Former prime minister Theresa May hasn’t declared that she’s signed a no-confidence letter to Graham Brady, the chair of the 1922 Committee of Conservative MPs, but has been a vocal opponent of her replacement. This has led some to see her as somehow better than him. Are we really going to forget the Windrush scandal and the hostile environment so quickly?
Douglas Ross, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives, is a bit of a windsock on Johnson, changing direction with each passing storm. But one thing he’s been consistent about is his long-running war against Scottish Travellers. He famously once said that, if he were prime minister for a day, his top priority would be “tougher enforcement against Gypsies and Travellers”, while, in 2018, he tried to get a Traveller family in his constituency evicted because their camp was “too visible”.
So while I suspect that the crocodile will cling to life this time, there is no reason to think that – when the snake eventually wins – whoever replaces Johnson as king of the swamp will be any better.
The current favourite to succeed Johnson is Jeremy Hunt, whose long tenure as health minister left the NHS on its knees. As my colleague Caroline Molloy put it, his record is “one of missed targets, lengthening waits, crumbling hospitals, missed opportunities, false solutions, funding boosts that vanished under scrutiny, and blaming everyone but himself”.
Second favourite is the foreign secretary, Liz Truss, whose dangerous rhetoric on the Northern Ireland protocol and trips across the Atlantic funded by the Koch Brothers would ring alarm bells in any sane democracy.
Whether or not the serpent crushes the crocodilian makes for compelling viewing for political junkies. But for the country, the big questions are about climate breakdown, the urgent need to invest in public services and the rapid decomposition of our democracy. The reality is that whether or not Johnson survives will make little difference to any of these.
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