Boris is out, Berry hopes to be in, while Rishi takes stance on drama over the latest list of House of Lords ascendances...it's all change in Westminster!
Flying high: Sian Berry
It might be third time lucky for Green Party co-leader Sian Berry, who has announced her hopes to replace outgoing Caroline Lucas as parliamentary candidate for Brighton Pavilion.
Three-time parliamentary candidate, three-time candidate for London mayor, Berry now hopes to build on the formidable footprint left by Lucas as the Green Party’s sole MP.
Berry’s rivals are yet to reveal themselves, but her profile as an active Green campaigner across issues from air quality to family housing to male violence mean she is in a strong position.
With the Green’s well-established in Brighton and making significant in-roads at the last local election, this is a great opportunity for Berry and may just give her the passage to Westminster she’s been waiting for.
Middle ranking: Rishi Sunak
As a man who is normally so prone to ducking confrontation, Sunak finally laid down the gauntlet and confronted his former boss Boris Johnson over the ex-PM’s honours list.
Rishi’s declaration that Johnson had asked him to meddle with parliamentary protocol in confirming the new peerages gained applause from his audience at London Tech Week.
A demonstration of integrity from the PM? More likely is an attempt by Sunak to distance himself from the disgraced former PM as the findings of the Partygate report start to leak out (more on that below), and to amputate Johnson’s blotted legacy from the Conservative Party ahead of the ever-looming general election campaign.
It’s a risky tactic that could alienate and aggravate what's left of Boris’s supporters on the Tory parliamentary benches (just Nadine holding court now?). But the bigger risk is that all this Conservative infighting cements the Tories as divided, untrustworthy, and not focused on the real issues in the minds of voters.
Sinking: Boris Johnson
Put down the prosecco, take in the bunting – the party is well and truly over for the former PM.
In a first for British politics, Boris was dealt a would-be-penalty by the Privileges Committee, whereby he’d be facing a 90-day suspension from parliamentary duties if he were still an MP. But in his typical style, Johnson has taken matters into his own hands, closing the cover on that alternative political universe by resigning, leaving the Committee in the bizarre position of sentencing him in the language of hypotheticals.
The report is scathing and unwavering in its assessment that Johnson deliberately misled Parliament over Covid lockdown parties at Downing Street, accusing him of “personal knowledge of breaches” and of “a deliberate closing of his mind” to the facts. Boris lashed out in response (what else are we to expect?), calling the report a “deranged conclusion” by a “kangaroo court”.
It’s the end of the rollercoaster ride for the man who has gone from achieving the Tories’ largest electoral result in 30 years, to both resigning and being suspended from Parliament in the same week.
Or is it? If we’ve learnt anything about the unpredictable furore of the Johnson era, it’s never say never. Bye bye, Boris – until we inevitably meet again?