JAMIE STONE: Word on the street is let’s get this election over and done with!
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Another day another scandal. This time it’s William Wragg, the vice chair of the famous 1922 Committee.
When I showed my wife the story on my phone this morning, her eyes widened. “Did you know about any of this?”
I confessed that I was just as surprised as the next person.
It wasn’t always like this. In the old days, scandals were like buses. You waited ages for one to break and then they all came at once. So it seems to be in recent times in the so-called “Mother of Parliaments”, Westminster.
“Very quiet this morning, Mr Stone.” So quipped Andy, the very nice doorkeeper, as I made to enter the chamber of the House of Commons just before the Easter break.
I knew what he meant. Yes, we have righteous indignation about what is happening in Gaza. Yes, we have extraordinary debates over the government’s proposals to send illegal refugees to Rwanda. But apart from that, these are dog days. The government is doing very little.
It was very different in the run-up to the December 2019 general election. The previous autumn months had positively seethed and boiled with controversy. Soft Brexit? Hard Brexit? No Brexit? Tories leaving their party and crossing the House... There was never a dull moment.
When Boris Johnson eventually called the general election, with his campaign slogan “Get Brexit Done”, it was like the ultimate crescendo of a huge battle.
We hit the streets running, and I can tell you the electorate had a lot to say. But this time it is so utterly different. It is almost, as some used to say about the Western Front during the First World War, “It’s too quiet...”
As I go about my business this Easter break, hold clinics, talk in the street in Wick, and do my shop in Asda, the sentiment is pretty much the same everywhere I go. “For goodness sake, let’s get the next general election over and done with.”
Whereas in 2019, whichever side you were on, the election was seen to be a necessity – the resolution of a political impasse. This time, there is just an agreed weariness and a wish for political stability and better leadership.
But as we know, the political polls continue to predict a massive change of government. Certainly in Westminster and very probably in Holyrood. There is a collective mood. To use an old political expression, it is time for a change.
So what does Rishi do in this situation? He’s damned if he doesn’t and he’s damned if he does. With the polls showing no change in fortunes for the main political party, it is almost as bad to hold an election in a month’s time as it would be to hold it before his time runs out at the end of this year. I wouldn’t want to be in Downing Street, trying to read the tea leaves.
This takes me to where I began. The scandals.
I had the good fortune, although some would say the bad fortune, of being taught Latin and Roman history for some eight years of my life (my proudest achievement was becoming top in Latin in my second year at Tain Royal Academy).
During the last years of the Roman Empire, when things were beginning to fall apart and the Huns and the Visigoths were getting ever closer to Rome itself, I was taught that the Roman Empire simply became too decadent and ultimately brought about its own collapse.
That is my concluding thought this Easter. Scandals and stasis, and a complete lack of direction with a government that has more than served its time.
Gentle readers, I’m not given to apocalyptic utterings, but I do believe that there is a historical parallel today.
• Jamie Stone is the Liberal Democrat MP for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross.
