2022: The Downfall of Boris Johnson

By TruePublica Editor: The downfall of pathological liar Boris Johnson is assured. The game-changing event has now happened and all bar a miracle, Boris Johnson is now dead in the water and his ousting is not if, but when.

The year 2022 marks 100 years, according to historians, when the British Empire had reached the apex of its power. And 100 years later, it is also the year that marks the escalation of the downfall of Gt Britain to the status of an irrelevant mid-sized country in the 21st century. We can thank a rapidly changing world and truly awful politicians for this collapse. The former was inevitable after WW2, the latter could have been avoided. The clues were there, but no one sought to defend our country from people who only wanted power, not work in public service in the public interest.

Britain struggled in a post-war world to uphold its Empire but it graciously and largely gave way to those that requested their independence. By the late 1960s, most of Britain’s territories had become independent countries. Today, many people, especially those aged over 60 bemoan this decline.  For them, Brexit was a chance to revive a time that was really confined to the history books several generations ago. These people were conned with Brexit. And the cost of it has been far greater than most people imagine… yet.

 

Boris Johnson

The Daily Telegraph summed up the future of Boris Johnson on December 11th by headlining with a piece that stated:

“The collapse of trust can be traced to the fatal flaws in Boris Johnson’s personality. The latest crisis in No 10 is no fleeting embarrassment, but a game-changer that has stripped the PM of any remaining credibility.”

 

Financial Times contributing editor, Phillip Stevens explains just how unsuited Johnson is to lead the country and why his premiership was always destined to be short-lived –

“Johnson has always been unfit for high political office, as incompetent as he is dishonest. Beyond Brexit – an exercise in self-harm set to make the UK at once poorer, less secure in its own union of nations, and weaker abroad – he has nothing to say.”

 

These comments are not just the result of the ‘partygate’ scandal and mishandling of Covid-19, but so much more.

There are all the promises that were broken. Not least, that we were to get 50,000 more NHS nurses and 50 million extra GP appointments along with 20,000 more police officers and that the pensions triple lock was to be maintained. All these promises have been broken or are on target to be. Not only was no increase in general taxation promised but it turned out – according to the Telegraph (again) that – “Conservative Prime Ministers have pushed through more than 1,000 tax rises at a rate of roughly one every three days over the past decade, according to new research.” This was calculated by the fact that the Government has made 1,651 tax changes since 2010 (up to February 2021), 63 per cent of which – 1,034 – were tax rises.

Other promises are the failure of the Home Office to deal with migrant crossings. This failure has got so bad that manslaughter charges have now been brought against high-ranking British officials for failing to help 27 people who subsequently drowned on November 26th attempting to cross the English Channel. Voters don’t want unmitigated migrant arrivals – but they don’t want them drowned either.

Farmers and fishermen now have an axe to grind as the promises of Brexit have not just dramatically failed to materialise – but Johnson even blamed them for ‘holding back the economy’.

Then there’s the stench of corruption emanating from the sewers connecting Downing Street to donors. A quick web search returns hundreds of articles spelling out the billions of taxpayers money gone in dodgy, murky deals. It’s a crisis on its own that would bring down any government if a pandemic hadn’t provided cover. Paying cash as a donor only to be rewarded many times over with lucrative government contracts is the stuff of third-world countries and tin-pot dictators. It’s a feature of this government though and voters don’t like that either.

Even the rampantly right-wing press such as the Daily Mail and Daily Express who lauded his ascension to No10 now think he should go. With a headline like – “Unhappy New Year for Boris? Six in 10 Britons want PM ousted” you know things are bad. And when the bookies say – “Johnson is expected to lose his job as UK prime minister at some point in 2022 as political betting sites slash their odds on the Tory leader exiting No 10″ – you know things are worse.

 

Not Taking back Control

It wasn’t that long ago when former PM Theresa May repeatedly withheld sensitive intelligence from Boris Johnson when he was foreign secretary, because they believed he would leak the information and therefore, represented a national security risk.  And whilst that was back in July 2019, the chair of the national security committee has written a letter to Johnson just two weeks ago on exactly the same matter.

