It has faced unparalleled troubles but this government cannot point to a single significant achievement in the past 12 months

Editorial: From the timing of lockdowns to the two fiascos over free school meals, the government just seems very bad at governing, and Tory backbenchers are rightly growing restive

(The Independent)

Few governments in recent times have managed to lose their vitality as rapidly as this one. Not quite a year after the general election that delivered an enviable working majority of 87 in the Commons, it is already having to have a relaunch. Or, rather, it isn’t having a relaunch because the prime minister is self-isolating – again – as a precaution against Covid.

Even if, as Boris Johnson bullishly claims, the episode stands as an outstanding success for the test and trace app, and even though he himself is “bursting with antibodies”, there remain questions about how Covid-secure Downing Street really is. To have to self-isolate once may be regarded a misfortune, but twice…?

The photograph of Mr Johnson with his backbench friend, without a mask and apparently less than two metres apart, plus the evidence that five other Tory MPs at the meeting are also now in self-isolation, suggests that the “hands, face, space” protocols may not have been rigidly adhered to. Like everything else that has befallen them in recent months, most dramatically the departure of Mr Johnson’s two most senior advisers, this adds to the impression that the government is gaffe-prone, if not actually incompetent.

The mishandling of the Covid crisis speaks for itself. The Brexit talks are grinding their way to a probable British compromise with the EU – far from the rosy promises of the Vote Leave campaign in 2016. There is little evidence of anything of substance to show for the so-called “levelling up” agenda (the subject of the ill-fated meeting between Mr Johnson and the MPs). The “green revolution” and its probably impractical targets for the adoption of electric vehicles has been postponed again. And the prime minister won’t even be able to turn up in person for Prime Minister’s Questions (which is probably just as well from his own point of view).  

Tory backbenchers and ministers are reportedly restive, and they are right to be. From the timing of lockdowns to the two fiascos over free school meals and the summer exams crisis, the government just seems very bad at governing. Of course it has had to face unparalleled troubles in the past year, but the ability to deal with crises is precisely how governments should be judged. It is difficult to identify a single significant achievement to show for the past year in office. Even the “oven-ready Brexit deal” they were elected to deliver has turned out to be half-baked.

To adapt a famous old election poster, “Boris isn’t working”. Can he be fixed?