Boris Johnson's return should remind us of Rishi Sunak's strengths

Should I apologise to Boris Johnson? Having supported him twice in 2019, I was apathetic towards his premiership, embarrassed by his downfall and critical of his mystical hold on some Tories. But last night he reminded us, the Bojo sceptics, of his finer qualities that Rishi Sunak, alas, does not share. Our former prime minister (a year later) served as a surprise prelude to his successor (a year later) in London.

His speech It was a pleasant glimpse into all the terrors that accompanied the advent of a Labour supermajority. In 2019, voters “sent Jeremy Corbyn and his then-disciple Keir Starmer into orbit.” Since then, the UK has delivered a world-class vaccine and defended Ukraine. Voting for reform would be “letting the Putinists deliver the Corbynites” and delivering “uncontrolled immigration and compulsory wokeness.” And so on.

Alongside Michael Gove and David Cameron, Johnson has turned a pre-election rally into the Conservative equivalent of an ageing rock band reuniting for one last gig. The audience understands that all the participants have fallen out and their careers have rapidly stagnated since their heyday. But bring them together, squint a little, and the old magic almost reappears.

Sunak, however, could not help but be disappointed. “Isn’t it great to be able to bring our Conservative family together?” he asked. until we read Suella Bravermans recent Telegraph Tribune. Sunak listed several of the party’s achievements, including David Cameron’s “saving our country” from “bankruptcy”, while ignoring the number of achievements that were reversed after the lockdown. Didn’t he just renege on everything ten months ago?

More comfortable in front of a blackboard than behind a podium, it is no surprise that the prime minister is not a public speaker of Johnson’s caliber. He is a financier, not a journalist; a pelotonist, not a populist. Seeing Johnson return to his natural habits reminds us of his unique campaign chemistry and why so many voters adored him.

It is particularly popular with those currently tempted by the siren song of Nigel Farage. It may have been Boris Johnson’s government that enabled the surge in immigration we have seen since 2019, and Rishi Sunak’s that introduced measures to curb its worst excesses. Johnson’s government may have collapsed in ignominy, infighting and cake. But for many of us Brexiteers, it remains the platform for our revolt.

Would Johnson have called an election in the rain? Would he have returned from France to discuss his childhood TV subscriptions, rather than rub shoulders with other leaders in tribute to the dead? Would he have launched a campaign that changed its message every five minutes, making the collapse of the 2019 coalition an absolute certainty? Would he have outdone Ed Davey?

All these questions are unanswerable, as counterfactuals always are. Instinct is that this Tory campaign was so miserable that Johnson could not have run a worse work. If nothing else, it would have brought a little more joy of life to the photoshoots. The 2019 campaign was almost fun. Love, in fact BorisWave's parodies and beats were better that “Vote Conservative to save this kitten.”

But to lose ourselves in idle fantasies about what could have, should have happened, is to ignore the reality of the current situation. Johnson is no longer prime minister because he failed to control 10 Downing Street and because his own MPs did not trust him. Sunak was far from a perfect occupant of 10 Downing Street, but he was the best the Conservative Party had at its disposal and kept the machine running.

Yes, he is not mobbed in shopping malls, nor spontaneously greeted by voters wearing vests and drinking Stella. on the curb. But he’s also a much better debater than most think. He swept Keir Starmer aside in their various joint appearances, hammering home his message about Labour’s tax hikes. Starmer wasn’t quite a flea-faced Joe Biden, but he struggled with Sunak’s discipline and courage.