I glimpsed the next conservative psychodrama: the return of Boris

At his book launch this week, Boris Johnson invited guests to imagine what life would have been like without the small handful of random events that led to his downfall. What if he hadn't gone to dinner with Charles Moore that fateful evening, when he should have been learning about Owen Paterson's misdeeds? What if Chris Pincher hadn't let his hands wander so freely around the Carlton Clubs bar? What if the new Conservative MPs had not been so psychologically oppressed by what they had read on Twitter and had not risen up against him?

When he responded that we would now be in the middle of Johnson's second-term honeymoon, the room erupted in cheers. There were some laughs too, but read Unchained it is to understand that the author is certainly not joking. This is not a candid farewell memoir from a man who has turned his back on Westminster. This reads like a comeback manifesto from someone who continues to kiss MPs (I don't blame any of them) and who thinks the book of his political adventures still has a few chapters to write.

The idea of ​​a Boris restoration may seem fanciful. But what seems impossible has happened recently in politics and, in the era of comebacks, from Michel Barnier to Donald Trump, it is unwise to rule anything out. Or assume that the current Conservative leadership battle will be the final word on who leads the party at the next election.

Kemi Badenoch's emergence in both finals is seen as a freak occurrence but, in fact, it follows logically from his broader argument about the need for seriousness in politics. Her rivals played games, lent each other votes and attempted to manipulate the race. But they blew it, canceled each other and let it go. She stayed out of the Westminster horse-trading and negotiations, even if it meant being accused of not being a team player. This will be very useful to him now. Her frankness, which annoys the deputies, is precisely what recommends her to party members.

Could it now implode during this final stage? I would be surprised. She has already shown her weakness: making jokes and speaking clearly, thus exposing herself to misinterpretations. She doesn't seem to care. I interviewed her on stage last week and she said that while most civil servants are good, 5 to 10 percent of them are bad and should be incarcerated. This has led to predictable reports that she wants 50,000 mandarins jailed. Was this a gaffe or a lighthearted way of making an important point? She's betting that conservative members and the general public will know a joke when they hear one take it seriously, but not literally.

The same thing is said of Donald Trump. Even if she hates the comparison, she, like him, tends to dominate political conversations. What she said or did not say about maternity pay seems to have more impact than an hour-long speech from her rivals. This ability to attract attention is of course useful if you lead a conservative party struggling to be heard. Having known her for years, I can attest that she enjoys what she considers fun combat (even if her opponents don't always appreciate it as much). She's a natural fighter: exactly what you'd expect from someone leading the opposition.

The problem is that Tory MPs may need a therapist more than a leader and never really appreciate it. She only obtained a third of the votes of her colleagues: never before has a candidate for the leadership of the Conservative Party come out on top with such low support. Robert Jenrick, his opponent, was even less popular. It is therefore not difficult to see how this party addicted to regicide rejects its new leader after a year or two, if only by natural reflex. Johnson seems to expect it. As he says in his new book, removing leaders is exactly what Tory MPs do.

It's also easy to see how it comes back. Keir Starmer won several seats that would normally be Conservative and could easily be Conservative again. By-elections are held three to four times a year and in the next one it is easy to see a local constituency party choosing Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson as their candidate. Just as William Hague was powerless to prevent the return of Michael Portillo, a new conservative leader could find it difficult to banish the former (still undefeated) Prime Minister. A Johnson return could happen at any time.

If support for Britain's Reform Party continues to grow and Tory polls fail to break the 30 percent mark, then you can see what a re-elected Boris might say: that he alone can defeat Farage, just as he did in 2019, bring the party together. large coalition of voters. His case would be stronger if Jenrick won, took Faragist positions and still got nowhere.

But then again, Britain tends to be unforgiving of its politicians. The exhumation of David Cameron can hardly be considered a great success. They must come back in different forms. Tony Blair is now a successful lobbyist. Rory Stewart, Jacob Rees-Mogg and Ed Balls are part-time broadcasters. George Osborne is a part-time financier and recently helped sell The Spectator, now edited by Michael Gove. But such resurrections happen outside of politics: those at Westminster rarely work.

And Johnson's record, unfortunately, is not one of success. Rather than reducing unemployment to a 50-year low (as he claims in his book), the number of furlough benefits increased from four million to a scandalous five million under his leadership. This is thanks, in large part, to the lockdowns which, even now, he cannot decide whether they are good or bad. He defends all his follies, from his obsession with net zero on HS2 to the catastrophic overspending, and then he wonders why taxes were so high. I instinctively wanted to reduce taxes and free people, he writes. However, he ended up doing the opposite.

In a debate I chaired at the last Conservative conference, I asked a room full of campaigners how many would be open to a restoration of Boris. Barely a dozen hands were raised, and that's what will disrupt his return. Memories of what actually happened during his premiership are still fresh. Principles are useless if they are not followed by actions: this is the lesson of his passage to No10. His book is a brilliantly written reminder of this fact and the kind of politics conservatives urgently need to abandon.