The stench of entitlement | thearticle

It is an irony that future historians will relish: the man who raised Boris Johnson to the greatest office of state — Dominic Cummings — is also the man who will do most to bring him down.

Cummings is the Deep Throat of Partygate.  The other twist in the brief and inglorious story of Boris de Pfeffel Johnson is that he will go down as one of Britain’s most consequential Prime

Ministers. He is the man (ably assisted by his nemesis) who hauled Brexit over the line with far-reaching consequences for the country and the union.   He has not gone yet. His performance

at PMQs suggests he will fight on. But it’s just a matter of time. He has turned from an asset to a liability faster than you can sink a glass of rosé at a garden party. He is a character so

flawed he makes MacBeth look like a stand-up guy. Irrespective of what the next few days throw up it is time for the Tory party and the country to reflect on what this is all about beyond

the obvious fact that the Prime Minister and his acolytes broke rules that millions of their countrymen were observing.  The May 20 Bring Your Own Bottle party is an open and shut case of

‘do as I say not as I do’. A sordid, base, example of monumental hypocrisy which only the powerful or the crooked imagine they can get away with. And only the powerful or the gullible

tolerate.  But more profoundly what Partygate exposes for all to see is a stupefying culture of entitlement that runs like a scab through a privileged, Oxbridge-educated elite that rules the

land.  To recap: one of the most powerful mandarins in Whitehall sends out a breezy invitation by email to 100 colleagues inviting them to a Bring Your Own Booze party at Number 10 to ‘

make the most of the lovely weather’. Martin Reynolds, Johnson’s principal private secretary, is a former British ambassador, an Oxford and Cambridge-educated City lawyer and a recipient of

a CMG: the Most Distinguished Order of St Michael and St George, a chivalric honour in the personal gift of the sovereign.  Outside the Downing Street bubble the rest of the country is

commanded to observe strict lockdown rules enacted by the Prime Minister. People are dying alone because the Prime Minister says so. Grandparents must gaze at their grandchildren through a

window. And so on. There are enough individual stories of hardship to fill a Doomsday book.  What do we imagine went on? Did Reynolds pop in to see the PM and ask: “I thought we’d invite the

team round for drinks boss, you know, to thank them for all their hard works” What did the boss say? “Good idea Martin”. Or perhaps Reynolds sent out the invitation for drinks in the PM’s

garden without asking him. No doubt Sue Gray will tell us.  But just think about this for a minute: Two of the most powerful men in the country tasked with protecting its citizens at a time

of great peril, men who live and breathe Covid, who make the rules, do not stop to think: “Hang on a minute. We can’t do this. What if we get found out?” Not the man with a Masters in law or

the man in Number 10 or the spin doctors who now have to clean up the mess.  Johnson admitted in Parliament today that he did attend the party. But he did so to thank staff and it was

therefore a work event. With his wife. Oh dear, oh dear.  This is Johnson’s scandal. He enabled it. His footloose style has freed his ministers and officials (including Cummings) from the

obligations not just of power but of the ordinary citizen.  It isn’t just one rule for them it’s no rules for them. The stench of entitlement, hypocrisy and deceit rises above Britain’s

,seat of government like vapour from an opium den.  But it goes beyond that. Downing Street is one of the most closely guarded sites in the UK. It is crawling with coppers. There are armed

officers at the gate. CCTV monitors the goings on in the garden 24/7.  Unless Johnson had sprinkled fairy dust on the Met’s finest and sent them to sleep the coming and goings, the clink of

wine glasses and the easy laughter on a hot summer’s evening would have not gone unnoticed.  On that very same day police up and down the country were raiding illegal parties. People were

being fined over £1,000 for breaking the lockdown rules. Is this negligence on the part of the Met, is it collusion or is it just “Yes Sir, no sir, three bags full Sir?” This _ is _ a

wake-up call: casual entitlement runs deep, in government, in Whitehall and, it seems, in law enforcement. We shall see if ‘I thought it was a work party” stands up to scrutiny by PC Plod —

assuming he comes calling.  But of course this particular shindig (and the 6 0thers) was not an aberration, a moment of madness by people doing big jobs under extreme pressure. It is part of

a culture that runs through those who govern us.  The grubby PPE VIP hotline which allowed those with access to the powerful to trouser hundreds of millions of pounds in defiance of fair

procurement rules is a particularly egregious example.  The government’s behaviour over Partygate has been foolish and arrogant. But more than that it has shone a light on a deep-seated

cancer at the heart of how this country is run. We live under the illusion that we are a fair and tolerant society and, in many respects, we are. But we are also a deeply inequitable one. 

Johnson so far, got away with it, like one of those bouncing punching bags that pops back up every time you hit it. But his time in the ring is running out. A MESSAGE FROM THEARTICLE _We are

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