In that case, he is the problem, and thus can’t be the solution.īut he has one gilt-edged asset. The trauma of Britain’s stringent lockdowns is still recent enough to have sparked real and lasting anger at the photos and emails depicting regular booze-ups in his Downing Street home and office, at a time when people could not see their dying relatives or attend funerals.Ī pervasive sense has taken hold that Johnson does not think he is bound by the rules that apply to everyone else. Much of the ire stems from Johnson’s own behaviour. In recent polls, almost two-thirds of Britons disapprove of their government the Labour opposition is ahead of the Tories by up to nine points and Johnson’s personal ratings are in the basement. There have been “resets” of his premiership before, including the usual menu of reheated announcements and familiar warnings to his cabinet ministers that they have to shape up and start delivering.īut this time the tank of goodwill and trust has been largely drained. He has announced a new housing policy – unaffordability is as big an issue in metropolitan Britain as it is in Australia’s major cities – and has hinted at potential tax cuts to help with the cost-of-living squeeze.
Johnson has spent the days since the vote trying to look busy, energetic and purposeful. He may be unpopular right now, the loyalist refrain goes, but in two years “partygate” – a sequence of lockdown-busting parties in Downing Street in 20 – will be forgotten.Īnd when the next general election is called, Johnson’s supporters say nobody but the maverick-in-chief can hold together the shaky coalition of tweed-wearing shire Tories, pinstriped bankers and blue-collared Brexit-backing battlers that he converted into an 80-seat majority in 2019. The history of previous Conservative Party no-confidence votes, the level of dissent among his parliamentary colleagues, and the antipathy within the general public, all suggest his days as prime minister are numbered.Ī fresh wave of crisis is likely to crest on June 24, the day after Johnson looks set to lose two Conservative seats at a pair of byelections, probably forfeiting one to Labour and one to the Liberal Democrats.īut there’s another view. Try as he might to carry on, the naysayers reckon it is only a matter of time before the famously regicidal Tories renew their rebellion and deliver the fatal blow. In Top PM: Maverick, Johnson is at that critical point in the standard action-film narrative, the end of act two, when the hero has reached his seemingly hopeless nadir.Īfter 148 of his 359 MPs voted against him in a no-confidence ballot this week, fed up with the never-ending drumbeat of the “partygate” saga, many pundits now see him as a dead man walking. Hopeless nadir: Can Boris Johnson’s risk-taking approach get him and his team through the politically tricky terrain? Getty At this point, that looks very much against the odds. He, too, is a risk-taking maverick, who hopes to guide his Conservative Party to unlikely success in a mission: to be re-elected next year or the year after. If British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has time to get down to his local cinema, he might well take some inspiration. Tom Cruise’s veteran pilot is repeatedly chastised for his recklessness, but through a combination of his risk-taking, his flying skills and his teammates’ loyalty, he completes the mission. London | The box office blockbuster in Britain right now is Top Gun: Maverick.
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