In that letter, Johnson was accused of failing to protect the UK’s national security. The committee’s members also include several senior Conservative backbenchers – who use strong language such as; “complacency may be creeping in” and there is “a significant reduction in Boris Johnson’s personal engagement”. It went further to point out with regard to international events that there was – “a systemic failure by the government to prepare properly”. In addition, this letter also “questions if the Foreign Office is fit for purpose”. Highlighted was the fact that the Defence and the Foreign Office will receive “the smallest annual, real-terms growth” of all government departments.

This was a damning indictment of leadership – and proves he has no real concept of controlling the complexities of government.

 

Brexit Reality

All of Boris Johnson’s new post-Brexit trade deals put together will have an economic benefit of just £3 to £7 per person over the next 15 years, according to the government’s own figures.

The tiny economic boost – amounting to just 0.01 to 0.02 per cent of GDP, and less than 50p per person a year – is dwarfed by the economic hit from leaving the EU, which the government originally estimated at minus 4 per cent of GDP but has since got worse still to minus 5 per cent of GDP over the same period.

The UK Trade Policy Observatory, states that the much-trumpeted free trade agreements (FTAs) “barely scratch the surface of the UK’s challenge to make up the GDP lost by leaving the EU”. Contrary to Johnson’s boasts of the deals creating a “new dawn” and representing “global Britain at its best”  – official estimates from the Office for Budget Responsibility point to a Brexit loss of more than £1,250 per person over the coming years. To put that in context, the government’s own department (OBR) confirms that Brexit losses equate to – “178 times bigger than trade deal gains.”

To pile the pressure on the Brexiteers, the evidence of their failure is now coming home. More than 60 per cent of British voters say Brexit has either “gone badly” or “worse than expected” a year after the UK withdrew from the European Union, according to a new poll. And other polls say the same. Indeed, around 42 per cent of people who voted to “Leave” the E.U. in 2016 now have a negative view of how Brexit has turned out.

In 2022, back-bench Brexiteers will turn against Johnson because it hasn’t turned out as they promised and they’ll want a scapegoat after blaming Johnson and Lord Frost for negotiating a deal that went bad so quickly.

 

Post-Covid Reality

Britain is not due to fair very well in a post-Covid world. With the reality of a 10 to 15-year effect of Brexit that will cause an enormous drag on the economy, it will feel like a decade long recession in terms of declining standards of living. This decline is set to get worse as household incomes will be hit even harder with further energy shocks (anticipated to double average bills next year), stubborn and persistent inflationary pressures (expected to turn out at nearly 4 per cent), rising interest rates and additional taxes.

The only thing Johnson can do is load the national debt even further to save his political skin – and there’s only so much debt you can afford to raise in times of rising interest rates.

Johnson and his acolytes will tell you that the UK will perform far better than the G7 (not forgetting it fell harder and therefore growth will be faster) next year, that rising wages and job opportunities are the result of Brexit. Whilst that may be true to some extent – none of that means anything if household income falls behind inflation. And worse, what happens when supply chains get their act together, Covid is finally defeated and then consumer demand falls? And it will, especially in the latter half of the year.

In 2022, the electorate will blame Johnson for all these failures simply because the good news will be totally outgunned by the bad news. The public like scapegoats – just like politicians do.

Boris Johnson is a pathological liar, he lies incessantly to get his way. He is manipulative and cunning and has very little regard or respect for the rights and feelings of others. He also has a weak grip on reality – confirmed by his constant over-optimistic predictions and desertion of his closest allies.

He has lost control of his backbenchers, of the economic mess of Brexit (and quite possibly the outcome of Covid-19) and has no control over inflation and other rising household costs.

The clock is ticking for Johnson – it’s just a matter of time – not if but when. Reality will constantly keep coming back to bite into the lies and everyone will get tired of being associated with the scandals that infect the entire Tory party – and that includes the biggest lie of them all – Brexit.

 

References

• An A to Z guide of Boris Johnson’s failures in government (LINK)
• List of  Boris Johnson lies (LINK)
• The MO of a pathological liar (LINK)
• Face it Boris Johnson, you’re not in control (The Times Paywall LINK)

 

 

 

 

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