“Boris Johnson has been allowed to hand out gongs to his partygate pals and Rishi Sunak has just waved it through” (Daisy Cooper)
Jingle and Mingle Invite
Late May 2023, Cabinet Office (CO) found entries in Boris’ ministerial diary showing family and friends met at Chequers June 2020-May 2021. A clear breach of lockdown rules, they handed it to Thames Valley police. Livid that material was given to cops, The Bumbler called it ‘bizarre’ and appointed new lawyers to represent him at the covid inquiry. The inquiry requested his WhatsApp messages unredacted. CO argued they were irrelevant but Baroness Halibut said non-compliance was a criminal offence. CO then claimed to not have all the notebooks, diaries and messages in question. Boris insisted they did. Was he dobbing on Rishi Rich or was Rishi being protected over ‘eat out to die out’ or his own flouting of lockdown rules? The deadline for submission of documents or witness statements from senior officials explaining why not extended to 4.00 p.m. 1st June, the CO sent the inquiry a letter instead saying they were bringing a judicial review. It then transpired there were no messages predating May 2021, when, it turned out, it was discovered Boris’ phone number had been public for 15 years so he got a new one. Labour suspecting a coverup, Number 10 denied it. Boris then said he’d provide unedited messages direct to the inquiry and asked CO to help access those from his old phone. CO lawyers subsequently warned he risked losing publicly-funded legal advice for ‘knowingly’ frustrating or undermining the government position. Why were taxpayers forking out for it in the first place? Doing the media rounds, a faceless tory minister said WhatsApp was private, not official (so don’t use it to set up meetings!) and ex-lawyer Robert Jerk claimed it wasn’t ‘common practice’ for an inquiry rather than government to decide what was relevant. Since when?
On an annual stateside visit to keep his green card, Rishi went to Washington early June to suck up to Uncle Joe and be mistakenly dubbed Mr President. Discussing co-operation but not free trade, Andrew Neil informed Newscast the so-called Atlantic Deal was designed to stop China beating the west on tech – according to the Yanks, the UK was the only European country that could do so. Rishi’s jaunt meant missing a fourth PMQs. Rayner quizzed Dowdy on the covid inquiry, which he said they’d furnished with all the resources to ‘learn the lessons’. She retorted working people wouldn’t thank them for spending hundreds of thousands on ‘loophole lawyers’. Boris’ long-awaited honours list was published the next day. Amongst other pals, it made Nasty Patel a dame, Rees-Moggy a knight, Shaun Bailey, Simon Clarke and Jack Doyle peers, gave Dan Rosenfield a CBE, Ben Mallett an OBE and Martin Reynolds – who sent invites to the notorious lockdown number 10 garden party – Order of the Bath. More evidence later emerged of 30 of Shaun Bailey’s mayoral campaign aides invited to ‘jingle and mingle’ at tory HQ 14th December 2020. Ben Mallet said he didn’t send the invite but was captured on video falling onto the lavish party buffeti.
Not on the list, Dreadful Doris resigned as an MP in a fit of pique then changed her mind. Rayner was incandescent at rewards doled out to those who broke covid rules and ‘toady’ Rishi granting “prizes to this carousel of cronies.” Daisy Cooper agreed. It was later suggested HOLAC* blocked peerages for Doris and Nigel Adams, and Rishi claimed The Bumbler bade he overrule them. Warned it could mean more by-elections, Rishi reportedly said ‘so be it’. Boris called it all rubbish. Then Nigel resigned from his Selby and Ainsty seat. Not technically possible for an MP to resign, we wondered what the hell was going on!ii
A letter from The Privileges Committee saying he misled parliament and recommending a lengthy suspension, late Friday 9th June, Boris resigned with immediate effect (for now). In a verbose statement, he railed at a ‘kangaroo court’ and a ‘witch hunt’ to drive him out over Brexit. Most members tories, a flummoxed Chair Harman blasted back he “impugned the integrity of The House.” Silly Bob still wished he was PM while from a ‘beautiful’ Ashton (according to Charlie Stayt), Rayner named him a coward for not staying to face the consequences or contest the findings before publication – delayed in light of Boris’ rebuttal, amounting to contempt of parliament. Asked if labour would abolish The Lords, she cited Gordon Brown’s report advocating reform. A ‘disgusted’ public not accepting the current situation, an elected second chamber would be in their election manifesto. Lord Dracula Howard laughably told Laura K. Boris ‘unquestionably’ did good things and Shatts maintained he was a man of many qualities but people wanting to ‘move on’ from the drama, there was no chance of his return.
