Published on 10 July 2022

I had the top ‘Reader’s Letter’ published by the Daily Telegraph on 9 June 2022, occasioned by an email to all Tory party members by the Supreme Leader, telling us all the things that weren’t in the 2019 Manifesto that were now going to happen, and avoiding mention of everything in that manifesto that was now not going to happen.

Incensed, I reached for the keyboard.

Here is the pre-edits version, in case you cannot get behind the paywall…

‘Bemused Conservative Party members received an email from Johnson on Tuesday headed ‘My plan to deliver’, and addressed to his supposed supporters. It is a windy and imprecise laundry list of aims and platitudes out of which, one fears, will emanate many more measures not supported by the supporters to whom he lays claim.

A simple rule-of-thumb should be applied:
1. if it was in the 2019 Manifesto, do it, and quickly, and in the most trenchant form
2. if it was not in the 2019 Manifesto, do not do it, or anything like it

If the Prime Minister cannot see his way clear to doing what he was elected to do, he should clear the way for someone else to do it.’