Eight months into Boris Johnson’s leadership, he was faced with what many deemed was a challenge greater than the second world war, which his hero Winston Churchill presided over; the Covid pandemic had just begun.
While Johnson was criticised in March 2020 for being slow to enact lockdown measures to prevent deaths, after warnings from the World Health Organization, he managed to garner the public’s sympathy as he himself battled the disease in intensive care.
Eight months into Rishi Sunak’s leadership, the prime minister is struggling to distance himself from the chaos of Johnson’s leadership and deliver a government of “integrity, professionalism and accountability” as he promised in October last year.
This weekend alone, the prime minister was hit with a fresh Partygate video showed Conservative party staff dancing, drinking and joking about breaking lockdown rules, as well as reports about which Tory MPs will support or back the privileges committee report in the Commons over Johnson’s Partygate lies and news that the Metropolitan police is considering the fresh Partygate evidence.
While a number of senior Conservative MPs have privately accepted that they were in for “embarrassing” defeats in the upcoming byelections in Uxbridge, Mid Bedfordshire and Selby, news of the Partygate video felt to some as a “nail in the coffin”.
One MP said: “Boris Johnson partying during lockdown is still coming up on the doorsteps. It’s not going to go away before these electoral tests.” Another said, “Johnson had an ability to connect with the public. Many Tories haven’t forgiven him, but the fact that he remains on their minds is a problem. They don’t mention Sunak.”
On top of this, news of David Warburton’s resignation as an MP on Saturday, after he was suspended last year pending the outcome of an investigation into allegations of harassment and drug use, cast voters minds back to Johnson’s failure to act on sexual misconduct claims when in No 10, a government Sunak was a senior member of as chancellor.
Ultimately it seems many within his party believe the Johnson drama will certainly not go away until he can think creatively and “dream up a concept”. One former cabinet minister said: “We can’t sell a vision to the public if Rishi doesn’t have one himself. He needs to think big, be creative and articulate a dream the public will want to live by and ultimately vote for.”
Another said it’s not enough for Sunak to repeatedly set out his five missions as they “do not mean anything” to a public battling a cost of living crisis and a Tory membership facing rising mortgage repayments.
As the Partygate vote begins in the Commons on Monday and the Covid inquiry waits to hear evidence from former prime minister David Cameron, Sunak will be hoping to demonstrate that he is getting on with the job and delivering on what he claims are the public’s priorities. That will prove difficult after fresh figures revealed he is failing to “stop the boats”. More than 10,000 people are known to have crossed the Channel in small boats so far this year.
But some of his allies have faith in his ability to “fully keep his head down” this week, swerve the drama and certainly avoid voting in the chamber on Monday.