How Boris Johnson squandered his premiership

Boris Johnson has been given so many second chances. He hasn’t taken any of them.

Let’s start with his voting for Theresa May’s terrible Brexit deal. Despite this, when Theresa May resigned he was backed by Leavers and became PM. Having become PM he didn’t, as he should have done, back a no deal, and instead negotiated a revised version of May’s deal. Though a huge improvement on her version, it was far from perfect. Leavers backed him nonetheless and he won a large majority in the general election. And for having defeated Corbyn and achieved Brexit he will be remembered as a hero by many Conservatives.

Barely a couple of months after the general election, Covid arrived. He seemed tossed around by events, initially seeming to favour facilitating the spread through the ‘squashing the sombrero’ strategy, then switching to a far too long lockdown, then adopting a ‘something will turn up’ strategy through the latter part of 2020, then new lockdowns.