Remember Boris, this affair may come back to bite you

The General Election may not be until 2024 but voters don’t forget things like the Cummings scandal easily, explains Michael Settle

VOTERS don’t forget. Back in 1992, the Tory government suffered the ignominy of Black Wednesday when it had to withdraw sterling from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism, see the Treasury lose billions of pounds and raise interest rates to an eye-watering 15 per cent.

Of course, the Whitehall drama eventually led to economic recovery, which caused some Tories to rename it White Wednesday, but the political damage had been done.

The Conservatives’ record on economic management had been trashed and five years later voters gave their verdict on the tired-looking government of John Major, opting instead for the shiny New Labour alternative offering social justice and economic competence.

This week, another Whitehall drama has been served up with Dominic Cummings as the headline act. If anyone had any doubts about the Svengali-like influence he has on Boris Johnson, it was how the country’s leader offered an aide the run of the Downing Street rose garden to hold an impromptu press conference.

On Monday, the venue, normally the scene of major prime ministerial statements, became the stage for someone who is the real Deputy PM to soliloquise on why he was justified in driving 260 miles with his family to Durham.

Certain Conservatives were reassured by Mr Cummings’ performance while others feared it could leave a bad impression on voters about the Johnson administration.

“He didn’t come across as Satan or Blofeld but it will cause us damage,” one senior party source noted wryly. “This isn’t going to go away but Johnson will simply tough it out – he can’t do anything else now.”

Interestingly, the king of cut-through, rated for judging the nation’s mood outside the Westminster bubble – ie on the EU referendum – so misjudged it on this occasion.

There were numerous holes in Mr Cummings’ Swiss cheese story, the biggest one being his hour-long mobile eye test to the beauty spot of Barnard Castle.

Yesterday, Durham Police said of this that there “might have been a minor breach of the regulations that would have warranted police intervention”. Lawyers pointed out the word “might” was used because it would be up to a court to decide. However, the Government’s political opponents were adamant Mr Cummings was bang to rights and he should go. But yet another Trump-like doubling down was expected.

Amid all the political high drama, the most important thing is: what effect the Cummings affair will have on the public’s observance of the lockdown rules as they begin to be eased.

Matt Hancock, England’s Health Secretary, insisted it was citizens’ “civic duty” to obey the test and tracing scheme being introduced north and south of the Border. Some will feel it’s a bit rich for him to make such an appeal when they believe Mr Cummings put his own paternal instinct before the good of the wider community.

As I tap, Douglas Ross, the Scotland Office Minister, remains the only ministerial casualty from the Cummings affair. A colleague noted how the Moray MP was a singleminded chap who, in his role as a football referee, often had to make black-and-white decisions; “penalty or no penalty”. On this occasion, it was a penalty.

After a week of damaging headlines, Mr Johnson and his colleagues have been exhorting the public to cast aside the froth of the Cummings affair and “move on” to more important things like saving people’s lives and rescuing the economy.

The PM’S plea fell on deaf ears during Wednesday’s Liaison

Committee meeting where he was metaphorically duffed up by senior opponents, who clearly wanted to expose what they believe is Mr Johnson’s rank hypocrisy.

Labour’s tribune Yvette Cooper was the most assertive, deriding him for putting his loyalty to Mr Cummings before the national interest.

And yet it was interesting to see how Keir Starmer stepped back, suddenly agreeing with Mr Johnson it was time to move on, saying: “We cannot lose another week to this farce. We need to get back on track.”

On the Durham trip, the Labour leader dodged whether the No 10 aide should go but sought to undermine the PM’S leadership, saying the saga had shown him to have been weak.

Politically, having Mr Cummings remain in Downing St is a boon to Sir Keir as he rebuilds his party from the Corbyn ruins.

The charge Mr Johnson and his aide represent a self-obsessed “Tory elite,” running things from Downing Street in their own interests and not in the nation’s, is one the Labour leader will make repeatedly in the run-up to the 2024 poll.

Sir Keir and his chums will be hoping that for many voters the Cummings affair will have gone into the memory bank and will be just one more factor why in 2024 they reject the “Tory elite” and give Labour its biggest ever landslide to put the lawyerly knight inside No 10.

The charge of a selfobsessed ‘Tory elite’ will be made repeatedly in the run up to the 2024 poll