Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

So when I first checked the news this morning Blunt had already withdrawn his statement "after further reflection" (with a Tory whip no doubt ). I think if he tried to push that there's no way he could have kept the whip. I'm still not entirely sure if he can keep the whip despite his retraction. I just think it's really difficult for a former justice minister to call something an international scandal and miscarriage of justice - also I think lots of people are annoyed that he basically tried to position it as a gay rights issue. Absent some absolutely incredible evidence that we've not heard yet, I take fairly strong exception to the idea that being prosecuted and convicted of groping a 15 year old boy is a gay rights issue

Rather unfortunately he also caused the implosion of the All Party Parliamentary Group on LGBT rights - as I say Blunt is gay, he's very pro-trans rights and did very good work opposing Theresa May's government drugs legislation that almost accidentally criminalised poppers. But, following his remarks, various members of the AAPG resigned including his vice-chairs. He's now stepped down to allow a new AAPG to be founded that will be in a better position to campaign on LGBT issues without his controversy and mess distracting from it all.

Semi-relatedly - the chart on the conversion therapy ban. As mentioned above basically no-one sees why you'd ban conversion therapy around sexuality but not gender identity and pretty broad categories of people support a ban:

[Sheilbh]

Sounds to me like Blunt's local party is going to try and de-select him as their candidate for the next election:

ReigateConservatives
@RBConservative
From our Chairman:
Crispin Blunt MP made a public statement yesterday about Imran Ahmad Khan's conviction for child sexual assault.

We totally disagree with Crispin's statement and it does not represent the views of our members or our association.
Our thoughts are firmly with the victim and their family.

In line with our party's rules our executive council will meet at the earliest possible opportunity to consider further actions.

On behalf of the officers of Reigate & Banstead Conservative Association.

Dr Ben Mearns

Separately BBC is reporting that Sunak and Johnson have both been issued with fines for covid regulation breaches. Not sure where this goes now and if it means their investigation is finished - but that is confirmation that Johnson (and Sunak) broke the law.

I thought this last fortnight might mean Johnson does actually reshuffle Sunak away - now the political power swung the other way. Given that they've both been fined I think it makes that more difficult for Johnson. So, like a Beckett play, Johnson and Sunak may be stuck, quietly loathing each other but with an almost MAD situation where either moving against the other will trigger their own destruction

The key from here, I think, is if the party consolidates behind an alternative to Johnson. I don't really understand odds - but from what I can see there's no real favourite here and basically Truss, Tom Tugendhat, Jeremy Hunt, Ben Wallace, Penny Mordaunt, Javid, Gove and Nadhim Zahawi all seem to have a chance. I'm not sure that the Tories don't just lash themselves to Johnson if one of those potential replacements doesn't start to pull ahead.

Edit: Incidentaly if Sunak really hates Johnson now because he blames him for the briefings about his wife's tax affairs - and he wants to destroy him - the thing he should do is resign as a matter of principe having been fined by the police

Edit: And Starmer's out quickly and strongly:
"Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak have broken the law and repeatedly lied to the British public. They must both resign.

"The Conservatives are totally unfit to govern. Britain deserves better."

[Sheilbh]

Three hours in and no one from the cabinet's popped up to offer a defence yet. So they're very much relying on the B team here, such as Michael Fabricant defending the suitcase of booze: "There is no bar in Downing Street... That's the only way you can actually get any alcohol into Downing Street"

Edit: Think this by Jess Elgot of the Guardian is true and quite revealing:

Jessica Elgot
@jessicaelgot
Two MPs tell me that they do not want to trigger leadership contest because of the paucity of candidates. "Successors are all damaged, from national insurance or visas or silly remarks, that means an unpredictable contest and you can't have that in a war," one says.

