £100,000s worth of consultancy fees for a company that received millions of pounds worth of no-bid Covid contracts from the Tory government. Compounding the sleaze was an attempt by the Conservative party to delay a vote mandating a recall election for Paterson. The public outcry against the party's overt manipulation caused Boris Johnson’s government to do a U-turn and Paterson resigned.
Like Trump, Boris, a man of little talent but with a genius for self-promotion, has survived accusations of dishonesty and incompetence. He got his job because of his ability to sell Brexit to the British people — which by any objective measure has been the worst self-inflicted wound in British political history. However, the Covid pandemic has given Boris political cover. Because, while the UK has been slammed worse than most countries, it has allowed the Tories to point the finger at Covid rather than Brexit as the root cause of Britain’s economic problems. When Covid finally goes away, the Brexit folly’s true ramifications will be fully revealed. Not that this will trouble Boris. He is not a long-term thinker and has the blustering self-confidence to believe he would find some other way to excuse the disaster.
The dismal North Shropshire result is not Boris’s only PR disaster. Last winter, while the government was asking Britons to isolate and self-quarantine, Number 10 and Conservative party headquarters were hosting Christmas parties and quiz nights. Over the last few weeks, photographs and surreptitiously recorded testimony have revealed the Tory Party’s blatant hypocrisy. Johnson took a Trumpian approach to his defense by denying everything when challenged by opposition leaders in the Prime Minister’s parliamentary question time. But the obvious dissembling is no longer dismissed as ‘Boris being Boris’.
On top of that, Johnson started a renovation of the Prime Minister’s apartments with no clear idea of how it was going to be paid for. The exchequer allots £30,000 a year for the PM to decorate his private residence as he sees fit. But for Boris and his latest wife, Carrie Symonds (his third) — with whom he has two children (the 6th and 7th he admits to) — this was insufficient. The renovation’s cost has been estimated at upward of £200,000. Initially, the Party and members of the cabinet said that Johnson had paid for it out of his own pocket. But that turned out to be a lie.
The conservative party has no particular respect for Johnson’s leadership ability. He was promoted because of his ability to win elections. And it paid off in 2019, when the Conservatives won in a landslide. They made inroads in Labour strongholds in the industrial North. And Boris with celebrated across the right-wing political spectrum. But now these new Conservative MPs realize that, if the Tories cannot hold onto strongholds like North Shropshire, their marginal seats are at great risk. The emergence of the Omicron variety of Covid, which has hit the United Kingdom hard, has mandated tougher anti-Covid measures. This has weakened Boris’s support from the far-right MPs. What does this all mean for his future?
In the British political system, there are no set terms for the government. The party in power can call a general election whenever they want, as long as it is within five years of the previous election. However, at any time, a vote of ‘no confidence’ can oust the Government. Or a party can elect to change its leader. But for now, the Tories may decide to leave Boris in place to take all the heat — and fire him when convenient. As they did Margaret Thatcher in 1990. We won’t know until next year as parliament is on its Christmas break.
