Rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic?

That was the reshuffle, that was. It was supposed to be Theresa May putting her stamp of authority on her rebellious party, but instead her rebellious party stamped on her. You might have thought that Jeremy Hunt, who is in charge of the flatlining NHS in England, where the only machine that goes beep is the one in his head, would be a prime candidate for a demotion. Or at least a sideways shuffle, which would be considerably more movement than the many patients waiting in Accident and Emergency departments nationwide. However, Jeremy refused to budge, and Mrs M is so politically weak that she couldn’t force him to go. Instead she did a U-turn, retracted and expanded his authority. What was that she was saying about strong leadership? Run it passed me again without breaking sniggering.

Justine Greening decided she’d rather waltz off to the back benches rather than be moved from Education to the DWP. Now she’ll join the ranks of those plotting Theresa’s downfall. And this tells us all we need to know about Conservative priorities; that Theresa May wants to remove the comprehensive supporting and free school sceptic Justine Greening from education whilst she, the PM, was still backing the appointment of Toby Young to the new university watchdog.

You know, that’s the Toby who is in favour of eugenics and selective breeding for higher IQs, who doesn’t like accessibility ramps for disabled children and who has serially tweeted about the size of women’s breasts. Personally I could be in favour of eugenics if it were possible to selectively breed out dickheads like Toby. Thankfully, Toby has just announced his resignation. We can now look forward to a parade of British nationalist journalists publishing columns telling us how terrible it is that Toby is being silenced for his youthful indiscretions, even though he made most of them when he was already a supposedly responsible adult. It’s a dreadful digital inquisition, they'll claim. Not it's not. It's people accurately quoting his own words back at him. This is the man who wrote a scathing review of the film 'I Daniel Blake' claiming that it didn’t ring true because the main character wasn’t like any of the people in Channel 5’s poverty porn programmes. Daily Mail journalists are tweeting that 'political correctness' was sapping public life of talented people. Which would be true, but only if the talent you had in mind was a talent for being offensive and a total wanker. What’s really sapping public life of talented people is the nepotism and cronyism of this government. Toby Young is best pals with Boris Johnson and the Foreign Secretary’s brother, the newly appointed Transport Minister, Jo Johnson. It’s a sign of the utter moral bankruptcy of the Conservative party that Toby Young jumped instead of being pushed. His resignation comes after over 200,000 people signed a petition demanding that he be removed from office. Toby Young has performed one valuable public service though. Just when you thought that Theresa May couldn’t look any weaker or less principled, there comes Toby to prove you wrong. When Mr Young displays a better grasp of ethics than the Conservative party, you know you’ve got a problem. As an aside, did you know that almost 340,000 people have signed a petition demanding that Jeremy Hunt be removed from office? And he's just got a promotion instead. Nice one, Mrs M.

The new appointments signal a shift to the right in a party which has already surrendered what passes for its soul in that direction. After Justine Greening refused the role, Esther McVey was appointed as Head of the Department of Work and Pensions instead, which is like putting the Child Snatcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang in charge of children’s services. A couple of years ago, Esther justified the proliferation of foodbanks in the UK. She thinks it’s only what you should expect. I agree, Esther, it’s only what you should expect when the DWP is leaving people without any means of feeding themselves. It’s only what you should expect when, like Esther, you have consistently voted to reduce benefits and to make life even more difficult for people who are already struggling. She has always voted against raising income tax on people who are paid more than £150,000 though, because it’s only poor people who should shoulder the burden of paying for the bankers’ mistakes. The last time Esther was in charge of the DWP people voted her out of office in the 2015 General Election. We can but hope that history will repeat itself soon.

 

Maybe as a sign of pre-empting trouble ahead, there are reports that Mrs May is also to appoint a minister for no-deal Brexit. The truth is there’s no need for the Prime Minister to appoint a minister for failure because all her cabinet are already doing that job. It’s the only thing that they’re any good at.

Endnote: where is the effective opposition when all this is going on? Why doesn't Labour have a massive lead in the Polls? Mrs M and her crew are offering an open-goal. Back of the net, Jezza, back of the net.