Boris Johnson is out. But his ugly brand of politics will go on | Peter Oborne | MiddleEastEye | 7 July 2022
The next Tory leader will almost certainly pursue the same policies as Johnson
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson makes a statement outside 10 Downing Street in central London on July 7, 2022 (AFP)
There was relief and exultation today that Boris Johnson’s sordid premiership has ended.
Wholly understandable.
But I have sombre news for those who expect change. It’s most unlikely. The next Tory leader will almost certainly pursue the same policies as Johnson.
Johnson was brought down because of his greed, venality, abuse of power and habitual deceit
On Brexit. On civil liberties. On the Human Rights Act. The same English nationalism and cheap, ugly, vicious populism.
Remember that Johnson was not brought down because of his policies. These were popular among Tory members, many of whom considered that he did not go far enough.
He was brought down because of his greed, venality, abuse of power and habitual deceit.
Eventually this became too much to stomach even for the most ardent Brexit-supporting Tories.
Who comes next?
But they haven’t changed their minds about anything else – as I predict will become apparent as soon as the Tory leadership election gets properly underway next week.
The election that will determine who’s the next British prime minister.
Boris Johnson: The billionaires’ useful idiot Read More »
The system works like this: Tory MPs run a series of ballots that narrows the choice down to two candidates.
Those candidates then put their case before Tory members in the country.
This is the system that made Boris Johnson prime minister three years ago in the summer of 2019.
The identical system will operate this time as well. Which means that we can expect the same kind of winner: a politician set on confrontation with Europe, weaponising immigration, attacking the rule of law, tearing up the Human Rights Act, and tearing up the Northern Ireland protocol.
In other words, the next Tory leader will wage war on the fundamental tenets of liberal democracy, just as Boris Johnson did.
Tory members will choose
Bear in mind there are less than 200,000 members of the Conservative Party. They tend to be elderly, white, insular – and hostile to the European Union. Many are former members of UKIP.
Unsurprisingly surveys prove that large numbers are bigots.
A poll carried out by YouGov (founded by current Chancellor Nadhim Zahawi) found that two-thirds of Tory members believe the noxious conspiracy theory that parts of the UK are governed by sharia law, and 45 percent think some areas are dangerous for non-Muslims to enter.
Britain will have a new face in Downing Street this autumn. But the Johnson project is likely to carry on regardless
This tiny and unappetising congregation of Tory members comprises less than half of one percent of the British population. Yet they will ultimately choose the next Tory leader.
That’s why Michel Barnier – EU negotiator over Brexit – was almost certainly too optimistic when he said today that “The departure of Boris Johnson opens a new page” in Britain’s relations with Europe.
Tory grandee Michael Heseltine forecast that the end of Johnson meant the end of Brexit. Dream on Lord Heseltine.
All available evidence shows that anyone advocating a closer relationship with Europe stands a negligible chance of winning the Tory leadership.
The billionaires’ vote
As I described in Middle East Eye last month, Johnson sustained himself in power thanks to the support of two powerful and allied groups. First, the billionaire Tory donors who – in an ugly and deeply troubling mutation of democratic politics – today control the Conservative Party.
Second, the big newspaper proprietors – Murdoch, Rothermere and the Barclay family. They all backed him to be Tory leader three years ago, then threw their support behind him in the 2019 general election.
With the single exception of the Times, which turned on Johnson at the last possible moment, all three backed Johnson right up to his departure this morning.
Nadhim Zahawi: From Jeffrey Archer’s ‘Lemon Kurd’ to UK chancellor Read More »
As night follows day, the mainstream press in alliance with the billionaire donors will seek to choose Johnson’s successor. It will take a brave politician to defy their wishes. Jeremy Hunt, former Foreign Secretary, is the most likely to challenge this oligarchical system.
If he does so, he will fail.
Remember that all the leading candidates in the leadership contest served in Johnson’s cabinet. They supported his policies, and in many cases repeated his lies.
Take for example the resignation letter sent by Sajid Javid to the prime minister yesterday, insisting that the British people expected “integrity” from the government.
