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So, we are a day on from Johnson’s fine and his cronies have been out in force. Only two so far have come out against – Lord Wolfson and Nigel Mills. Meanwhile, 77 Conservative MPs have offered excuses for Boris Johnson, expressing their full-throated support. Seeing them tweet their pre-prepared scripts is like watching a Russian bot farm churn out misinformation. It’s not the first time they’ve done this, but this time round they have learned that using the exact same message is cause for derision. Instead, they seem to have agreed a few common “defences”. I’ve grouped them into three categories based on which copy and paste excuse they decided to use!
The spineless hand wringers
The first group is the one I probably have the most contempt for. These are the people who are essentially acknowledging that what Boris Johnson has done mandates his resignation. Then they have grubbed around in the dirt for whatever excuse they could find. They’ve settle on “the war in Ukraine”. A war we are not involved in. Apparently, the fact that there is a war means that they can’t get rid of a corrupt, lying, law breaking Prime Minister. Despite the fact that the country got rid of a Prime Minister during World War I and II.
If this “excuse” were serious, then arguably they should be calling for a government of national unity to rally behind a leader that commands support from both sides of the house. But it’s not serious. It’s ludicrous. The only thing that’s more astonishing than this excuse is that they expect us to believe it.
This excuse has had, by far, the most traction. Presumably because it let’s them pretend that they care and act like they would do something, if only they could. With that in mind, it was tough to pick the best of the bunch. But the winner by a nose has to be Tom Hunt, who seems to think that this is the argument that will win the day:
Rather than respond to this bit of Twitter-lawyering, I’ll let Nish Kumar sum it up…
The “what-about”-ers
This group seem to think that Labour should answer for the Prime Minister breaking his own laws. Apparently, whatever the Prime Minister has done, Labour have done far worse. These are the type of people who, when presented with a crime, would like to ask “who committed it” before deciding their view.
The crowd here was a little thinner, but my favourite has to be Brendan Clarke-Smith. Apparently he is incapable of recognising the difference between a driving offence and breaking your own lockdown laws. He also seems to miss that people were find thousands of pounds for this same offence.
The “I don’t giver a shit”-ers
This group has two sub-sets. The most common stance is “he’s apologised, we need to move on”. This presumably ignores the fact that he is only sorry he got caught. Not sorry he committed the offence. It also ignores the fact that he lied to parliament and as recently as a week ago insisted he had not broken the law. This group acknowledges the reality of public anger, but tries to downplay the seriousness.
For me the winner has to be the haunter pencil, Jacob Rees-Mogg for the sheer dismissive tone.
The second sub-set are perhaps the most brazen. They are also the most honest. They just don’t think the PM should have to abide by his own laws. By the laws he set. There argument seems to be that he shouldn’t have been fined at all, and that it’s all much ado about nothing. The winner in this category is Adam Holloway. Then again, it’s hardly surprising. Holloway seems to have an aversion to scrutiny in general.
And an honourable mention goes to this Conservative MP who tried to make it about Brexit…
Amanda Milling seems to think that it’s OK to break the law IF you voted for Brexit. Presumably by the same logic a Remainer should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
But the winner is…
Michael Fabricant, for this particularly offensive intervention. He has managed to spark outrage from Teachers unions and the Royal College of Nurses. His idiotic comments suggesting that these two put upon groups have a few work drinks at the end of the day shows how out of touch this man is. I have long suspected that his wig is an “Aliens” style parasitic life form. Perhaps it’s finally taken over the host.
