the times | Thursday November 11 2021 31
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Buy prints or signed copies of Times cartoons from our Print Gallery at timescartoons.co.uk or call 020 7711 7826Anxious Tories can smell decay in the air
Having been misled by No 10, backbenchers are ‘self-whipping’ as concern spreads about being hitched to a toxic brand
party machine is working well and
the economy is humming. Margaret
Thatcher discovered this when she
was removed in 1990 despite having
won a majority of 102 three years
earlier.
This No 10 finds itself in tough
terrain. It is negotiating robustly with
the EU over the Northern Ireland
protocol. Does it have the support
for triggering Article 16, launching a
messy trade war with the EU? It
would not take many MPs with
doubts to vote with the opposition or
abstain for the government’s
majority to be slashed, or worse.
There will also be pressure this
winter over energy prices, pay and
who knows what other excitements.
Already the government has little
time left to deliver. The pandemic
has played tricks with perceptions
and it seems as though Boris’s
general election triumph of
December 2019 is recent. On the
contrary, on a standard
parliamentary run of four years, this
government is halfway through.
What has really been achieved so
far? The majority may end up being
squandered.
This shouldn’t be overstated. The
government isn’t about to fall but the
process of decay is advanced. As a
Tory MP tells me: “I feel as though
we’re going to lose. I don’t know
when or how exactly. But we’re on
the way to losing.”vote is on, usually have no idea.
Much of what’s on the order paper is
highly technical. “It could be an
amendment relating to changes to
sub-section 7 of an old piece of
legislation,” an MP says.
With vote after vote the process
becomes mechanical, except in
cases when eagle-eyed rebels have
done their work highlighting a flaw
and organising against ministers.
Moving around the parliamentary
estate, sometimes at speed, between
meetings and committees, loyal
MPs on the government side need
to be able to rely on the whips and
the government doing their job to
ensure there isn’t anything too stupid
on the order paper that turns out
later to be indefensible.
The system broke last week.
Having been made fools of by the
prime minister over the Paterson
vote, Tory MPs are on high alert.
“I’ve spoken to three groups of
colleagues who are saying they now
want to check everything,” an MP
says. This could catch on, points out
a veteran Tory MP who is appalled
by how weak parliament has become
when scrutinising the executive.
The breakdown of trust has all
manner of implications for the
stability or otherwise of the
government and its pursuit of policy.
A majority of 80 should be more
than enough for just about anything,
but only if the parliamentary andof scandal will dent the Tories.
They’re already raising taxes, after
introducing a left-wing budget, and
the vaccine boost is wearing off.
What I suspect is more significant
is the impact this is already having
on the workings of Westminster, and
the perception among Tory MPs that
the “take back control” government
has lost control. An administration
with an 80-seat majority is behaving
as though it is broken.
This means that, after Paterson,
the most mentally alert MPs withthe strongest survival instincts are
now doing something called “self-
whipping”. This is not some
questionable, deviant practice soon to
feature on the front of a newspaper.
It simply means smarter Tory MPs
are reading the Commons order
paper especially closely to check
what they are being asked to vote for.
That might sound odd to voters.
Shouldn’t MPs always understand
precisely what they are voting for on
a daily basis?
No, that’s not how it usually works.
Talk to an MP of any party when the
division bell announcing a vote rings
and they will, when asked what theB
oris Johnson has always
loved the freedom of the
open road. Before he was
encumbered by round the
clock security and walled up
in Downing Street, the prime minister
was an easy rider who enjoyed
heading out on the highway looking
for adventure, pedalling his bicycle
round London to do as he pleased.
“Boris is a high testosterone kind
of guy,” says a senior Tory. “He’s not
used to being constrained.”
Might pent-up energy and
frustration explain some of his
recent odd decisions? Tory MPs say
it is as plausible an explanation as
any for the way in which he decided
to plunge the government into a
vortex. The whirlpool of sleaze is
whizzing round so fast it is
destroying the reputations of
bewildered Conservative MPs at the
rate of about two a day as new and
old allegations surface.
Unsurprisingly, Tory MPs are
furious about what has happened
and worried where the scandal goes
next. Idealistic younger MPs are
depressed at being tainted by the
tarnishing of the Tory brand.
Having been three-line-whipped
last week to defend Owen Paterson
on his outside interests and to
demand the overhaul of the
Commons standards system, those
MPs who followed orders and voted
with the government were
humiliated when the prime minister
U-turned the next morning. That left
the chief whip, Mark Spencer,
exposed. The chief organises, or
whips, MPs to ensure the
government has the numbers it
needs to win votes in the Commons.
It’s a furtive business.
Highly unusually, it’s spilling out
into the open. Spencer’s colleagues in
the whips’ office are reported as
saying the disastrous Paterson
manoeuvre was not the idea of “the
chief”. It was a direct order from the
prime minister. Johnson took a “rip
the sticking plaster off” approach to
the problem and now finds the
government left staring at a gaping,
self-inflicted wound.
Just ten days ago it looked different
when leaders were gathering in
Glasgow for Cop26. Johnson seemed
pre-eminent. The prime minister
appeared to be putting difficulties
behind him. Not now.
Much of the immediate focus is,
understandably, on what this might
mean in terms of the opinion polls.
Perhaps an 18th-century-style stenchThe whirlpool of
sleaze is destroying the
reputation of MPs
Iain
Martin@iainmartin1