The paradox of libertarian Boris following the 'star of science'

Nobody predicted this scenario – prime minister Boris Johnson held at bay by a key section of his own party, able to make decisions only with the aid of the Labour opposition. His Tory opponents may have mustered a hundred votes in the Commons, but all the signs are that a significant number of others nearly joined them. They are the Covid sceptics. And they have now been joined by Lord Frost, who has been crucial to Johnson’s Brexit strategy.

What is surprising is that the philosophy that has caused this rebellion is libertarianism, the desire for the State to have as little role as possible in the affairs of its citizens – even in the midst of a raging pandemic.

The majority of the public quite like firm guidance and clear rules, and are out of step with this brand of Toryism. One might have expected a rebellion over government incompetence, which is widely disapproved of, and one is overdue concerning the Prime Minister’s personal integrity, in which almost nobody has much faith.

But individual liberty? Not having to produce a so-called Covid passport before entering a night-club? Being required to wear a mask when travelling on public transport? Insisting that healthcare workers in day-to-day contact with frail and vulnerable patients should be vaccinated?

These are all measures which enjoy substantial support among the population at large, so Labour is well aligned with public opinion. So for the time being is the Johnson government, though muttering against him is growing louder from within its own ranks. The Spectator and Daily Telegraph have taken up the libertarian hue and cry, but not so far the Daily Mail, which has been a thorn in the side of many Tory governments in the past. But there is a libertarian momentum here, a sharp wind blowing across the political prairie, which is novel and unusual. It even links arms with the anti-vaxxer movement, the vociferous and sometimes violent campaign that takes distrust of science and politicians to its conspiratorial extreme. Its supporters do not wear masks. Some of them even believe the very existence of the Covid pandemic is fake news.

The North Shropshire by-election, a hitherto safe seat lost by a substantial margin, showed a massive volume of grass-roots Tory dismay with the Government. But here’s the puzzle. Rural Tories are not by and large libertarians. They represent the land-and-property part of the Tory coalition, not the free-market entrepreneurial part. Their farmers and shop keepers do not warm to the idea of importing chlorinated chickens or hormone-fattened beef from America. They supported Brexit not because they wanted free markets and deregulation, but because they objected to to the idea of foreigners having any say in the government of Britain. At a push they are more for protection than for free trade.

What fuelled the anti-Tory votes in Shropshire were those other two sticks to beat the Government with, competence and integrity. They do not want the State demolished in the name of freedom. Many of them do very well out of it. They want good government. They want politicians who behave themselves properly.

So Boris Johnson has to fight a war on many fronts, which would challenge the skill of a genius or a saint, of which he is neither. Leaving aside for a moment the strange phenomenon of Tory Covid scepticism, there is an impression in the country that his lack of moral principle in his own life has set the tone for many in Government. I have noted in this space before that one of his biographers, Andrew Gimson, quoted a letter Johnson's housemaster at Eton had written to his parents, observations which seem as relevant today, I remarked two years ago, as the day they were made.

“Boris sometimes seem affronted,” he wrote, “when criticised for what amounts to a gross failure of responsibility... I think he honestly believes it is churlish of us not to regard him as an exception, one who should be free of the network of obligations which bind everyone else.” That still hits the nail. The ethical tone of an institution is set at the head. People learn to imitate their bosses. If they think that 10 Downing Street itself is pretty relaxed about following the rules, those in other parts of the Government and Tory party machine will feel the same. They feel they have been given tacit permission.

And so at the end of last year in various parts of the Whitehall and Westminster village, people assembled to flirt, eat cheese and other nibbles, drink wine and make a lot of noise, and perhaps enjoy a Christmas quiz together. OK as long as the rest of the public didn’t know about it, they thought. The most devastating poster produced during the North Shropshire by-election campaign showed a group of well-known smiling Tory faces, with the unsubtle but totally deserved caption: “They’re laughing at you.” Taking the conservative voters of rural England for mugs is about as toxic an insult as British politics has ever seen. These voters are not just disillusioned. They are hurt and angry.

Things can only get worse for Boris. The official science-based advice the government is receiving all points to further restrictions on personal liberty, and the sooner the better. If Johnson has lost control of his Party, he can only proceed to do what the scientists recommend if Labour backs him. That is a power shift of terminal proportions, for Labour can pull the rug out from under him whenever it likes.

Yet in this very confusing and paradoxical situation, one irony stands out. Johnson is, by temperament as the Eton school master pointed out, the very model of a modern libertarian. Some might even call him a libertine, a swordsman cavalier among cavaliers. He would be happier leading the rebels than resisting them. But he has hitched his star to the scientific advice, and has little choice but to follow it. If they say a surge in the prevalence of the Omicron Covid variant requires an end to family gatherings this holiday season – another lockdown by any other name – that is what he has to do. Whether his Tory opponents will ever forgive him is another question. So is the question of how long he can bear it.