Has it really taken Javid three years to wake up to the fact that Johnson is a habitual liar? And let’s not forgot how, even as health secretary, Javid repeated Boris Johnson’s mendacious claim, now under investigation by the National Audit Office, that he was building 48 new hospitals.
Rishi Sunak is equally compromised.
The same applies to anyone who served in the Johnson cabinet. They cannot disown his legacy. Britain will have a new face in Downing Street this autumn. But the Johnson project is likely to carry on regardless.
_________
Peter Oborne won best commentary/blogging in both 2022 and 2017, and was also named freelancer of the year in 2016 at the Drum Online Media Awards for articles he wrote for Middle East Eye. He was also named as British Press Awards Columnist of the Year in 2013. He resigned as chief political columnist of the Daily Telegraph in 2015. His latest book, The Assault on Truth: Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and the Emergence of a New Moral Barbarism, was published in February 2021 and was a Sunday Times Top Ten Bestseller. His previous books include The Triumph of the Political Class, The Rise of Political Lying, and Why the West is Wrong about Nuclear Iran.
| truthaholics 
Absolutely agree with Peter Oborne’s analysis of what the British public can expect. Ultimately nothing will change for the welfare and support of the people. The UK government is not, and never was, ruled by and for its people.
The UK will most certainly not turn the page on its ugly racist islamophobic and xenophobic policies. There will be no end to the egregiously overreaching bills in the process of being pushed into “laws” intended to eradicate #HumanRights and targeted to criminalize our fundamental #HumanRights. Because it is the imperial white plutocratic corporatocratic elitists, whose white privilege of superiority and deep pockets to purchase, bribe and blackmail any and all integrity of the Conservatives, who run the UK government.
There will be no-about-face on Brexit. Brexshit is the predominant motive to end adhering to the European Union’s foreign and domestic policies and crush all pretense of #democracy, shred inalienable #HumanRights and remorselessly join in US empire’s warmongering agenda as its imperial minion to aid and abet empire’s relentless #WarCrimes and #CrimesAgainstHumanity objectives domestically and globally for global domination.
As the British #HumanRights organisation Liberty concisely stated today: “The Government is in a state of disarray – but don’t let that fool you.
The personnel may be changing but the core of its agenda remains the same. It still aims to rip up our Human Rights Act by passing the disastrous Rights Removal Bill. It still wants to restrict our right to protest even further with the Public Order Bill.
The threat to our rights remains and we must stay vigilant.
A lot has changed in the last 48 hours, but Liberty’s mission hasn’t. We stand against the Government’s rights-destroying agenda.”
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Reblogged this on HUMANS 4 HUMAN RIGHTS and commented:
Absolutely agree with Peter Oborne’s analysis of what the British public can expect. Ultimately nothing will change for the welfare and support of the people. The UK government is not, and never was, ruled by and for its people.
The UK will most certainly not turn the page on its ugly racist islamophobic and xenophobic policies. There will be no end to the egregiously overreaching bills in the process of being pushed into “laws” intended to eradicate #HumanRights and targeted to criminalize our fundamental #HumanRights. Because it is the imperial white plutocratic corporatocratic elitists, whose white privilege of superiority and deep pockets to purchase, bribe and blackmail any and all integrity of the Conservatives, who run the UK government.
There will be no-about-face on Brexit. Brexshit is the predominant motive to end adhering to the European Union’s foreign and domestic policies and crush all pretense of #democracy, shred inalienable #HumanRights and remorselessly join in US empire’s warmongering agenda as its imperial minion to aid and abet empire’s relentless #WarCrimes and #CrimesAgainstHumanity objectives domestically and globally for global domination.
As the British #HumanRights organisation Liberty concisely stated today: “The Government is in a state of disarray – but don’t let that fool you.
The personnel may be changing but the core of its agenda remains the same. It still aims to rip up our Human Rights Act by passing the disastrous Rights Removal Bill. It still wants to restrict our right to protest even further with the Public Order Bill.
The threat to our rights remains and we must stay vigilant.
A lot has changed in the last 48 hours, but Liberty’s mission hasn’t. We stand against the Government’s rights-destroying agenda.”
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