It’s not mad (although it IS controversial) to believe Boris alone can save the Tories from catastrophe

NOT all problems in life are soluble. this is certainly true of politics. Let’s be realistic. the tories are in a mess and it’s very doubtful whether they will be able to get out of it before the General Election.

It seems not to matter how inadequate Sir Keir Starmer and Labour are, or how bereft of ideas. the tories sink ever further in the polls and Rishi Sunak is sinking with them.

No 10 hopes last-minute tax cuts may save them. Much as I’ll welcome them when they are unveiled by the Chancellor in early March, it seems unlikely that a bribe so late in the day will sway many voters. they will pocket the change — and remember that the tories raised taxes in the first place.

As for Rwanda, I’ll be astonished if enough illegal migrants are put on airplanes before the election to deter others from coming here. the Government will claim success but the numbers of people still crossing the Channel will tell a different story.

the truth is that many of us are fed up with uncontrolled immigration, both legal and illegal, and the tories have left it too late (again) to convince us that they have cracked the problem.

Am I being too gloomy? I hope so, but I think not. the tories look tired, and are unloved. And, let’s face it, for all his considerable gifts and palpable decency, Rishi hasn’t clicked with enough voters in the centre and on the Right.

If he had, the more hardline Reform UK, led by Richard tice, with Nigel Farage hovering in the wings, wouldn’t be registering around 10 per cent in the polls. Most of the party’s supporters are disenchanted tories. the Conservatives face being biffed from the Left by Labour, and by Reform from the Right.

In these dismal circumstances a former tory minister, Simon Clarke, is calling for his fellow MPs to give Rishi the heave-ho. Sir Simon is known for being the secondtallest man in the Commons, and for serving loyally on HMS

Liz truss as it slipped ignominiously beneath the waves in october 2022.

HOWEVER, Ms truss is distancing herself from her former lieutenant’s latest antics, while many tories — including, on the Right, Priti Patel and David Davis — have given him the cold shoulder.

A widespread view on the tory benches is that Clarke is an ineffectual chump. I shan’t dissent. He seems to have ignored the first lesson of political assassination, which is that it’s advisable to hunt in company. Sir Simon by himself is almost a joke. of course, he may have credible co-conspirators up his sleeve. we’ll see.

My main reason for thinking him foolish is his proposal, some nine months before the probable date of the election, that the tories should look for a new leader in a contest that would advertise their divisions, besides wearying the nation. It might make sense if they had a Margaret thatcher or an Abraham Lincoln limbering up, but they don’t.

why should Sir Simon think the electorate will be more drawn to the likely candidates than it has been to Rishi Sunak?

we have former Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, feisty to the point of being divisive, and unproven as an electoral asset. the tories would be unwise to assume that disenchanted voters will flock to her banner. they might run in the opposite direction.

then there is Business Secretary, Kemi Badenoch, a more balanced and attractive figure on the tory Right, but equally untested in the cauldron of national politics. Her time may come but it would surely be rash to turn to her as a saviour on the eve of an election.

Finally — unless I’ve forgotten someone — there is Leader of the House, Penny Mordaunt, who fell at the second-to-last fence the last time the tories held a leadership race. Her supporters remind us that she held a huge ceremonial sword with commendable composure and no little strength at last year’s Coronation.

this would certainly qualify her for the role of Boadicea if the tories were thinking of putting on a re-enactment of the Roman invasion of Britain. But Prime Minister?

It’s amazing that Simon Clarke should think that any of these candidates could be more successful than Rishi. I am assuming that even he doesn’t think his old skipper, Liz truss, should have another stint on the bridge.

But there is another alternative. It is at this point I say to readers: come close. the name I have in mind is that of the most hated and the most admired politician in Britain. It can’t be safely uttered in some quarters. I am talking of Boris Johnson.

Am I mad? Note that I don’t speak as the former Prime Minister’s greatest fan. I am painfully aware of his shortcomings. I don’t even think — in the rather unlikely event of his being recalled from oxfordshire’s answer to Colombeyles - Deux- Églises, where Charles de Gaulle served out his political exile — that he would beat Sir Keir Starmer.

AND yet — please hear me out — I observe certain things. one is that Boris led the tories to their biggest victory in three decades. the second is that Labour feared his leadership and was relieved when he was hustled out of office — unjustly I now believe, though I didn’t think so at the time. Labour doesn’t fear Rishi, Suella, Kemi, Penny or any other Conservative.

Unlike those tories, Boris has the legitimacy of having won an election. And, whatever may be thought of him, and despite his well-known faults, he is the sole substantial tory politician — a sometimes blundering heavyweight, apt to land a stray punch below his opponent’s belt, in a field of welterweights.

I concede there are problems, not least of which is that Boris is no longer an MP. An obliging tory with a massive majority would have to stand aside for him. the ensuing campaign would attract every Boris-hater in the land, with an incredulous BBC acting as ringmaster, reminding voters of every sin he had ever committed.

Another difficulty is that, to judge by his record as PM, Boris is not the anti-immigration, low-tax champion for which many on the Right yearn. Quite the opposite. In many ways he’s really a tory wet. But I expect he can change.

oh, yes, I nearly forgot. there’s another problem. A lot of tory MPs loathe Boris, though others love him. Might the haters tolerate him if he saved some of their seats?

I am sure, by the way, that the unidentified sponsor of the YouGov polling published a few weeks ago and yesterday in the Daily telegraph, which has illuminated the tories’ dire predicament, is rooting for Boris. we know that ex-Brexit Secretary Lord Frost is part of the plot.

As I say, some problems have no solution. whatever happens, Sir Keir Starmer will probably be sitting in No 10 this time next year. But there is a difference between calamity and defeat.

It’s wishful thinking to suppose that Rishi Sunak can turn things around and win the election. It’s mad to think that Kemi, Suella or the rest of them could do any better.

But it’s not mad, though it is certainly controversial, to believe that Boris Johnson alone can save the tories from catastrophe.