August 2021

It is over a year and a half since Britain left the European Union, but the problems created by the last minute agreement designed to foil a No Deal Brexit remain, so far, intractable. Brexit isn’t done in relation to the Irish border and financial services and there is the potential for more such issues to emerge in the future. This mess is of the Tories own making and complicates their quest to establish Britain’s place in the world post-Brexit. In addition the government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic remains cavalier – costing more lives, creating uncertainty for small businesses and damaging the economy. These and other issues are heightening divisions within the Tory Party which have been suppressed of late.

Post-Brexit, the only way of avoiding a hard border between the UK and the EU would have been to adopt something like Theresa May’s deal keeping Britain aligned with EU rules. Without that alignment, under Johnson’s agreement, a hard border and new customs checks and regulations were inevitable. The Good Friday Agreement, reached to end the armed conflict in Ireland, virtually did away with the border between north and south. To have re-introduced that as the EU-UK border may have prevented a Brexit agreement being reached due to opposition from the Irish government and the EU. To avoid this Johnson’s answer was to create a border instead between Britain and the whole of Ireland including the north. Did he think this would be problem free? No doubt something will be worked out to ensure the free movement of sausages, but in the process Johnson has caused difficulties for businesses and massive political problems alienating the Tories’ allies in the unionist parties in the north, with protesters taking to the streets. He has also annoyed the government of the Irish Republic and the EU which has no interest in reaching easy compromises to get him out of his difficulties.

Johnson’s last minute Brexit deal with the EU, among many other shortcomings, left out financial services - the biggest sector of the UK economy. Agreement on this sector was to be reached at a later date. The City of London has made losses of more than a trillion dollars of assets and thousands of jobs to EU financial centres since Brexit. In his Mansion House speech on 1st July 21, Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak, seemed to admit that prospects for a deal allowing UK financial services equal access to EU markets had receded. This leaves the sector attempting to orientate itself towards different markets, with divided views on how helpful possible deregulation will be in attracting new business.

The other major issue facing the country is the coronavirus pandemic. Johnson’s handling of this bears all the same hallmarks as his handling of Brexit. As revealed by Dominic Cummings, Johnson was well aware of the cost in human life of pursuing herd immunity and getting rid of restrictions, yet that has remained his chosen course of action. The government went ahead with opening up while the virus was still circulating at a very high level. It is difficult to fathom whether Johnson’s actions are callous and incompetent or devious and calculated. As the population becomes worn down by contradictory advice and impossible to follow guidance then the more people give up. The government, therefore, gets its way, continuing to dispense with restrictions which would help prevent the spread of the virus. An example of this has been the “pingdemic” where not only those with the virus were having to take time off work, but their contacts numbering hundreds of thousands were pinged by the NHS contact tracing app and asked to self-isolate. Some people are receiving serial requests to self-isolate. This is not only a problem for individuals but also for businesses and services. The government’s answer is not to restrict mixing to prevent the risky contacts which are happening, but to downgrade the app so that you are less likely to get pinged. This will increase the level of risk.

Another example of the erosion of credibility and trust in the government which is undermining the effort to fight the virus is the faltering effort to get young people vaccinated. All along they were told that their risk from the virus was low, now they are berated for not getting vaccinated and are being tempted by patronising, as yet undefined, giveaways from fast food companies.

The country is being pushed towards a position where the virus will be allowed to circulate freely in pursuit of herd immunity. But, now more than ever, this seems not only like a high-risk strategy, but also one which is unachievable. Can there be herd immunity with a constantly mutating virus which challenges the protection bestowed by vaccines? We are being groomed to accept a situation where thousands continue to die of Covid. The free circulation of the virus enables it to continue to mutate, posing a threat not only to this country, but to the rest of the world.

Johnson can announce as many grand schemes as he wants, which might or might not come to pass, but the reality is that on the key questions of the day the Tories are failing. How long can they carry on like this? Sadly there is little popular opposition and none from Kier Starmer so Johnson is not immediately threatened on that front. However discontent among the Tories is beginning to grow.

Until recently Johnson’s position within the Party looked unassailable. His 2019 election victory gave him a big majority in Parliament ensuring the loyalty of MPs which was reinforced by his popularity with Tory Party members and his ruthlessness in dealing with opposition. In the previous parliament he removed the whip from 21 MPs, including some of the most senior figures in the Party. Although dissent was suppressed it didn’t go away as is now becoming clear. Divisions are emerging round economic, political and international policy and dissatisfaction with Johnson as a leader.

For its survival post-Brexit the Tories see a strong partnership with the United States as essential and Johnson has caved in to US pressure to fall into line with its aggressive stance towards China. Yet China also offers untapped possibilities which could be a big boost to the City of London as well as other sectors of the economy. That is a circle which will be difficult, if not impossible, to square and means that Britain will likely miss out on economic links which could be very valuable to its post-Brexit development. Acknowledging the difficulties faced by the City of London without an agreement to access EU financial markets, Rishi Sunak in his Mansion House speech mentioned above, promoted the idea that London could become a centre for Chinese financial services. (1) In doing so he also made a plea for a better trading relationship with China. While a closer relationship with China was favoured by former Chancellor, George Osborne and the Prime Minister at the time, David Cameron, Johnson’s alignment with the US has put the brakes on that. Sunak is, therefore, at odds with Johnson and a significant body within the Tory Party, like the China Research Group lead by Tom Tugendhat, who are hostile to China.

There are also known to be differences between Sunak and Johnson on domestic economic policy with Sunak following a more traditional neo-liberal line. He sees state intervention in the economy to combat the effects of the pandemic as a temporary expedient and wants a return to a more neo-liberal norm when the crisis is over. Johnson, however, appears to favour more state intervention in the economy.

The need to respond to their new-found electoral base in the North of England is a source of tension within the Tory Party, with voters in its southern heartlands concerned that they might lose out. In addition, up-grading infrastructure and loosening planning laws to allow house building conflict with the interests of the comfortably-off who don’t want more housing or railways like HS2 in their back yards. These issues were deemed to be significant factors in the Tories drubbing in the Chesham and Amersham by election on 17/6/21 where the Lib Dems overturned a 16,000 Tory majority to win by over 8000 votes. This is the first time the constituency has not returned a Conservative MP. But the Tories have received considerable funding from the construction and development industry - £17.9millon since Johnson became Prime Minister. (2) How will the interests of Tory voters in the south be squared with the Party funders who expect some return for their cash?

There remain tensions with the pro-EU establishment and sections of the Tory vote which is unhappy with Johnson’s aggressive pursuit of Brexit.

One measure of dissatisfaction among Tory MPs was that at the beginning of July, Sir Graham Brady was re-elected as the chair of the 1922 committee which represents backbench Tory MPs and runs leadership elections. This is highly significant as it is a powerful post and Brady won in the face of a determined campaign to unseat him by Johnson and his allies who backed Heather Wheeler.

There have been rebellions of Tory MPs on diverse issues including Covid lockdown measures and senior party figures have been prominent in leading the charge.