Inundated with threatening messages from Boris’ supporters, committee members were offered additional security. The damning report was released at 9.00 a.m. Thursday 15th. Written evidence revealing an ‘oasis of normality’ in Downing Street, they concluded Boris was guilty of deliberately misleading The House and The Committee, breaching confidence, impugning The Committee thus undermining the democratic process, and complicit in a campaign of abuse and attempted intimidation of members. If Boris hadn’t resigned, they’d have recommended an unprecedented 90 day’s suspensioniii.
Griping that Harman and Bernard Jerkin (under investigation for attending his wife’s birthday party during tier 2 restrictions) had ‘prejudicial views’, Boris said the findings were ‘deranged’ and ‘the final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination’. Rayner likened his rant to a ‘Pound Shop Trump’ and Bereaved Families said Boris should be banned from ever standing for public office again. But Dreadful Doris wanted tories who voted to accept the recommendations to be booted out and David TC Davies questioned how he could be found guilty of events The Met didn’t prosecute. Err, Lying to parliament was a different thing, you moron! Boris then asked supporters not to vote against the report because the world needed to move on, as he’d moved onto a weekly Daily Gammon column. When it came to it, only 7 MPs voted no. 225 abstained and some didn’t even turn up including an apparently ‘too busy’ spineless Rishi.
Update:
29th June, a follow-up Privileges Committee report accused seven Boris allies (Dreadful Doris, Rees-Moggy, Nasty Patel, Mark Jenkinson, Michael Fabricant, Brendan Clarke-Smith, Andrea Jenkyns, Zac Goldsmith, Lord Cruddas and Lord Greenhalgh) of a co-ordinated campaign to interfere with their work. Saying they had no right, they lambasted Dreadful Doris and Rees-Moggy for ‘vociferously’ airing warped views on their TV shows which had a significant impact on individuals, hence the need for increased security. Batting off journos, Rees-Moggy was off to church then the test match and urged they do likewise. Early next morning, Goldsmith resigned from government, allegedly due to apathy over environmental issues and nothing to do with being named in the report as Rishi Rich claimed. The first time I’d ever agreed with him, Ed Millipede maintained Zac’s resignation letter rang true.
4th July, The Met re-opened Partygate investigations, not into Boris’ shindigs at Number 10 or Chequers but the Jingle and Mingle bash and another on 8th December, attended by Bernard Jerkin according to Guido Fawkes.
“His mind was engaged in a warfare of the gods. His mind paced outwards over no-man’s land, over the fields of the slain, paced to the rhythm of the blood’s red bugles” (Mervyn Peake)
It Will End In Tiers
Haiga – Fall Road i
Orangey pink suffused the bedroom on a bitterly cold Monday morning. Phil cooked porridge for breakfast to warm us up but as he had to go back to the kitchen for missing items, I feared it would freeze. No internet meant no morning metro. He amused me doing dinosaur impressions complete with tiny arms. Since I couldn’t post blogs, I worked on the next part of the journal. Inevitably, the editing made my eyes go funny. In the afternoon, I went for a small top-up shop. Although I’d enjoyed Phil’s hot lunch of egg, beans and spam fritters, it meant a stacked draining board awaited, making cleansing groceries tricky. I huffed, puffed and collapsed on the sofa. Phil huddled by the radiator to ease his arthritis so I dismissed the idea of giving him a hard time to commiserate with his pain. As usual, I got no rest during my siesta, but felt lovely and cosy in bed.
Oxford University/AstraZeneca proclaimed their jab a ‘vaccine for the world’, commendably provided not-for-profit to developing countries. Apparently 70% effective if given in 2 full doses, but 90% if given in a half dose then a full dose – how did that work? The government had ordered enough to vaccinate 50m people in the UK with 4m already in government storage, but it wasn’t even licensed yet! Boris promised MP’s an end to the national lockdown on 2nd December. Nationwide, non-essential shops, hairdressers and gyms would be allowed to open, but we’d all be in tiers again.
