When Boris Johnson first became Prime Minister, he did not have a majority in parliament. Still, he didn’t worry too much about making friends with Tory MPs. He decided to work from the outside in, using his public popularity to pressure colleagues. A snap election was looming: backing him, he said, was their best hope of surviving. He was right, and delivered a majority of 80. This gave him huge personal authority. MPs deferred to his judgment even when they disagreed.
How different things look now. Johnson finds himself pleading with his MPs not to pull the plug on his premiership in what seems like a daily struggle. ‘He’s now a prisoner of the parliamentary party,’ says one minister. They make demands; he attempts to appease them. Everything — from staff changes at No. 10 to the makeup of the whips’ office — is designed to show that he is listening to backbenchers. We have entered a new phase of government where almost everything the Prime Minister does is aimed at placating his MPs. They, not the public, are the audience he is most concerned about for now.
The lockdowns, the Owen Paterson debacle, ‘partygate’ and dismal parliamentary management have all taken their toll. Only a few months ago, those close to Johnson spoke about a decade in power. Now, they’re hoping to make it past next week’s half-term holiday. One loyal cabinet minister hopes that if a challenge ‘doesn’t materialise before half-term, it won’t happen for a while’. Another government member points out that there are only seven weeks when parliament is sitting between now and the May elections (which will be his next major electoral test).
Johnson’s team desperately needs this break. The new No. 10 operation needs time to settle in and work out how (indeed, if) things can function.
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