The current approach to ‘sleaze’ risks entrenching the cynicism many already feel about politics in general
Anywhere I’ve visited – market towns, Barratt estates, inner cities – and asked strangers their opinions on politics, the answers quickly drift in a predictable direction: politicians are all on the take, they’re in it for themselves, lining their pockets and taking us all for a ride. Politicians are less trusted than advertising executives – only one in seven trusts them to be honest – which is why the guaranteed route to receiving applause from a Question Time audience is to dismiss politicians as “all the same”. Episodes such as the expenses scandal, quite predictably, poured accelerant over an already raging bonfire of cynicism: the number of voters believing MPs put their own interests above all else surged.
If any good emerged from Boris Johnson reportedly declaring he would rather see the “bodies pile high” than lock down the country, it was that we would finally discuss how the government oversaw a pandemic death toll three times higher than the Luftwaffe managed in the blitz. Instead, we are now debating John Lewis curtains. That is not to dismiss the validity of the scrutiny the prime minister is under. A man sacked twice for deceit is a proven and objective liar; a man who, 12 years ago, dismissed his £250,000 second salary from the Telegraph as “chicken feed” clearly enjoys a standard of living most would deem luxurious as intolerable squalor. If a prime minister can receive secret lumps of money from anonymous wealthy donors, the electorate is denied the ability to scrutinise if there are any government rewards for such generosity.
