Inside Politics: ‘Final nail in his comeback coffin’

More talks aimed at ending strike action and Boris Johnson is back in the headlines for all the wrong reasons, writes Matt Mathers

Health Secretary Steve Barclay (Stefan Rousseau/PA) (PA Wire)

Hello there, I’m Matt Mathers and welcome to The Independent’s Inside Politics newsletter.

It was once remarked that Boris Johnson was brought down by Boris Johnson. Are we now witnessing Boris Johnson’s ‘comeback’ being scuppered by Boris Johnson? Elsewhere, ministers are holding more talks with union chiefs and health and transport sector leaders on strikes.

Inside the bubble

Commons action gets underway with Defra questions at 9.30am, followed by any urgent questions or statements. Penny Mordaunt, Commons leader, is up next with the weekly parliamentary business statement. After that comes any other statements. The main business will be backbench-led debates on Iran and landfill tax fraud. SNP MP David Linden has an adjournment debate on the retained EU law bill.

Daily briefing

End of the line?

This week is drawing to a close in pretty much the same fashion as it started: ministers and industry chiefs in the health and rail sectors are set to meet with unions today for talks aimed at bringing an end to strikes over pay and conditions.

Steve Barclay, the health secretary, will talk with representatives from the British Medical Association (BMA) after junior doctors began voting on strike action on Monday. Around 45,000 doctors are being balloted and the BMA says it will stage a full 72-hour walkout in March if there is a 50 per cent ‘yes’ vote. Doctors will not provide emergency NHS care during the walkouts and will need to arrange emergency cover to ensure patient safety, it added.

Announcing the vote, the BMA said successive governments have overseen 15 years of real-terms pay cuts for junior doctors in England, which amounts to a “staggering and unjustifiable” 26.1 per cent decline in pay since 2008/09. Junior doctors were not part of an NHS pay rise this year because their salaries are reviewed on a multi-year basis. Ministers, meanwhile, say they are sticking to the recommendations of independent pay review bodies.

Could we be about to see the end of the rail disputes? It feels as though these walkouts have been going on for an eternity now but there is some cause for optimism after Mark Harper, the transport secretary, said that there will be a “renewed offer” on the table before crunch talks today between the Rail Delivery Group and the Rail Maritime and Transport Union.

Mick Whelan, general secretary of the Aslef train drivers’ union, on Wednesday told the Commons transport select committee there was “zero” chance of a resolution. But Harper later said that was “unfair” as the situation had “moved on”. “I’m hopeful that now that there is a renewed offer on the table, that that (a deal) can happen, and we saw confirmation today,” he told ITV’s Peston show last night.

Meanwhile, at least 100,000 civil servants will strike as part of a coordinated national “day of action” in a major escalation of action by the Public and Commercial Services union, which announced that its members from 124 government departments and other bodies will walk out on 1 February.

Health Secretary Steve Barclay (Stefan Rousseau/PA) (PA Wire)

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Bo no

Boris Johnson might be out of office in No 10 but he is certainly not out of the headlines. And as you’ve probably already guessed it isn’t for the right reasons.

The former PM, who much of the public now love to hate, reportedly joked that one of the Covid lockdown gatherings he attended was “the most unsocially distanced party in the UK right now”.

Those comments, some Tory MPs say, could be the “final nail in his comeback coffin”. A number of Tory MPs said the former prime minister’s alleged remarks at the November 2020 event – not denied by his spokesperson – make it more likely that he will be found to have misled parliament at the upcoming Partygate inquiry.

“This will make the privileges committee inquiry more difficult for Boris – if this is stood up, he clearly knew what was going on,” one former minister tells The Independent.

Today’s cartoon

See all of The Independent’s daily cartoons here

(Dave Brown)

On the record

Gary Streeter, Tory MP, on the prospect of Johnson returning as leader.

“It is inconceivable that he would ever lead us again. Tory MPs don’t want him. We have had an upgrade.”

From the Twitterati

Paul Waugh, i chief politics commentator, on Johnson and Sunak’s legacies.

“.@RishiSunak and @BorisJohnson’s backing for British science could be their real legacy.”

Essential reading

• Sean O’Grady, The Independent: Andrew Bridgen joins a growing number of whipless MPs
• Salma Shah, The Independent: The odds are stacked against him – but could Rishi Sunak possibly win?
• David Aaronovitch, The Times: Greatest threat to the NHS is loss of faith
• James Ball, The New European: The man who wasn’t there

Inside Politics first appeared in our daily morning email. You can sign up via this link.