Boris Johnson is a lucky Prime Minister. Over the first six months of his Premiership he has had, not once but twice, the kind of opportunity that rarely comes along during the whole reign of most PMs. The opportunity to appear live on television from Downing Street, having combed his hair and straightened his tie, with as many Union Jacks behind him as he chooses and to provide inspiring national leadership.
Those opportunities were provided by the Coronavirus Epidemic and the Black Lives Matter protests. He flunked them both.
With regard to the BLM protests, he could have spoken to the nation in a way that would unite us all in common cause. He could have shown empathy, he could have shared examples of racial discrimination from his own experiences as a public servant, he could have committed his Government to eradicating discrimination, he could have outlined some immediate actions, he could have committed to implementing the various reports and audits completed under his and May’s and Cameron’s Premiership that are currently gathering dust, he could have appointed a Commission led by the great and good respected by the BAME communities to come forward with an action plan within a few months, he could have appointed a special Minister to oversee the work, he could have sought a joint approach across the party political divide, he could have faced down the toxic response to the BLM movement that progress for them can only be at the expense of the white community so will be resisted. He could have appeared like a statesman and occupied a position above the daily political dogfight.
He chose to do none of this.
He could have focused on those 600 recommendations sitting in the dusty reports lying around Whitehall. That alone would have kept him out of mischief for quite a while.
Instead he turned to Twitter to comment about the right to protest peacefully and took no position beyond indicating understanding about the feelings surrounding the death of George Floyd.
Following the demonstrations over the weekend of June 5th and 6th, which were largely peaceful, and attended by thousands at numerous locations all over the country, he took to Twitter again. Predictably, perhaps, in London there were attacks on the police and statues in Parliament Square were defaced. There was no justification for this, but in the wider scheme of events it was pretty small- scale stuff.
This was Johnson’s big opportunity to rise above the events of the street and tackle a long running sore that had been wearing away at British society for centuries. Instead he took to Twitter and talked of thuggery and highlighting the graffiti scrawled on the statue of Winston Churchill. In one series of tweets, he moved the debate away from the real issue on to a large lump of granite in the form of a rather overweight Winston Churchill. Johnson tweeted at length promoting the idea that Churchill’s statue was genuinely under threat. He speculated about a 10-year jail sentence for desecrating war memorials.
His response was orchestrated with Tory MPs popping up on social media in support talking of Churchill’s place in our history and the importance of monuments. The nationalist dog whistle was well and truly being blown.
The culture war was stoked.
Predictably on June 13th, those that Johnson’s virtual signalling was aimed at turned up in central London. They said their mission was to protect monuments. Social media was treated to a world view that called for the Mayor of London to be shot as a traitor and a version of history that had Churchill killing Hitler. I must have missed that scene in Darkest Hour. All that is regrettable about the UK was on display in Parliament Square – duly summoned by Boris Johnson. Mainly so-called ‘low information’ white men had come for a fight. There were few Black Lives Matters protestors around, so they took on the police instead. Social media treated us to a thug winding himself up to take on a police officer before advancing on the smallest female officer in the line before him. The scenes were ugly and showed the UK in poor light as the pictures were beamed around the world.
Make no mistake – these people were there by invitation from Boris Johnson. This was the opportunity for the Britain First wing of the Boris Johnson supporters club to present themselves. Johnson had successfully moved the debate away from discrimination, inequality and injustice to nationalism and statues.
Johnson had shown more animation about a lump of granite than any other issue since his general election win.
The fighting and mayhem in Whitehall was at the end of long road signposted by Johnson’s newspaper articles promoting descriptions such as “water melon smiles” and “piccaninnies”, his articles, as far back as 1996, rallying against calls for greater gun controls following Dunblane, a Brexit campaign driven by xenophobia, fostering the idea that immigrants come to the UK to take jobs away from white people because they will accept lower wages (an evidence free assertion), the promotion of the idea that some how the English are better than everybody else, using austerity to blame foreigners for sponging off the welfare state and thereby wasting the hard earned money of everybody else, promotion of a hostile environment for immigrants.
Johnson’s tweets were straight out of the Trump playbook. Instead of promoting cohesion he preached division. He used exaggeration as a diversion. He positioned himself as the promoter of law and order.
Those jumping up and down and throwing fists and missiles on Saturday, if they voted at all in the last election, would have voted for Johnson. They now form part of his base. A base strengthened by his annexation of the Brexit Party.
While I have been writing this blog, Johnson has announced the formation of a Commission to examine racial discrimination. This was quietly sneaked out on Sunday evening with little media coverage at the time or the following day. A cynic might see this as a sop. A hint at doing something. Meanwhile Johnson is still writing about statues. Any resulting action will have to viewed through the prism of the Tory Party voter base. Recommendations would have to pass the Daily Mail reader test.
Why are we so surprised when after making people angry and promoting a grievance culture, people do actually get angry and are open to opportunities to exhibit that anger?
The road that led to Saturday’s events was in part constructed by Johnson and his cabal and at least they should own it.
In the meantime, perhaps he should cease calling Donald Trump. Expecting Johnson to position himself as a unifying force is perhaps a stretch too far.
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