Boris™

Democracy in action

The next British Prime Minister, Boris™ Johnson, is the choice of 92,153 paid up members of the Conservative party. His opponent got 46,656 votes, meaning that Boris™ won by a majority of 45,497 votes. In effect, those 45,497 votes chose the Prime Minister of the UK. Furthermore, 20,002 party members (12.6%) chose not to vote or spoiled their ballots (509).

Put more concisely, he was chosen by about two-thirds of the 159,320 eligible Conservative voters. Put even more concisely, around 0.2% of the electorate of the United Kingdom chose him as their Prime Minister.

As far as the parliamentary party is concerned, only half of them (51.1%) chose him in the run-off vote on 20 June. Hardly resounding support, even from his own tribe.

Crowning the leader

Boris™ fans thought his acceptance speech was refreshing – although after Theresa May, a speak-your-weight machine would sound refreshing. The speech itself was a shambles – quite as shambolic as the man himself.

He may be, in fact just the right man for the Conservative party, since the whole event gave little sign of organizational ability: having started late, keeping the public and media waiting for twenty minutes or so, the Tory panjandrums indulged in another ten minutes or so of coy teasing: speechmaking, mutual thanking and congratulation from a beauty pageant of nonentities demurely flashing their garters before finally announcing the result of the ballot.

Sometimes that rare moment in the sun just leaves the shadow behind. The main topic of interest at this event was: where was the mistress?

Blustering and bumbling for Britain

As far as the shambolic acceptance speech goes, he was, say the fanclub, saving himself for his accession speech in parliament today. Given that he has had a month to prepare a decent and statesmanlike acceptance speech for this moment, it was just one more shambles from the master of disorderly conduct. Start as you mean to go on. The Not-Theresa-May bounce will last another week at the most. At least she had someone at her side with whom she could be seen in public.

The fanclub, whilst admitting his very many defects, resort to that old saw: 'Boris™ is not a detail man. He will surround himself with good people.' Since there are very few good people in the parliamentary ranks at the moment, this in itself is going to be a struggle.

The burning question for the tabloids is: will he smuggle his mistress into 10 Downing Street furtively by the back door or brazenly through the front. Since the happy couple have now set themselves up in a nearby townhouse, some cynics wonder just how long it will be before No. 10 becomes just the office. At least then he will have a place to go back to when the crockery starts flying.