The new parliamentary year will be very different, for MPs and journalists alike

Think the prime minister will return after recess refreshed and full of vigour? Think again, writes Andrew Woodcock

Crisis management: Boris Johnson has had a torrid summer (AFP/Getty)

The return from summer recess is usually a time for fresh starts at Westminster.

With any rancour and dissension among MPs dissipated by six weeks on beaches and in constituencies, prime ministers have plenty of opportunities to draw a line under disputes of the past and inject some vigour into their plans for the future.

Traditionally, the autumn starts with a series of party conferences giving the prime minister and leaders of opposition parties a chance to gee up their activists, launch new policies and generally hog the media headlines with their biggest speeches of the year.

A budget or autumn statement allows the chancellor to cut taxes or hand out goodies to voters and the Queen’s Speech presents MPs with a new legislative agenda for the parliamentary year, packed full of eye-catching initiatives to show that the government is really delivering on its promises.

Little of this will apply when MPs return to sparsely-populated socially-distanced green benches on Tuesday next week.

Instead of a carefree break, recharging batteries away from the spotlight, Boris Johnson has had a torrid summer of coronavirus lockdowns and quarantines, fruitless Brexit talks and a humiliating U-turn over exam results, topped off by a row over face coverings for school pupils. The success of his strategy for leading the UK out of its Covid-induced shutdown will immediately be tested as children go back to the classrooms.

Mr Johnson will miss the ego-boosting adulation of the Tory faithful, as the annual conference is downgraded to a virtual gathering to avoid it turning into a super-spreader event.

And while a budget, spending review and state opening of parliament are pencilled in for the autumn, no dates have been fixed for any of them and rumours are rife that chancellor Rishi Sunak may postpone any significant fiscal announcements until 2021 when the economic impact of Covid-19 becomes clearer.

Whatever happens, there is no prospect of Mr Johnson leaping free from his current travails to embark on his promised journey to a “levelled-up” post-Brexit Britain.

Autumn presents him with the same problems which bedevilled him when parliament broke up in July, with ministers and medics agreeing that the Covid crisis could well stretch into 2021 or beyond. Talks on a post-Brexit trade deal, with the EU heading towards the buffers ahead of a 31 December deadline, could add disruption to trade and travel to the existing pandemic chaos.

Yours,

Andrew Woodcock

Political editor