Prime Minister of Great Britain: Johnson is by no means defeated – Politics

After the harsh sentencing of former Prime Minister Boris Johnson by a House of Commons committee, Johnson and his supporters launched a counterattack. They have decided to turn the Tory base against the Tory group and their government – and threaten party colleagues who support the committee’s report by voting outside their constituencies.

There is little doubt that Parliament will approve the committee’s report in the House of Commons on Monday, if only because the opposition will vote for him and reduce the number of Johnson loyalists opposing him to twenty to thirty in the House of Commons. Johnson even advised his followers on Friday to abstain. He clearly doesn’t care that it turns out how little support he has in the group.

Angry Tory activists

However, many Conservative MPs who wanted nothing to do with Johnson had previously considered abstaining or staying away from the vote – in this case for fear of reprisals from their local groups. Because those who support the report only anger the angry party members, a former minister told the BBC. Another insider source said: “They don’t understand how much anger they have stirred up in the party with their report.” According to opinion polls, only about a third of Conservative Party members believe the report will mean “the end of Boris Johnson’s political career”. On the other hand, 54 percent believe it is “by no means over” for Johnson.

And this is despite the fact that in its scathing verdict the committee accused the former prime minister of “deliberately misleading Parliament” and in practice accused him of being a danger to the UK’s democratic institutions.

That didn’t stop Johnson from describing Thursday’s report as “completely unhinged”. His followers spoke of a “hateful and vindictive” report. MP James Doddridge, Johnson’s former Parliamentary Private Secretary, expressed his anger: “Why don’t we get to work right away? Why don’t we put Boris in stock at once and hand out rotten food to be thrown at him?”

Johnson became a columnist for the Daily Mail

On the other hand, former allies of Johnson such as MP Tim Lawton called the committee’s report “legitimate” and a “devastating verdict”. The leader of the party and government, Rishi Sunak, backtracked on Friday and indicated that he would prefer not to participate in Parliament next Monday.

Meanwhile, Boris Johnson is already fully focused on the future political fight against Sunak and his party’s “establishment”, which he accuses of “assassinating” his personal career. He hopes to get broad swaths of the party base behind him again at the Conservative Party conference in October.

The former prime minister also managed to secure a very useful platform from which to attack the government. The influential Daily Mail has given the former prime minister space for a new weekly column. According to information from the Financial Times, Boris Johnson is also considering standing as an independent candidate in next year’s London mayoral election, not only to embarrass the Tory candidate but also to test his popularity.