One of the hazards of writing a fortnightly political column is that the political scene can change a great deal in such a short period. Two weeks ago most political columnists recognised that Boris Johnson was facing plenty of difficulties, but very few of them were writing that he might be brought down before their next column was due.

Things have changed rapidly. Bit by bit the facts of the affair have been dragged out in the media and the House of Commons. 

Yes, agreed Boris Johnson, there were a number of people, about thirty or so, in the garden of Number 10. And yes, they were drinking wine. And yes, we learned someone on the Prime Minister’s staff had written to about a hundred people inviting them to the gathering and to bring a bottle with them. And yes, the Prime Minister himself had joined them for a while, thinking that those present were just having a refresher whilst they were at work.

By then poor Boris Johnson must have wished that there had been a prolonged thunderstorm keeping everyone indoors that day. To add to his troubles, three of his Cabinet colleagues — Rishi Sunak, Dominic Raab and Michael Gove — were anxious to let it be known that they were not at the party, but were busy at their departmental duties.

That reminded me of the fall of Prime Minister Thatcher when John Major pleaded that he was unable to get to Westminster to support her due to a painful wisdom tooth, which eased just in time to let him arrive in Westminster to stand as the “Keep Heseltine out” candidate and be elected as her successor. 

The fate of Prime Minister Johnson may now be in the hands of Sue Gray, the tough Ulsterwoman civil servant charged with investigating the parties at No 10.  At present It would not take much more to bring the Prime Minister down.   

Boris Johnson is at least spared, for the time being, the hazards of by-elections. Whilst there are two pending — that at Southend West where the sitting Member Sir David Amess was murdered last October — is set for 3 February, but it will tell us nothing about public opinion on Boris Johnston as, out of respect for Sir David, neither Labour nor the Liberal Democrats are fielding candidates.  

The other by-election at Birmingham Erdington arose from the death of Labour’s Jack Dromey (the husband of Harriet Harman MP) who had a majority of 3,500 over the Tories with the Lib Dems, and would probably be an easy win for Labour in any event.  

Listen to the Pope

The views of Pope Francis will find support from well beyond the ranks of the Catholic Church. Last December he compared the European Union to a dictatorship in its attempt to impose “woke” rules on language. Now he has gone on to describe cancel culture as “ideological colonisation”, saying the EU risked failing if it became a vehicle for such a thing.  

That, he said, “leaves no space for freedom of expression”.  It is good to see that the leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics has come out fighting on such matters and that he also recognised “those places where an effective vaccination campaign has taken place, the risk of severe repercussions of the disease (Covid ) has decreased”,  adding that “it is important to immunize as much of the general population as possible”.

Perhaps that encouraged Alex Hawke, the Australian Immigration Minister who has had to deal with the case of the world leading tennis player, Novak Djokovic, to finally deport him. To be fair to Djokovic he has not campaigned against vaccination; he has simply not been vaccinated, perhaps for fear that it might affect his remarkable physical strength and skill. 

Nonetheless, the Australian people have every right to protect themselves against the foul Covid disease and he had no right to seek to enter their country by deception. 

That silly edifice

The Sunday Telegraph reported that the ridiculous earth mound in Hyde Park by Marble Arch which tourists were encouraged to climb for a fee of £8 has been closed and hopefully will be removed before long. The deputy leader of Westminster Council, Melvyn Caplan, has resigned after the costs tripled from an initial forecast of £2 million. Anyone wanting a view across Hyde Park could have gotten much the same view from the top deck of a London bus without getting their shoes muddy (especially ladies’ high heels) or the effort of climbing a hillock.

Be careful what you wish for 

A couple of paragraphs down from that news story I noticed another about Staffordshire Wildlife Trust which had carried out a trial to try to recreate the effect of beavers by laying trees across a river in the Manifold Valley in the Peak District. The manager of the trust, Nick Mott told the BBC that “the key benefit is that it alleviates flooding”.  

Well, yes, that might be so, but I think that the trustees might think about the law of unintended consequences before they lumber the Trust with what might be another embarrassment.