All the challenges for Boris Johnson
UK, the political point before the summer break in the House of Commons
The House of Commons has officially entered the summer break – the so-called "recess" – and the last session of Question Time last week was useful to take stock of the political situation in the UK before the resumption of work in September. Prime Minister Boris Johnson followed the session from Checkers – where he was in self-isolation – but despite this he got a "liar" from a Labor MP, promptly suspended from the session by the speaker, Sir Lindsay Hoyle.
The past week hasn't been a good one for BoJo, despite the Tory leader just celebrating two years in Downing Street. On Monday 19 there was the long-awaited Freedom Day , but the numbers of the pandemic and the "pingdemic", with hundreds of thousands of workers in basic services such as transport and food forced to self-isolate – have overshadowed the restoration of freedoms , limited since March 2020. In recent days, infections have been decreasing, but scientists warn that to see the results of Freedom Day on the contagion curve we will have to wait until next weekend. Johnson, however, can already see one result with his own eyes: in the latest YouGov polls, the Conservatives' lead over Labor dropped from 13 to 6 points and the alarm went off at Tory. Yes, because upon returning from holidays, taxes will have to be handled to cope with the surge in public spending of this year and a half of Covid. The risk is that Johnson's voters are paying the most. Retirees, in particular, fear that the government will cancel the triple guarantee – triple lock – on pensions, which guaranteed them a revaluation of the sums of at least 2.5% on an annual basis.
The government will also find other issues on the table and, perhaps, the summer break will give the executive some thought. Of course, the end of the pandemic is at the head of the Cabinet's concerns. As well as the problems on the Northern Irish Protocol, exposed by the Minister for Brexit, Lord Frost, to the municipalities last Monday. Ulster, like Scotland, remains a thorn in the side for an unloved premier outside England. Yet, even in London one wonders if the “leveling up”, rebalancing between the different geographical areas of the country, could benefit the Tories. In the by-election of Chesham and Amersham the Conservatives lost their historic seat in Buckinghamshire and many saw in this defeat a reaction of the local electorate to the passage of the new High Speed - High Speed 2 – which should connect faster. the cities of Lancashire and Yorkshire. Johnson is also pressured by the new recruits of the former Northeast Labor Wall. The Northern Research Group's group of deputies urged him to set out more clearly his strategy for rebuilding the most depressed areas in the north of the country. The premier's speech on July 15 has partially appeased the requests but the backbenchers expect concrete solutions to be brought to their constituencies.
In all this, the silly season has begun, a nickname that the British give to the summer season where everything – or almost – stops, and political-parliamentary gossip abound. In the days before the recess the newspaper "i" was reporting of an impending reshuffle in the government, with Education Minister Gavin Williamson due to lose his job. Nothing has been done but between now and the reopening of Westminster we will still hear some good ones.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/uk-il-punto-politico-prima-della-pausa-estiva-alla-camera-dei-comuni/ on Tue, 27 Jul 2021 05:00:33 +0000.