Editorial. The British, like all populations affected by the Covid, have endured their share of tragedies, constraints and deprivations: confinements, canceled family reunions, funerals in small groups. The country has just passed the milestone of 150,000 deaths linked to the pandemic, a sad record, with a per capita rate higher than that of the European Union (EU).
However, while it was enacting prohibitions and sanctions against the population, the government of Boris Johnson multiplied the parts washed down in Downing Street. According to press revelations, the Prime Minister participated in one of these collective parties in May 2020 less than an hour after one of his ministers announced the ban on such gatherings. In April 2021, another of these receptions was held the day before Queen Elizabeth attended alone, in Windsor Chapel, the funeral of her husband, Philip. Poignant, the image of the queen seated in the middle of empty stalls, facing the coffin of the prince, has been around the world.
In a country whose rule of law (“the rule of law”) is one facet of identity, Boris Johnson’s contempt for rules made under his own authority rightly causes intense anger. Two out of three Britons want him to resign, according to polls, as do several MPs from his party. Coming after a long series of blunders, the scandal of parts illegal is obviously one too many, the one that marks the beginning of the end of Mr Johnson’s resounding reign over British politics. This time, the contempt for the people is flagrant.
Illusionist
In 2019, with Westminster paralyzed, unable to secure a majority on the European Union divorce deal brokered by Theresa May, Boris Johnson emerged as not just the savior of the Conservative Party, but the man who would finally “make Brexit happen”. His opportunism, his lightness, his elastic relationship to the truth were already known. But wrapped in a phenomenal aplomb, an undeniable charisma and a solid humor, these characteristics of the character could appear to certain Britons as assets, when casting off with the continent.
Since then, Mr. Johnson’s two main constants have been his contempt for institutions and his propensity for lies, coupled with his rage to deny them. In the summer of 2019, fearing the censorship of deputies about Brexit, he went so far as to “suspend” Parliament, until the Supreme Court stopped the adventure. Denying his own signature on customs controls in the Irish Sea, he threatened, more recently, to denounce the Brexit agreement. Even caught in the act, Boris Johnson continues to deny: Downing Street parties were “work meetings”, he dared.
But the prime minister’s original lie was about nothing less than Brexit itself. By repeating that the British could “to have the butter and the money from the butter” (“to have the cake and eat it”) once out of the EU, Boris Johnson won over a large part of the public: both popular pro-Brexit voters, to whom he dangled state aid, and the ultraliberals of his party, who instead expect drastic deregulation. Today, all are waiting in vain for the “Brexit dividends” he promised. British democracy will need all its assets to get the country out of the impasse where the illusionist “Boris” has led it.