To translate that - they're saying that all plausible successors have either embraced wildly unpopular policies, are embroiled in embarrassing scandals - or both And that's probably a fairly accurate diagnosis of the situation and may, in fact, be why Tory MPs decide not to get rid of Johnson. My view is that it's still more likely than not that they'll bin him after the May local elections, at which point the Tories will get no credit for it because it will be seen that they didn't get rid of him as a point of principle but for losing (which would also be true).

It's also another reason why I think, despite an 80 seat majority, the Tories will (in my view) probably lose the next election. Everything just feels very 1990s in many, many ways.

Also public opinion on this basically hasn't moved from when the story was paused in January/February - once they make up their mind



Edit: Oh and Carrie Johnson has also been fined.

[Sheilbh]

The whips should be sending someone to physically wrestle Michael Fabricant away from doing any more Zoom interviews

"I don't think at any time he thought he was breaking the law... he thought just like many teachers and nurses who after a very long shift would go back to the staff room and have a quiet drink"

Edit: Oh and to be clear this is in relation to one event - the "ambushed by a cake" birthday party - so there are still ongoing investigations into other incidents and Johnson could be fined again (and again).

[Josquius]

Alas I can see the defence now - who cares. Look at Ukraine. Really important and deadly stuff. Typical labour to moan about unimportant things.

And I can see it working

[Richard Hakluyt]

I wonder who Johnson will get to pay his fine    ?

[Sheilbh]

Alas I can see the defence now - who cares. Look at Ukraine. Really important and deadly stuff. Typical labour to moan about unimportant things.

And I can see it working

I can see it working with the Tory parliamentary party - who are the only people who can get rid of him at the minute. I see no sign whatsoever that it works with the public. His net approval for the Ukraine crisis has gone up by about 15-20 points - but that's from -50 to -35 to -30. Savanta also did a snap poll and they have about 60% of people think he should resign, only 30% shouldn't (and that's probably the floor for the Tories - or Labour absent absolute collapse).

The big dangers to him from Tory MPs are the local elections and other fines - although the locals look to me like they'd be Labour friendly and the last local elections were in 2018 (pre-Salisbury) so there might not be much movement, not sure. But also this is a fine for one event - he's given his statement tonight apologising etc. Not sure how many times he can do that before it becomes an issue in itself and we know the police are investigating multiple events he attended. "I am once again apologising for..."

[Richard Hakluyt]

Fabricant is good isn't he? All over the country workers on building sites, in factories and medical facilities are kicking themselves for not realising that, despite their workplace not having a bar, they were free to bring in suitcases of booze to liven things up.

[Sheilbh]

Incidentally this increases my suspicion that all the stories that basically wiped out Sunak may have been sourced from Number 10. If they were aware a fine for Johnson and his wife (but possibly didn't know about Sunak) was on its way it, explains why there's a tonne of negative stories about Sunak - largely based on leaks about his family's tax and US immigration status. Info that, according to Sunak, he provided to the Cabinet Office when he became a minister.

If your big risk from getting fined is that Sunak makes his move, it makes a lot of sense to torpedo him in advance.

Edit: More practically with the police doing these fines event by event, I'm just not sure how many times Johnson can do a video like this (especially if the other fines don't drop during recess so he has to do it, repeatedly, in front of parliament):
https://twitter.com/BBCPolitics/status/1513961470601699333?s=20&t=thiB7KMRg50DWGeV9MdLTg

And similarly how many times cabinet ministers have to re-state their support. Do they just start cutting and pasting their tweets? Do they re-tweet it? "As set out in my previous five statements on the Prime Minister being fined..." It just doesn't strike me as plausible for this to keep happening (which seems likely)

[Tamas]

Apparently you have to acquire a sponsor in the UK prior to applying to be hosted here as a Ukrainian refugee, creating a nice indentured servant/slave market, especially for predatory men:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/13/stop-matching-lone-female-ukraine-refugees-with-single-men-uk-told

[Sheilbh]

Yeah I read an article about this in the Sunday Times and it's sickening. The scheme is you volunteer to host a Ukrainian refugee in your home for a minimum of six months.

