The lady’s not for turning, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher famously told a Conservative Party conference in 1980, when the pressure on her to walk back her policy of liberalising the United Kingdom’s economy mounted, including from her party’s Members of Parliament. Four decades and a bit later, Prime Minister Boris Johnson ~ ‘Bulldog Boris’ to his admirers ~ is showing a great deal of tenacity in hanging on to his post after surviving a no-confidence motion by ruling Conservative Party MPs on Monday night. Out of the 359 Tory MPs, 211 voted in his favour and 148 against him. According to Conservative Party rules, for the no-confidence motion against Mr Johnson to have been carried out, 180 MPs needed to have voted against him. But though he has survived, Mr Johnson has been badly bruised politically by what amounts to a revolt within the party led by Tory backbenchers. Indeed, the betting is he may not last the year. 

That’s because more MPs voted against Mr Johnson than those who did against his predecessor Ms Theresa May who got through a similar no-confidence vote with more support than him, yet had to resign as PM a few months later. Mrs Thatcher, too, went out in a similar fashion, as did her successor Mr John Major. For his critics, “Bumbling Boris”, by hanging on to power despite the evident dissatisfaction with his leadership style among a large number of ruling party MPs, not to mention the Opposition, is further proof that he’s “damaged goods”. 

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While “Partygate” and the subsequent fine imposed on the Prime Minister for attending staff get-togethers at 10 Downing Street in breach of Covid-19 protocols by an independent commission of inquiry was the spark for the no-trust motion, unhappiness among the party rank-and-file at his performance had been building for a while. Though he is credited with delivering Brexit, the mega post-Brexit trade deals that he promised are still a work in progress. On Covid-19, any good work his administration did has been overshadowed by the Partygate scandal. The conflict in Europe has given Mr Johnson an opportunity to make stirring, almost-Churchillian speeches condemning Russia; he’s followed that up by providing British weapons systems to Ukraine and doing his best to drum up international support for Kiev. But many leading Conservatives, while appreciative of his efforts, are sceptical about how much of a vote-catcher the Ukraine war is likely to be. 

But Mr Johnson is unlike any other British Prime Minister. When it comes to brazening things out, it is widely accepted, that he has no peer in contemporary UK politics. Emerging from the vote, Mr Johnson portrayed it as a “distraction” and admonished his fellow Tory MPs – “focus on policy”. He went on to add: “This is a very good result for politics and the country. It’s a convincing result, a decisive result.” The vote was anything but convincing, as precedents show. A win’s a win, however, and Mr Johnson cannot be challenged with another no-confidence motion by Conservative MPs for at least another year. If he lasts that long, that is.