A zombie government? We should be so lucky.
All summer long, and it’s been a long, long summer, we have been told that Boris Johnson and his ministers are the undead, staggering around Whitehall, doing their expenses and checking Expedia, as the dog-days of a disgraced administration dwindle to dust.
In fairness, however, zombies seem pretty clear in their priorities (eating people) and go about it with admirable vim and vigour (particularly those scary, superfast ones). There seems little apparent confusion among the zombie community over lockdown rules or the need for legal reviews or leadership contests.
In any case, our new prime minister will be announced tomorrow lunchtime after being chosen – as seems perfectly normal in a functioning liberal democracy – by an absolutely representative 0.29% of the population, a tiny sliver of voters, who happen to be almost all white, of the right, and north of 50.
Barring the biggest turn-up since Johnson’s last Downing Street party, Liz Truss will be in Balmoral on Tuesday to get sworn in by the Queen before moving into Number 10 to finally address an economic crisis that becomes more terrifying with every day that passes.
The experts’ projections, particularly around energy bills, are so astronomical, so catastrophic, that it is hard to contemplate the scale of the onslaught ahead. Of course, those most at risk, the most vulnerable, must be our priority but if annual energy bills are really to hit £6,000 next year, the utter devastation will not be limited to our poorest postcodes.
We can only wish Truss well as she begins her time in Downing Street but she has done nothing to dispel concern about her character and capabilities in recent weeks in what would have been a ludicrously protracted, self-indulgent leadership contest at any time never mind when the country teeters on the brink.
There are many things that should never be forgiven or forgotten about Johnson’s time in office but the recent weeks of rudderless drift as the Tory party talked to itself while flames flickered around our economy, is arguably the most disgraceful of all.
Meanwhile, in Scotland, our first minister has spent the summer travelling to Denmark to open the Scottish Government’s “Nordic Office” before, back in Scotland, squeezing past the mounds of strike-bound rubbish on the Royal Mile for her series of gigs on the Fringe.
We should perhaps be comforted by it all. If our politicians don’t seem to be taking the looming storm too seriously then perhaps the lowering sky isn’t so dark after all. As Hemingway had it: “Isn’t it pretty to think so”.
We report today how Nicola Sturgeon has told her MSPs that, despite giving some observers the impression that she is increasingly fed-up and inching towards the exit, she is going nowhere, that she has seen off Johnson, his predecessor and will see off his successor too. However, given the state of the Tories and the difficulties ahead, she may only need to wait months not years for the removal vans to arrive at Number 10 again.
If not already, our new prime minister may very soon better understand the old saying about being careful what you wish for. The rest of us can only be careful who we vote for. Whenever, that is, we are given the chance.
Meanwhile, as the sun rises, Johnson, dishevelled and dust-caked, will lurch zombie-like from the rubble and ruin, and order breakfast. A new dawn breaks.
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