Boris Johnson’s need to be loved could be what brings him down

Afew weeks ago this column suggested that debate about Boris Johnson’s future should come to an end. His position as party leader was no longer in doubt and the disruption that this argument was causing should cease.

Then came the publication of Sue Gray’s report and photographs of the Prime Minister joining in what were unmistakably ebullient social gatherings in Downing Street, along with some rather squalid detail about staff behavior at those events – and the whole game changed.

So I apologise for my premature judement. This is not over. The Prime Minister’s supporters who insist that there is actually no new information in any of these developments to justify dissidence in the party are missing the point. Public confidence is not always – or even very often – about hard facts. It is as much about appearance and belief in the personal qualities of political figures. Neither of these things are trivial.

There is much more to being an elected national leader than there is, say, to the requirements for running a large organisation. Competence, reliable judgement, and an ability to deal with staff might get you a creditable pass as a company CEO but voters tend to feel that politicians who are nothing more than managers are deeply unsatisfactory.

Most people – even those who are not ideological – believe that governing should involve ideals, values, an idea of the greater good, and some criteria for what a just society ought to be like. Potential candidates are expected to embody these principles, or at least to express them with conviction. Of course, the ways to inspire public trust or admiration – or their opposites – can vary hugely. Often they depend on the circumstances of the day. But even in tranquil times, the matter of personality is always, rightly, at the core of it. Which brings us to the question of Boris Johnson’s future.

There have been very few politicians in our lifetimes who have traded on their personalities as much as he has. His humour, his ability to communicate in a relaxed and engaging way with people of all backgrounds (immensely valuable in a class-conscious country), and his air of good-natured optimism have been astonishingly effective in endearing him to sections of the population which have been famously averse to voting Conservative.

That is no mean thing. It can be a gift not just to his party but to the country as a whole if it succeeds in lifting morale and making the population feel more united.

But this triumph of personality carries an appalling risk. If jocular confidence begins to look like callous hubris, and the casual disregard of detail is revealed to be a shambolic failure to take responsibility, then the very traits that had once been so successful can be turned inside out.

This can be a painless reversal of opinion in the public mind: voters do not need to decide that they were mistaken in their original judgment. They can simply become convinced that those Johnson traits which had once seemed attractive are no longer right for the times: that he is incapable of adapting his attitudes and approach to suit new circumstances. This is the view of a number of backbenchers who regarded the Prime Minister as the perfect leader for Brexit but believe that he is failing to maintain serious concentration in the face of a whole new set of complex dilemmas. The very things that were once his greatest advantages are now his most egregious disadvantages and they seem to be ineradicable aspects of his character.

His most potent critics – the ones who haven’t always hated him for suspect reasons – are particularly concerned by what they see as his obsessive need to be liked. There is now a good deal of evidence that he will put his own vulnerability – this compulsive need to be wanted – above any commitment he might have had to principle or policy direction. In fact, so in thrall is he to any shifts in public opinion – however mercurial or ill-informed they might be – that he will happily dump even the fundamentals of his party’s political position.

Even more alarming, they believe that he will do (is doing) this without any careful thought about what the practical consequences might be for his own government and for the country.

If this critical analysis is correct, then it is absolutely imperative that the party act to remove him as soon as it is practically possible.

His pride in his ability to unite people in their affection for him will have become a curse, not just to everyone associated with his Government, or to Conservatism as a philosophy, but to the future of the economy and everything that depends on it.

The counter argument to this from his supporters is that any attempt to replace him at this time would be self-indulgent and, in itself, irresponsible: faced with a cost-ofliving crisis, war in Europe and a possible full-blown recession, we cannot afford weeks of uncertainty and instability while the party plays leadership games. And, they also argue (more quietly) that his gift for endearing himself to voters is not exhausted. He is clever and not without historical insight. He can recover from this.

But what, the critical camp replies, if he does too much damage at this present desperate stage? What if he is so determined to hang on to office that he embraces whatever the opinion polls say voters want – even if those things are contradictory and inconsistent? What if he is so fearful of rejection that he makes moves to buy off every potential protest, and thereby closes down the possibility of reforms that might have encouraged real economic growth and social progress?

Maybe this point has already been passed. One Johnson ally has been quoted as asking what point there would be to a leadership challenge: “There’s no alternative strategy, no alternative plan.” If that is true then there really is little to be gained from removing him – or in debating anything at all.

Allies of the PM say no one appeals to voters so strongly. Critics say he has jettisoned principle in a desperate bid to hang on to office

If confidence begins to look like hubris... the traits that had once been so successful can be turned inside out