It's one of those things where I was really annoyed at how slow the scheme was to work. There's lots of volunteers (churches and charities are coordinating but will be able to sponsor soon, along with universities and businesses) but so far it's taking a very long time for the Home Office to match people. So there's a pathetic number matched. The flipside of that is that it allows local authorities and the Home Office to do safeguarding checks on people who are going to be hosting vulnerable people. And it might be better if it is slower but there's good safeguarding.

There's been other similar stories - I think it was a German story I read about aid workers starting to informally check each other on the Polish border because there had been people posing as aid workers, but were actually from organised crime taking women and children for sex trafficking.

The whole thought just makes me so angry and sad. It's just evil.

[Richard Hakluyt]

There is a legitimate tension between providing immediate help and ensuring a safe environment, but the UK seems to be dragging its feet when it comes to the housing of Ukranian refugees.

[Sheilbh]

There is a legitimate tension between providing immediate help and ensuring a safe environment, but the UK seems to be dragging its feet when it comes to the housing of Ukranian refugees.

Yeah - it's the Home Office. The idea that they should move quickly in response to asylum claims or be aiming to settle people is entirely alien to that entire organisation.

They're also not basically competent which makes me worry that even though safeguarding checks should be done they'll still fuck it up. In theory all people volunteering to be hosts need to do a DBS (although that would only pick up people with a criminal record/previous safeguarding concerns) and their accommodation should be checked by the local council before a refugee is settled - but there's concerns those aren't happening in person and future check-ups are at the council's discretion. It comes back to the same point that keeps happening - it needs funding. There should be safeguarding checks, there should be monitoring to prevent abuse but it should be quick.

On the criminals taking advantage on the border, this article is incredibly upsetting, but worth a read:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ukraine-refugees-go-from-one-hell-to-another-as-abusers-exploit-women-and-children-bjnw7gltq

In particular this stat stood out - from the Secretary General of Missing Children in Europe - because it feels like any possibility to explain is awful:

She is particularly concerned about children and large numbers arriving unaccompanied and points out that at least 10,000 children disappeared in Europe's last refugee crisis in 2015.

[Josquius]

Yes. Read a piece today about the UN telling the UK off as perverts are exploiting the refugee situation to get Ukranian women living with them.
Kids add a whole other dimension of depressing.

Like a lot of tory policy the sponsorship scheme sounds great on the surface. But in practice it's just a way to mask doing virtually nothing /exploiting people. See also universal credit.

[Sheilbh]

Yes. Read a piece today about the UN telling the UK off as perverts are exploiting the refugee situation to get Ukranian women living women them.
Kids add a whole other dimension of depressing.

Yeah - although it is worth noting the story is based on Facebook messages (Sunday Times has the better article on this because they did the reporting - the Guardian is covering the follow up) for groups helping match refugees with hosts/sponsors. There is still a process of getting DBS from people who've applied to host (though that only covers people with criminal records) and councils assessing them all (again questions that not enough is being done in person). The story demonstrates why the vetting is necessary - but not that this is already happening. Not least because so few applications have been processed but also, I hope, because the council inspection weeds out the guy who said he has a spare room who has a studio flat. As I say I think there's a funding issue to make sure councils can follow up regularly and to process applications quickly (apparently local authorities are only gettig £10,000 per person for safeguarding).

Weirdly my boss actually had a visit from the council social worker today to host a Ukrainian refugee.

Separately, a junior justice minister in the Lords has resigned - first resignation so far (though others may follow). One thing you have to give the Tories - they're pretty good at dramatic resignations:


Edit: And in why I think "just move on" still won't work - not only are there more events for the police to issue fines on, but one former senior officer has said that his understanding is there's still a "huge amount" of evidence to review. Looking forward to our next round of "move on" statements in a fortnight

Edit: We're also back to Boris Johnson being joked about on light entertainment shows:
https://twitter.com/scottygb/status/1514312511935418384?s=20&t=wU7kQVQEWdfuTJd38At0ZA