The week in politics: Walking ministerial dead
Like government in fast-forward, the coalition has already reached the age of sleaze and decline.
By Ian Dunt
Who will go first? That’s the only question we care about now. The options are endless. It’s a Cabinet of the walking dead. Will they drip away randomly or fall apart at once like some terrible, fleshy Jenga board? Will it be Vince Cable, who has already promised to push the nuclear button? Or perhaps Andrew Lansley, who has been so sidelined he can now only be viewed in two dimensions? Perhaps David ‘two-brain’ Willetts, neither of whose brains realised the political implications of suggesting that rich kids could buy their way into university.
This week, Chris Huhne, Theresa May and Ken Clarke took centre stage, each of them giving us a month’s worth of political scandal and misfortune in the space of an hour. It’s as if the coalition is doing government on fast-forward. The first ministerial resignation came just days after the Cabinet was formed. The U-turns reared their head slowly afterwards. We’re now at the equivalent of the Major sleaze years and it’s only been 12 months. Sure, there are no brown cash-filled envelopes, but there are political scandals every day of the week. Happy first birthday. No more roses.
It seemed difficult to imagine how anything could push Chris Huhne’s catastrophic scandal on speeding tickets and pressured wives off the front pages on Monday morning. The police were looking into it, Huhne was partaking in the worst-ever pre-arranged door-stepping exercise in recent political memory (complete with a half-nod to Laura Kuenssberg followed by aghast confusion at the existence of an unplanned second question). By Tuesday he was “welcoming” the police investigation, as that old adage about a woman scorned once again showed its resonance.
But he was saved by one of those media theatre explosions that can only properly be enjoyed with 24-hour news and a bottle of Chablis. Ken Clarke decided to pop into BBC Radio 5 Live to chat about his criminal justice proposals on Wednesday. The plans could see sentences halved if the suspect offers a guilty plea when he or she is charged. He got lost – “bogged down” to use his words – in a debate on rape and came out of it spectacularly badly. Having discussed “serious” and “proper” rape, the Twittersphere/24-hour news beast suddenly broke its chains and feasted on his bloated, unkempt career.
Within two hours, Ed Miliband had become over-excited and demanded Clarke’s resignation, telling David Cameron: “The justice secretary should not be in his post by the end of the day.” The demand went down well with some sketchwriters, but it made Cameron much less likely to get rid of him and it alienated the very Lib Dem voters Miliband wants to tempt. They remain loyal to Clarke because of his plans for penal reform. By Friday, most commentators had decided that Miliband had wasted a valuable bullet on a poorly-selected target. Next time he makes the big ‘resignation demand’ people will pay less attention.
In a wonderful piece of timing, Clarke was due to appear on Question Time the following evening at – wait for it – Wormwood Scrubs. Bonanza. He managed the event pretty well, refusing to apologise (beyond the default ‘apologising for causing offence’ tactic, obviously) but maintaining the type of sorrowful tone which pretty much put the issue to bed. Still, it was a tough time for the old boy, who got his fingers badly burned. It served to further destabilise him just when the Tory backbenchers would like nothing else but to see his well-fed behind.
Not many people noticed, but Theresa May was simultaneously experiencing what was surely the most humiliating moment of her career. The righteous-indignation-bomb that accompanied Clarke’s comments drowned out the home secretary’s appearance at the Police Federation conference. She sat on stage as chairman Paul McKeever dressed her down, then rose to utter silence, delivered a speech and then sat down again to total silence. It was monstrous. She must have silently breathed a sigh of relief when she left the hall to discover that Ken had distracted everyone with those wonderful loose lips of his.
There was some other news, of course. Two men are going on trial for the murder of Stephen Lawrence, Nick Clegg announced plans for Lords reform, Elliot Morley was jailed for 16 months for his expenses, super-injunctions got some proper attention and the coalition continued to treat NHS reforms like a child custody battle during a messy divorce.
It barely registered. We’re all playing that zombie-movie game now. It’s the news equivalent of figuring out which of the survivors will die first in a zombie flick. It’s political tragedy with an ensemble cast and a laughter track.
