Boris Johnson’s ‘method’ isn’t working

Is the Boris Johnson ‘method’ reaching the end of the road and if it is, can the Prime Minister find a new one – or is he altogether done for?

The method, by all accounts deployed across more than one facet of the Prime Minister’s life, involves issuing a series of charmingly delivered apologies for things not having turned out as he’d led his audience to believe they would.

Each apology is immediately followed by a new pledge that matters will take a decisive turn for the better very soon. And thus does the PM buy himself more time in which to extricate himself from scrapes.

On Thursday he was at it again during a Downing Street press conference called to sugar the pill of a second national lockdown.

‘This is not a repeat of the spring,’ he said, ‘these measures are time-limited… these rules will expire and on the second of December we plan to move back to a tiered approach.