Opinion

Britain’s ebullient new premier

July 24, 2019



It would appear that very few people are indifferent to the arrival of Britain’s new Prime Minister Boris Johnson at Number Ten Downing Street. The reactions have been of either great exhilaration or deep despair. Johnson has that rare quality among politicians, which is immense charisma. By his own admission, he is not a details man. Yet his two successive terms as mayor of London, a traditional Socialist stronghold, demonstrated that he had the vision and verve to inspire a generally well-chosen team of loyal subordinates to whom he delegated day-to-day business.

However, running the UK is going to be a very different challenge. He takes over a Conservative party that only has a parliamentary majority thanks to support from ten Ulster Unionist MPs. There remains within his party a small core of MPs who are deeply opposed to Britain’s exist from the European Union. The British establishment, including most importantly, the Civil Service, could not believe what they saw as the ill-educated stupidity of the 17 million Britons who in June 2016 voted to quit the EU. Since that epic decision, its members have done their best to sabotage or water down Brexit.

As much as anything else, Boris Johnson won the overwhelming support of the rank-and-file members of his party, because he is irrevocably committed to leaving the EU in a little over three months’ time, with or without a renegotiated deal from Brussels. Brexit is, therefore, going to be his top priority. Getting a recalcitrant parliament to agree, if necessary to walking away without an agreement with the EU, will be his biggest concern. It may be that he will run the risk of calling a snap general election in an attempt to give himself a working majority. But his lackluster predecessor Theresa May tried that and actually lost rather than gained MPs.

It seems clear that until October at the very least, Johnson’s agenda is going to be packed with Brexit business. This means that this former foreign secretary is unlikely to give much attention to foreign affairs in general and the Middle East in particular. He may, however, try to boost his electoral standing with some sweeping domestic measures. He has long been a critic of the British “nanny state”. But unlike most leaders in other democracies, UK premiers do not enjoy total control over the machinery of government. The British Civil Service is a self-perpetuating institution that will only embrace change on its own terms. Ministers come and go, sometimes serving for less than a year, but the bureaucrats go on forever. Johnson is unlikely to win over these mandarins by charm alone.

His critics claim that he has “no moral compass”, unlike Winston Churchill, the last British leader of undoubted charisma. Last year Johnson actually produced a Churchill biography and it was clear how much he admires the man. But Churchill united Britain in the face of Nazi aggression. Johnson can give no such rallying call. Instead he takes over a country that is deeply divided on Brexit and dominated by a bien-pensant elite liberal establishment. It will take a great deal more than his ebullience and appeal to allow him to steer the course that will make him the successful prime minister he has long dreamed of being.


July 24, 2019
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