Operation Save Big Dog and the real scandal of Boris’s leadership

There is a theory which states the primary reason for Boris Johnson’s political longevity is that there are simply so many scandals that the latest infidelity drives the last one from public consciousness before it really has time to sink in.

‘Who paid for his wallpaper? Meal delivery? He had a party while forcing the country into social isolation and atomisation? How many parties— what do you mean the police are investigating him?’

At this point, it seems like the revelation most likely to do him in will be the discovery that, at some point in the last two years, Boris Johnson sat quietly in a room and diligently worked through an afternoon without once breaking from his papers to do something outrageous.

We left people outside the airport while we filled a plane with pets

But perhaps this is unfair. For all that the mood in the Conservative’s 2019 intake may be getting a bit Blackadder Goes Forth (‘Field Marshall Haig is worried this may be depressing the men a tad—’), Johnson’s loyalists do have a point when they note that these are ultimately about style rather than substance; yes, they undermine his authority and his ability to take measures to contain future variants, but they aren’t nearly so serious as the situation in Ukraine? Shouldn’t we be talking about policy?