Boris Johnson is making boring politics look attractive
All the chaos is putting voters in the mood for calm
THINGS ARE never dull around Boris Johnson. Since 2019 the prime minister has led the Conservatives to their biggest vote-share since 1979, shaken up politics, taken Britain out of the European Union, endured a pandemic, nearly died, had a child, struck a trade deal with the EU, got married, had another child, and seen his net approval rating swing from +40 to -51 after revelations about potentially illegal parties in 10 Downing Street. His repeated dishonesty—and a police investigation into the high jinks, launched on January 25th—make them the most damaging in a series of scandals. Others include scrounging £53,000 ($72,000) from donors to redecorate his residence and trying to prorogue Parliament illegally. If Napoleon was history on horseback, Mr Johnson is history on a pantomime horse.
This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline “Wrecking ball”
Britain January 29th 2022
- Boris Johnson, the prime minister who can’t say no
- The Bank of England is determined to prevent a wage-price spiral
- Little sign of compromise over the Northern Ireland protocol
- Britain has long been a leader in genome-sequencing
- Brexit and covid-19 have produced a bigger civil service
- Britain’s newly listed tech firms are taking a beating
- After more than two decades, Britain is finally rid of termites
- Boris Johnson is making boring politics look attractive
From the January 29th 2022 edition
Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents
Explore the editionMore from Britain
Britain’s brokers are diversifying and becoming less British
London’s depleted stockmarket is forcing them to change
What a buzzy startup reveals about Britain’s biotech sector
Lots of clever scientists, not enough business nous
Britain’s government lacks a clear Europe policy
It should be more ambitious over getting closer to the EU
The Rachel Reeves theory of growth
The chancellor says it’s her number-one priority. We ask her what that means for Britain