This is a “worth reading even if it is long” recap of the Cummings story by Politicians.eu’s daily email.
If you get the free daily email there are many links to additional parts of the story.
QUOTE
SO IT’S ONE RULE FOR THEM? Boris Johnson will chair a tense bank holiday Cabinet meeting this morning with the Tory Party in a state of near-mutiny over his decision to stand by lockdown-flouting aide Dominic Cummings. The prime minister will gather his senior ministers via Zoom to agree a further tweaking of lockdown restrictions in the coming weeks, with Johnson planning to update the nation — and, he hopes, change the narrative — at another must-see press conference tonight. The PM’s most senior aides have canceled planned leave and flooded what was a pretty empty half-term news grid with attention-grabbing lockdown stories, starting with last night’s rushed-out announcement on schools. But trouble is still bubbling up from below, with Tory MPs from every wing of the party reporting abject rage from their constituents — and letting their whips know in no uncertain terms. This is not going away anytime soon.
Quick recap: Multiple conversations with Tory MPs and ministers reveal six key points of concern this morning about Cummings’ actions and the way this episode has been handled by No. 10.
First — the drive to Durham: The central charge is a willingness to ignore what we all thought was clear and unequivocal “stay at home” guidance for symptomatic people, and to have risked spreading the virus at motorway services, petrol stations or anywhere else a family of three traveling 260 miles may have needed to stop along the way. A senior government official last night insisted Cummings had not broken any rules — but refused once again to say whether he stopped off anywhere on the long drive to Durham. You all saw Transport Secretary Grant Shapps fail to answer this same question on TV yesterday. It’s going to be asked again and again.
Second — a day trip to Barnard Castle? The same government official also refused to confirm or deny whether Cummings did indeed make a separate lockdown-flouting 30-mile road trip from Durham to the beauty spot of Barnard Castle on his wife Mary Wakefield’s birthday in mid-April; and again, you all saw Boris Johnson fail to answer this same question on TV last night. Sky News reports this morning that the “distinctive” car number plate noted down by the local man who spotted Cummings at Barnard Castle does indeed match up with “a car Mr Cummings has got into in the past.” The Mirror and the Guardian say a complaint has been filed to the police.
Third — the PR operation: One MP cited the “arrogance” of Spectator journo Mary Wakefield’s decision to publish on April 23 what now looks to have been a pretty misleading version of the Cummings’ family life in lockdown, leaving her employer — a proud Tory institution with 300 years of history under its belt — looking a little daft when the truth came out. (It was notable the Speccie was the first right-leaning publication to publish a furious opinion piece headlined “Why Dominic Cummings must go” after the story broke.) And the knee-jerk reaction on Friday night for “a friend” of Cummings to brief accommodating journos that he “isn’t remotely bothered” by this story went down like a cold cup of sick among almost every Tory MP Playbook has spoken to, given the sensitive context and the serious impact the revelations are having upon party and government alike.
Fourth — the changing story: Equally enraging for Tory MPs has been No. 10’s failure to agree upon a credible story that ties in with what most people understood the lockdown guidance to be; and indeed with the police’s own version of events. The decision to exploit a loophole about exceptional circumstances for people unable to care for vulnerable people looks barely credible on the face of it, given thousands and thousands of parents have been in this exact same position but managed to stay at home, and given Cummings was well enough at the time to drive 260 miles across the country. Crucially, of course, there may be extenuating circumstances here we don’t know about — but if so, No. 10 is point-blank refusing to say. And so the questions continue.
Fifth — the impact on public health: It was pretty jaw-dropping to watch the unfortunate Grant Shapps being asked to effectively rewrite vital public health advice on the hoof as he was given the impossible task of answering journalists’ questions over the weekend. Asked if symptomatic people were now allowed to get in their cars and go and isolate near to their families, Shapps said: “You have to get yourself sort of locked down and do that in the best and most practical way. And that will be different for different people under whatever circumstances their particular family circumstances happen to dictate.” You may not have seen that one on a government poster last month.
Sixth — the damage to the Tory Party: Politically, this is the most worrying charge of all for many Tory MPs, and the one that Keir Starmer is clearly going to be hanging around this government’s neck every week forever more — that it’s “one rule for them, and another for the rest of us.” One rule for a Westminster elite, and another for the rest who are missing their families, worrying about their children, mourning their dead from afar. As Nigel Farage will tell you, this is one of the most potent attack lines in modern politics — and it looks like Cummings has handed it to his opponents on a plate.
END QUOTE