In tier 1, pubs could open, with a curfew and an hour drinking up time. In tier 2, there’d be no ‘wet pubs’ but eateries were allowed. In tier 3, only take-away and delivery was permitted. Kier called the strategy ‘risky’ as previously, the tier system led to areas drifting from one level to another and those in tier 3 seeing ‘no way out’. At the press conference, The Bumbler said many regions would be in higher tiers than before and wittered in his ridiculous metaphors: “(we) could now hear hooves as well as bugles coming over the hill,” but warned it would be months until everyone was vaccinated, and this was “the season to be jolly careful.” The Good Law project and Runnymede Trust sued Boris and The Cock for discrimination by appointing their crony mates to key Covid roles including Dildo, Kate Bigham and Mike Coupe (ex-Sainsburys’ boss). They called for a judicial review as fair competition rules were not followed, the jobs weren’t advertised, were unpaid thus not open to all, and breached the 2010 Equality Act – appointees were all white and able-bodied.
The Oxford Dictionary declared it impossible to select one ‘word of the year’ and listed 16. Not surprisingly, many were Covid-related including coronavirus, Covid-19, pandemic, superspreader, furlough, lockdown, moonshot, remote, staycation, unmute and zoombombing.
At the mercy of terrestrial telly in the evening, we watched Dispatches – Is Covid Racist? on Channel 4. The most startling revelations were that Filipino nurses were at scandalously high levels of risk in the early stages of the pandemic and 100% of doctors who died were black or minority ethnic. BMA surveys showed they were under more pressure to work in Covid wards with inadequate PPE. PHE found historic structural inequalities but the government denied racism. Cowardly Ministers declined to appear on the programme sending a mealy-mouthed statement instead. Dr Ronx Ikharia concluded there were uncomfortable issues to address that must be faced up to.
Phil complained about the amount of news and current affairs we’d viewed. “It’s not my fault we can’t watch escapist nonsense with no internet, is it?”
On a grey Tuesday, I texted my walking friend for an update. Required to wear full PPE including a visor, all she could see when working was a reflection of her own face. (I was later relieved to hear it didn’t say ‘face shield’ on it). I sympathised and asked her to keep me posted. I worked on the journal, then ‘Maple Leaves’ collage and declared it finished. Later in the week, I applied a coat of PVA and weighed it down with heavy books to seal it. I meant to do yoga in the afternoon but with no energy, I spent time in bed reading and trying to get warm, before a spot of guitar in the evening.
Having been assured they were fixing our phone line, it turned out they lied- putting the job on a list doesn’t mean fixing it! They then told Phil it was being done the next day, meaning they hadn’t even started. “That’s outrageous!” I exclaimed. “What if you’re old, live alone and don’t have a mobile?” “Don’t worry,” he assured me, “I’ve shouted very quietly at them and put in a claim for the 5 days of no phone or internet.”
Look North reported on the Astra-Zeneca antibody trial; an alternative for those who couldn’t have a vaccine. As 70% of the population had to be immunised for efficacy, we discussed the issue of vaccine take-up. I thought the idea of not allowing travel without it was fair enough, if it could be implemented. After all, you already needed certain jabs to go to particular regions of the world. “The hippies can stay in their little hovels. Anyway, a lot of sceptics and ant-vaxxers might come round from an altruistic viewpoint. I’m more worried the government will screw it up: ‘Oops! It was stored in the wrong fridge. The dog ate it. Sorry!’”
Following a cobra meeting involving the devolved leaders, the UK-wide agreement on enabling family Christmas dinners was confirmed. Between 23-27 Dec, up to 3 households could mix, in homes, churches or outdoors, but not in hospitality venues, with travel across borders allowed. Why on earth had they made it so people had to travel on a Sunday when the next day was a bank holiday? Bad enough on the rails with weekend engineering, Shatts told us not to use trains due to restricted capacity and Simon Calder popped up to say Kings Cross would be closed from 24th December for a week. Cue road traffic mayhem! Bemused by ultra-cautious Wales agreeing to this ‘rule of 3’, Drakeford explained they’d had to find “a guided way to Christmas…(otherwise the) risk was very high that people would make up the rules.” Prof. Medley intoned: “we’re in a process…whereby the population’s risk of filling up the NHS is… being passed down to… individuals.” Prof. Hayward said it was: “throwing fuel on the Covid fire,” adding we were in ”danger of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.” As most opinion polls showed the majority of people didn’t think it was worth the risk with vaccines on the horizon, we observed that the call for a ‘normal’ Christmas was whipped up by TV news presenters already donning reindeer antlers: “bunch of babies!”
On the eve of Rishi Rich’s spending review, Mayor Burnman warned the north faced an economic crisis worse than the 1980’s. Trump instructed his team to make ready for Biden but denied that meant he had lost and vowed to continue legal fights.
The Big Freeze
Straggly Thyme
Wednesday, work on the journal became difficult. I needed the internet to fill in news gaps and fact-check. We set off on the shopping expedition to the next town, postponed from the previous week.
