Cummings

We learned this week that the principal advisor to the Rt Hon First Lord of the Treasury, suffering together with his wife from Covid-19 symptoms, elected to drive some 250 miles to his parents’ property in Co. Durham.  This despite government injunctions to stay at home and travel only in case of urgent necessity.  He argues that this was necessary to assure the care of his child should he and his wife become incapacitated, which, frankly, does not begin to hold water.  As the author of much of the present government’s policy, and presumably that regarding confinement, this is nothing less than contemptuous, arrogant hypocrisy.

As if that weren’t bad enough, said Rt Hon First Lord of the Treasury is backing him.  This morning we were assuming that Cummings would have to go.  Now, it seems to us that Johnson’s days must be numbered.  In decades past, he would by now have had a visit from the men in grey suits.  Unfortunately, Parliament is now pretty much devoid of suitable stateswomen and men.  Where are the Willie Whitelaws, Jean Trumpingtons and Peter Carringtons?  Well, there seems at last to be one on the front bench opposite the dispatch box, and it’ll be interesting to see how the House supports him.