Boris Johnson is determined to demolish the rules on standards in public life – handing a peerage to Peter Cruddas is just the latest example

With his majority of 80, there is no one to stop Johnson taking the UK down the path towards a one-party state in which cronyism is rife – but the prime minister may yet regret his actions

Peter Cruddas was once listed as the richest person in the City of London (Rex Features)

So much for the Downing Street spin that Boris Johnson would soften his style of governing when his turbulent sidekick Dominic Cummings departed the scene last month. It didn’t last long. 

Johnson has overruled the independent House of Lords appointments commission by handing a peerage to Peter Cruddas, a former Conservative Party treasurer criticised by the Court of Appeal for selling access to the then prime minister David Cameron.  

Like Cummings, Cruddas was a key figure in the 2016 Vote Leave campaign, to which he donated £1.5m. He has given more than £3m to the Tories, including £658,000 since Johnson became prime minister. He also helped fund Johnson’s Tory leadership campaign. He is not the first party donor to spark allegations of “cash for peerages”, and won’t be the last, but his case is different.  

Once listed as the richest person in the City of London, Cruddas resigned as Tory treasurer after offering undercover reporters from The Sunday Times access to Cameron in return for £250,000 in donations. Although he successfully sued the paper for libel, the Court of Appeal said his actions were “unacceptable, inappropriate and wrong,” which is why the appointments commission objected to his peerage. Cruddas denied offering access for a donation but said at the time he deeply regretted “any impression of impropriety arising from my bluster in that conversation”.  

Johnson argued that the concerns were “historic” – even though the events happened only eight years ago – and cited Cruddas’s charitable foundation, which helps disadvantaged young people. His decision to override the commission by nominating Cruddas was “a clear and rare exception”.

The problem is that Johnson is making a habit out of exceptions. I doubt any previous prime minister would have overruled the commission. Or would have brazenly ignored the finding of Alex Allan, his ethics adviser, that Priti Patel broke the ministerial code by unintentionally bullying civil servants. Allan resigned; remarkably, Patel remains home secretary and, after being largely kept in her box during the Cummings era, is now enjoying a higher media profile.  

A year ago, Johnson literally bulldozed his way to victory at the general election. He won a mandate to deliver Brexit. But he has interpreted it as a mandate to demolish rules on standards in public life which have been observed by successive governments of all colours.  

The Vote Leave gang believe that these conventions helped to create a social democratic establishment through appointments which, even under Tory-led governments, saw more people with a Labour than Tory background handed jobs on public bodies. Tearing up the rules was seen as part of the Cummings plan for a permanent revolution but Cruddas’s elevation tells us that, with Cummings no longer there to shield Johnson from blame, it comes from the prime minister himself. Even without Cummings, the Vote Leave establishment is still in business.  

Another example of ripping up the rules was the way contracts for tackling coronavirus were handed to businessmen with personal links to Tory figures without the normal competitive procedures. Of course they had to be streamlined in such an emergency. But imagine how the Tory-supporting papers would have reported a Labour government doling out contracts to their friends and political allies.  

Johnson will carry on bulldozing. His mandate lasts another four years. He will demolish more obstacles in his way. He will give himself the power to call the next election when it suits him, by scrapping the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. Next in line: the Supreme Court, which will have its wings clipped for daring to block Johnson’s decision to suspend parliament for five weeks. We shouldn’t hold our breath for sensible reforms, such as allowing the Lords appointments commission the final word on peerages, or cutting the size of the bloated second chamber from 830 to 600, as the Lords themselves want to do.  

With his majority of 80, there is no one to stop Johnson taking the UK down the path towards a one-party state in which cronyism is rife. Yet I think some of his actions will return to haunt him. His letter telling Whitehall departments to ensure “there is no place for bullying,” a few days after he exonerated Patel, went down like a massive lead balloon with many of the civil servants ministers need to drive through their agenda.  

To many officials, it was another example of the “one rule for us, another for everyone else” mantra epitomised by Cummings’ trip to County Durham.  

One day, there will be a government of a different hue and the Tories might come to regret Johnson’s decision to tear up the rulebook. A Labour-led administration would feel under no obligation to revive it; the jackboot would be on the other foot, to the Tories’ cost.