Astounded at the price of the bus fare, we hoped it would be worthwhile. On the journey, we chatted to an old pub mate. He asked why he’d not seen any apple pictures on Facebook recently. I told him about the internet issues and how disgusting it was taking 5 days to fix it. “Yeah. I’m elderly and live alone. It would be awful.” The larger town market was even worse than ours, with only 3 stalls occupied. The indoor Market Hall was a better prospect. A purveyor of what we called ‘posh nosh’ was back. Due to health reasons, he’d stopped trading outdoors. “Our Sunday Market’s not the same without you.” I told him. “Well, it’s not the same full stop.” Phil wryly added. We availed ourselves of tasty local pies. The excellent café where we’d normally have bargainous all-day breakfasts displayed a sign for take-away chicken burgers. “Other burgers are available” a customer helpfully told us. “Thanks mate but it’s too late.” We sat in the community garden to eat among long shadows, nibbled brassica and straggly thyme obscured by leaf fall. Phil developed a headache as I headed to B&M. “You don’t need to come in with me.” “But I might miss something!” He made a bee-line for more spam.
In Lidl, we got some of the goodies we sought but the German speciality section was nowhere near as good as it used to be. A staple of festivities since childhood when my maternal granddad sent a box straight from the Nuremberg factory, I couldn’t have Christmas without the traditional treats. Imagine my horror at the stollen now in a luxury box at twice the price, and no spekulatius! Already fraught by the time we got home, I got a sharp pain in my lower back when sorting groceries, suggesting a pulled muscle. His headache persisted and he explained the trials of his brain resolving vision issues with his bad eyes. What a pair we made! On the plus side, we had internet. I caught up on news and deleted a pile of e-mail junk.
Rishi’s spending review started with the headlines ‘economic emergency’ and ‘deepest recession for 300 year’. In fact, 1709 was the year of the big freeze. There was a Public Sector pay freeze excepting NHS staff and those on less than £24k who would get an insulting extra £250. Dodds said: “The chancellor… clapped for key workers. Today (he) institutes a pay freeze for many of them. In contrast, there has been a bonanza for those who have won contracts… wasted and mismanaged public finance on an industrial scale… (and) takes a sledgehammer to consumer confidence.”
A plethora of unions decried the pay freeze. Rehan Azam, of GMB said (Rishi was) “on a collision course with public sector workers… we fought the public sector pay cap before and we busted it.” Mark Serwotka,of PCS and Mick Cash of RMT predicted industrial action. Meanwhile, Gail Cartmail of Unite called the £250 for the lower paid: “insulting, and compares badly with the inflated sums the government has wasted on PPE contracts for those with links to the Tory establishment.”
The living wage was going up 2.2%, there would be a £3bn ‘restart’ for the unemployed plus more dosh for Jobcentres and £4bn for ‘levelling up’ projects with a National Infrastructure Bank based in the north. £555bn would be spent on Covid in 2021; £18bn for PPE, tests and vaccines. What was the rest for? Rich tories? Overseas aid was cut from 0.7 to 0.5% of GDP, breaking a manifesto pledge. Baroness Sugg resigned saying it was ‘fundamentally wrong’, Justin Welby called it ‘shameful’ and Malala Yousafzai feared for girls’ education. Scathing attacks came from ex-PM’s Cameron, Major, Blair and Brown.
NAO reported £10bn wasted due to a lack of PPE supplies at the start of the plague. At PMQs, Keir asked for transparency on the waste of public money on useless equipment. The Cock told workers to stop ‘soldiering on’ when they were sick: “( the British are) peculiarly unusual for going into work when unwell.”
Vaccine hopes helped airline share prices soar and from 15th December, quarantine could be reduced if travellers paid for a test that came back clear. P&O Cruises cancelled sailings until April 2021 due to ‘uncertainty around European ports of call’.
In The Hands Of The Gods
Maple Leaves Collage
I arose feeling iffy on a misty Thursday but soldiered on. Phil again made porridge, leaving a nasty pan to wash and the gas ring on which got me riled. Controversial legendary footballer Diego Maradona died the previous day. Metro stole the show with their ‘in the hands of god’ headline. Belatedly posting the week’s blogs took ages, leaving time for little else. In the evening we viewed some much-missed escapism on Prime before reverting to current affairs. Justine Greening appeared on Newscast calling the government too short-sighted. Ex-ministers were always wise after the fact, weren’t they?
