Covid fraudsters are being
given a free pass
Alice Thomson
Page 25
A PM without integrity imperils democracy
Arguing that it would be disproportionate to sack Boris Johnson is nonsense: our political system is built on trust
Comment
The prime minister of the country
must be someone inside the circle
of trust. Someone that people
appreciate has so much to lose that
they will abide by the rules and tell
the truth in all circumstances. There
are so many parts of our governing
system that depend upon most
people accepting the basic integrity of
the occupant of No 10.
The apparent disproportion
between the office of a prime
minister and the issue of a cheese
and wine party is not an argument
against resignation. Because the real
issue is the maintenance of trust in
the office, and the fact that removing
a prime minister is almost
unthinkable is essential to that trust.
One of the great ironies in this
affair has been the role of Dominic
Cummings. When accused of breaking
the rules himself, his response was
that this was another example of the
media going on about something that
didn’t matter. Our reporting was
merely a form of entertainment.
For all his many talents and often
brilliant insights I have always
disagreed with him about this. The
rules matter and the details of
conduct and personal relationships
are valid and important things for the
media to report. His theory that such
things are basically irrelevant has
always been wrong. They are vital,
and are correctly reported as such.
The argument for parliamentary
government is that as people go
about their busy lives they have
representatives who are paid, and
accorded status, because they keep
their eyes on the detail and ensure
that the implicit trust accorded to
ministers, and above all the prime
minister, is deserved.
This is a moment for members
of parliament to do their job.[email protected]they lose all the financial advantages
their qualifications have bought
them. Because everyone knows it is
difficult and pricey to “turn” a
professional, they tend to be trusted.
And this makes fraudulent
professionals devastatingly effective.
The status, the trust, the price, the
fraud, the disciplinary system are all
locked together.
For this reason, it is vital the
people in the circle of trust are
subject to harsh discipline for
even minor infractions.
Exceptionally tough punishment
for what looks like almost irrelevant
pieces of dishonesty is what keeps
the whole system working. That is
why the disciplinary panel dismissed
Simon Read in a kerfuffle about
a box of doughnuts. It is about
maintaining the system of trust that
avoids serious fraud.Boris Johnson’s claim that he thought
a party was a work event is laughablethe parties, and should have told the
truth about it, this merits censure
rather than resignation.
Yes, admittedly, breaking the rules
was considered a resigning matter
in the cases of the government’s
modeller Neil Ferguson and the
former health secretary Matt
Hancock. But neither of them was
the prime minister. The resignation
of a prime minister is a weighty
matter and requires a weighty cause,
MPs could argue.
This, they could say, was a
government elected with a large
majority, partly because of the
personal appeal of the prime minister.
Everyone who voted for him knew
that he was flawed but most also
thought him talented. We all make
mistakes and this was his. Bringing
down his premiership over an
ill-judged plate of sausage rolls is an
excessive response to a human failing.
This is probably the best an
MP will be able to do if they want
to go on supporting the prime
minister. And because it strikes me
as the only coherent argument left,
it is worthwhile considering why it
is wrong.
In his excellent book Lying for
Money Dan Davies investigates
large-scale fraud and how the
perpetrators manage, at least
initially, to get away with it.
Common to many of these crimes is
that the fraudster has corrupted
someone who belongs to what
Davies calls the “circle of trust”. They
have managed to persuade someone
who is an accountant, a lawyer or an
actuary to become a confederate.
Davies explains the economics of
this. The professionals in the circle of
trust are expensive to corrupt,
because they are well-paid people
with a lot to lose. They have spent
years training and if found guilty of
an offence by a disciplinary panelB
efore he went to Tesco
Extra to buy some Krispy
Kreme doughnuts, Simon
Read had a distinguished
record of public service. He
had put himself in harm’s way again
and again. He had won a medal. He
had earned respect. And then he
went into a Wisbech supermarket in
his uniform, bought a sandwich, a
drink, carrots and 12 doughnuts, and
ended his police career.
Read was accused of having
scanned the carrot barcode twice
and failing to pay for the Krispy
Kremes. He had saved himself £9.88.
He said it had been a genuine
mistake but a disciplinary panel did
not agree. He was sacked, without
notice, for gross misconduct.
And this story from the end of 2020,
combining as it does the tragic and the
absurd, the trivial and the important,
is worth Tory MPs recalling as they
contemplate what they should do
now about the prime minister.
As MPs have tried composing
letters to their angry constituents
about the parties in No 10 Downing
Street, they will have noticed that
none of the ways of explaining things
quite works. Suggesting that Boris
Johnson believed that the bring a
bottle gathering in his garden was a
work meeting is obviously laughable.
It is not something that one
intelligent and truthful person writes
to another.
If you don’t put that, though, what
do you write? That you are waiting
for someone else to tell you if a bring
a bottle gathering was a party? That
is almost a worse answer.
Perhaps the worst suggestion of
all — one that has seriously been
made — is that the prime minister
should declare that, on reflection,
the regulations were too harsh.
Therefore, everyone else who broke
them should have their fines
returned. The idea that the
government should excuse its own
rule-breaking by a general amnesty
on rule-breaking is grotesque.
It would also be completely
politically ineffective. The people
most angry about the parties are
those who kept the rules, not those
who broke them. The law-abiding
are the people writing the letters.
There is, however, one line of
argument left that is at least honest
and not absolutely laughable. The
MPs can try making an argument
about proportion.
They can admit that the events
being held were parties and not workmeetings. They can admit that,
whatever Sue Gray may or may not
say, holding such parties was against
the rules as everyone understood
them. They can admit the prime
minister must have known all this,
and should have told the truth about
it, and hasn’t. But they can argue
that for him to resign would be
disproportionate.
The MPs can say that they believe
the prime minister has got many
things right — Brexit, vaccinations,
levelling up, whatever (the list will
vary depending on the MP and the
constituent) — and argue that even
though Johnson shouldn’t have heldOur leader must be
someone who tells the
truth in all situations
Daniel
Finkelstein@dannythefink
the times | Wednesday January 19 2022 23