I’m incredibly confused by this wiki, it appears that the UK is SELLING training, and SELLING minehunters (and often it will be defense suppliers, BAE systems), selling arms is pretty much the only big industry in the UK anymore (UAE, Saudi being typical customers). And yet, even the first three items in that wiki refers to sales, and labels them as “donations”). I’m not going to go into every one of those, perhaps there are donations in there, but I suspect it really isn’t as clear cut as that, but clicking through to articles there’s talk of “supplying”.
Well, apart from being elected on russian money, as an anti-EU government, and yet here, is supporting a pro-EU government, either hypocritical or making money or perhaps actually helping them (hard to say with this level of politics I don’t understand).
There is definitely a narrative of Johnson supporting Ukraine. But even the briefest of rubs on the surface flakes some paint away, and tells me that someone is being very kind with that wiki, and perhaps you’ve been reading the wrong newspapers.
Apparently he has done some kind of deal where he remains caretaker Prime Minister until the party conference in October while resigning as party leader.
This would undermine any successor who should use this conference to establish their authority and set out their vision. The last thing that they would want is Boris Johnson stealing their thunder. I Johnson thinks he has a personal mandate from the UK electorate because he won an election. That is not how it works. But then the Brexit vote had only an advisory status but then was transformed and politicised into an expression of the ‘democratic will of the people’ causing no end trouble. Johnson remaining in office will give him to scope to make all kinds of mischief.
I guess it would be down to the 1922 committee meeting on Monday to deal with any changes required by the party to evict Johnson from 10 Downing St, though he has head several meetings with the head of that committee. It is unclear what exactly is going on, it is becoming a circus.
I expect there is big debate within the party on how to give Boris Johnson the bums rush. There are plenty of candidates that could look after the shop while they elect a new leader. Not least former PM, Theresa May.
I suppose that makes sense in a roundabout politician sort of way. It just seems a bit odd for the party to say “This man isn’t fit to be our leader!”, while the MP’s of that party say “This man is fit to lead our country!”, even if only temporarily.
From a practical perspective, does this happen very often, and do we know what sort of control Johnson will have? Will things carry on more or less as normal, or will he have more limited power?
One of the things I have learnt about the British “constitution” is that the hugely important question of when the sovereign can ignore a prime minister’s request to dissolve parliament is answered in the Lascelles Principles which is named after a pseudonymous 1950 letter to the Times by the courtier Tommy Lascelles. What a system !!
Lascelles of course is a great curmudgeonly character on the Netflix show The Crown. I wonder what he would have thought of Boris.
One example from Canada: when William Lyon Mackenzie King decided to retire, he did so in two stages. First, the Liberal party had a leadership convention, which Louis St-Laurent won (in large part because of King’s behind-the-scenes manuevering). King then resigned as Liberal leader effective August 7, 1948. However, there were “just a few things to tidy up” before he left, so he stayed on as PM until November 15, 1948. The Liberals had a minority government, but the lengthy transfer of power internally in the party did not affect their ability to control the Commons.
However, the dynamics in that case were quite different. King was firmly in control of the Liberal Party right up to the end; he was just worn out and finally ready to relinquish control and retire to his country estate. The Liberals were united behind him and St Laurent, and didn’t have any problem with him taking a long goodbye, after he’d kept them in power for 21 years(!).
I think the party will say that a caretaker PM is better, and try to get him out of No 10 as quickly as possible.
There have been over 50 resignations and lots of posts to fill. That has never happened before. Usually a PM leaves with a largely Intact administration. Johnson remaining responsible for appointments during a leadership election when the candidates are competing for support. That would be quite a bizarre situation.
Usually Prime Ministers go quickly and quietly, with as much grace and dignity as they can muster. That is not likely with a character like Johnson. I expect he is plotting his return to power.
That’s a good point. A caretaker could fill those posts quickly, balanced among the different groups in the party, so that no-one has an immediate advantage.
The formally designated Deputy and therefore standby caretaker is Dominic Raab. As to whether that might still leave a leadership vacuum… well, you might think so, I couldn’t possibly comment.
At this point, regardless of any deal struck, I wouldn’t be surprised by either an irresistible public demand, and/or further revolt by Tory backbenchers, at the prospect of Boris remaining PM in any capacity for another four freakin’ months.