An update on the tiers from 2nd Dec confirmed 99% of England’s population would be in the higher tiers. Only Cornwall, the Isle of Wight and the aptly named Scilly Isles would be in tier 1. Predictably, London was in tier 2 but at least Liverpool dropped from tier 3 to 2 due to sterling efforts. Manchester and all of Yorkshire except for North Yorks were in tier 3. The government promised an MP vote next week and a review on 16th December. The postcode checker went live before the official announcement, causing chaos and the website to crash. Referencing the clearly coloured map of the country, Phil asked: “why do you need the postcode checker? You’d have to be an idiot to not know what area you live in!”
Pubs said it was their ‘darkest moment’ as Mitchells & Butlers announced 1,300 job losses (affecting All Bar One, Harvester and Toby Carvery – was that still a thing?) On Look North, Peter Kelly of PHE said while Leeds and Sheffield had lower infection rates than London, hospitals were under more pressure. Was that due to capacity, I wondered, and what about Nightingale hospitals? Curious, I researched the tier criteria, which were: number of infections overall, number of infections in the over 60’s, the rate at which cases went up or down, the number of positive tests, and pressure on the NHS.
But I didn’t find an answer to what on earth Prof. Kelly referred to as ‘the council of councils’. “That sounds a bit Gormenghast!”
Still feeling ropy Friday, I also had bad guts. Moaning at the injustice, I skipped morning exercise. I had a cheeky look at Oxfam Black Friday deals and asked Phil oblique questions to ascertain if an antique camera was worth the asking price. It wasn’t. That saved me a few quid! The co-op was very busy but manageable. Phil caught up with me in the seasonal aisle where I again searched surreptitiously for possible gifts. As he had a coupon for £5 off if he spent £50, we loaded the trolley with extra wine. After lunch, I spotted my elderly next-door neighbour with another woman hovering near the wall. I stood on the threshold to chat. They were assessing her garden for a possible spruce-up. Following a heart op early in the year and extended convalescence, she looked much better and said she felt it too. She was of course mystified by Phil’s cyber-jobs.
Sage gave the R rate as 0.9-1 but said infections and deaths were still high. How did that reconcile? Minister Jenrick suggested some areas might go down the tiers on 16th December, but Prof. John Edmunds warned it was too soon. Gains of the Welsh firebreak were ‘eroded’ leading to new restrictions and NI started one of their own, to last 2 weeks.
Overnight cold persisted into Saturday, and mist obscured any daylight. With no inclination to go outdoors, I finished editing the journal, cleaned the bathroom, and watched lots of telly, joking about ‘Brexit Box’ in the ad breaks. “Soon, that will be all we can watch,” predicted Phil. After dinner, we watched films and drank red wine.
Sunday, we both slept very late. “That’s red wine for you!” Attempting to dress and breakfast quickly, the old bread had gone mouldy meaning I had to wrangle a new loaf out of its wrapper. With no hope of sourcing decent veg by that time, the idea of going to the market was abandoned. Instead, Phil went to the co-op and used another coupon for free roast spuds. We discovered they didn’t save any time and looked raw, well after the recommended cooking time, while the accompanying pies were burnt. Bizarrely, it all tasted good. I fetched angel chimes and advent candles from the attic – yes; that time of year already!
Rabid Raab on Marr said we risked a third wave if MPs didn’t vote for the tiers and hinted that regions might split to better reflect varying infection rates. To further ameliorate revolting backbenchers, Boris wrote to them promising that tiers would be reviewed every 2 weeks, some regions could move down a tier from 16th December, another MP vote at the end of January, to publish evidence on which decisions were based, and a ‘sunset’ clause of 3rd February. Negotiating with nature again, he’d obviously been listening to The Oracle of Manchester (aka a woman interviewed in the street) who announced it would all be over by Easter. The government ordered 2m extra Moderna vaccines. Amidst an ever-more confusing picture, 7 brands were on order in total, none yet licensed*. So much for roll-out from 1st December. It was all too late for Dave Prowse, of Green Cross Code and Darth Vader fame, who died of Covid-19.
Covid dreams returned. That night, I had one suggesting it was wise to keep social distancing but not worry too much about cleanliness. That wouldn’t stop the incessant washing of hands and food though!
*Note: Full list of vaccines on order by the UK government: 1. Oxford University/Astra-Zeneca 2. Moderna 3. Pfizer/Biontech 4. Novavax 5. Valneva 6. GSK/Zanofi 7. Janssen.
The Corvus Diaries 