Peddling long-standing myths about immigration and European intervention paved the way for him to become UK prime minister and take the country out of the European Union, while “Partygate” cemented Johnson’s aura as a leader who plays fast and loose with facts and rules. On Thursday, after a tumultuous 48 hours and a series of resignations from his government, the British prime minister unveiled plans for his own exit. “In politics,” he told reporters and staff gathered outside his official residence in London, “nobody is absolutely indispensable.” WATCHES | British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announces his resignation:
Boris Johnson to step down as UK PM after flurry of resignations
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said he will resign after several ministers, including close allies, quit his government. Johnson said he would remain in his post until a successor is chosen. In the end, though, it wasn’t Johnson’s own misconceptions that got him down after three years as Conservative leader. It was his insistence that they lie – sometimes unknowingly – on his behalf. Sajid Javid, Johnson’s health secretary until Tuesday night, made his concerns on this point clear in a speech to the House of Commons. “This week again, we have had reason to question the truth and integrity of what we have been told,” Javid told MPs. “At some point, we have to come to the conclusion that enough is enough.”
“A graceful, self-service approach”
Javid showed “Partygate‘, the scandal involving large gatherings during the COVID-19 lockdowns that led to Johnson becoming the first sitting British prime minister to be sanctioned by the police. Javid said Johnson’s team had assured him no rules had been broken. After Javid resigned, more than 50 other ministers and aides followed him out the door in protest against the prime minister. Outgoing Justice Minister Victoria Atkins He wrote, “I can no longer pirouette around our broken values.” Jo Churchill, who served as environment minister; added that “a funny, self-serving approach” to the prime minister’s role “inevitably has its limitations”. It’s not like there weren’t red flags. 25:31 Boris Johnson’s “partygate” scandal For more than a month, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been embroiled in a scandal involving rallies at 10 Downing Street while the country was under restrictions due to COVID-19. One Conservative MP crossed the floor to Labour, while another called for his resignation, telling Johnson in parliament, “In God’s name, go.” Senior civil servant Sue Gray conducted an investigation into the alleged breach of the rules and this report is out. Today, CBC Europe correspondent Margaret Evans explains what led to this point and whether it could cost Johnson his job. Consider this warning from 40 years ago: “Boris sometimes seems offended when he is criticized for what amounts to a gross failure of responsibility.” So wrote Martin Hammond, who taught literature at Eton College, in a letter to Johnson’s father Stanley in 1982. The now famous note was reprinted in a 2012 biography by Andrew Gimson when Johnson was mayor of London . In a sign of things to come, Hammond added: “Boris has really taken a shamefully cavalier approach to his classical studies.” Former Prime Minister David Cameron crossed paths with Johnson, first at Eton and then again at Oxford University. A Daily Mail cover page This week he reminded Britons how Cameron treated his would-be Tory colleague: as a “greased pig”. Johnson ‘manages to slip out of other people’s hands where mere mortals fail’, says Cameron he said in 2019. Boris Johnson, who announced his resignation as British prime minister on Thursday after the latest in a series of scandals, is known to play fast and loose with the truth. (Henry Nicholls/Reuters)
Lies led to his downfall
Johnson’s latest scandal, however, spelled the death knell for his premiership. Again, it involved his trouble with the truth. After sexual misconduct allegations emerged last week about Tory MP Chris Pincher, Downing Street initially denied Johnson had any knowledge of previous allegations when he promoted Pincher to the role of deputy chief whip. Eventually, Johnson’s representative was forced to do so recognize the prime minister had even been personally informed of some of the allegations before Pincher’s promotion. “Very clear evidence this week that No. 10 was hiding the truth, if not the outright lie, I think, is the straw that broke the camel’s back,” Anand Menon, a politics professor at King’s College London, told CBC News . Johnson’s approach was not just about facts. Sometimes it proved painful. WATCHES | Londoners react to Johnson’s resignation:
Londoners react to the resignation of the British Prime Minister
Some in London were ready to be done with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, while others wished he could stay longer. In his resignation letter yesterday, Equalities Secretary Mike Freer said the Johnson government had created “an atmosphere of hostility towards LGBT+ people”. Earlier this year, Johnson was accused for disrespecting the families of victims of sexual abuse by repeating an unfounded claim involving Opposition Leader Keir Starmer and notorious child predator Jimmy Savile.
Misleading about Brexit
Johnson led the campaign in 2016 for the UK to leave the EU, a project based largely on Britons’ desire to further restrict immigration. Johnson traveled around the country in a red Brexit bus emblazoned with bold white letters arguing that Britain could choose to fund its National Health Service instead of “[sending] the EU £350m a week’ (or more than Cdn$700m at the time). The UK Statistics Authority labeled the number “a clear abuse of official statistics.” During the 2016 Brexit campaign, Boris Johnson, centre, and the Vote Leave campaign toured the UK on a bus carrying a slogan promising to take the hundreds of millions of pounds the country was sending to the European Union and to plow it into Instead, the National Health Service. UK Statistics called the claim “a clear misuse of official statistics”. (Christopher Furlong/Getty Images) Johnson’s two predecessors, Cameron and Theresa May, both saw their tenures as prime minister collapse due to Brexit. Divorce from the EU acted as a springboard for Johnson to reach No.10. His resignation speech on Thursday came with no apology and little sign of remorse. In contrast, Johnson described the Tory push for a change in leadership as “wacky”. The tone may not have come as a surprise to Johnson’s old teacher, Martin Hammond. “I think,” Hammond wrote in that 1982 letter, “he honestly thinks it’s crazy of us not to think of him as an exception, someone who should be free from the web of obligations that binds everyone else.” Thomas Daigle reported extensively on Brexit and the turmoil in the British Conservative Party while in the CBC’s London bureau from 2016 to 2019.
