What makes hypocrisy so destructive is the terrible shamelessness associated with it. In the famous scene in Casablanca, the policeman closes Rick’s Café Americano, saying: “I’m shocked – shocked to see that gambling is going on here.” A croupier approaches: “Your victory sir.” “Oh thanks,” the policeman says, putting the cash in his pocket. “Okay, everyone out!”
It’s a brilliant moment that shows the hypocrite in all his glory – he’s the one who carries on, as if what everyone can clearly see is not happening at all. What you are thinking is not happening. In other words, the hypocrite’s most important asset is a bloody brass neck.
Politics is particularly fertile ground when it comes to displays of complete, misplaced confidence – see for example Liz Truss’s shockingly delusional and unintentionally hilarious book tour. But in terms of pure, weapons-grade hypocrisy, the allegations that have emerged about Tory MP Mark Menzies are top drawer.
The allegation, which Menzies denies, is that he called an associate at midnight last December begging for £5,000, telling him he had been locked in his flat by “some bad people” and This was “life”. “Death” situation. The aide is said to have given Menzies £6,500, which was reimbursed from the Conservative campaign fund.
Leaving aside speculation about what an MP was doing to allegedly put himself in a “life and death” situation that required emergency assistance at three in the morning, the point is that the Conservative Party should Knew about the allegations three months ago.
It was only when the story broke in the Thursday Times, along with other allegations of Menzies’ use of campaign funds, that the government finally decided he should lose the whip. It would be an act of extreme intellectual distortion to reach any conclusion except that the government was simply hoping the whole thing would blow over.
But this did not happen. And during the three months that the government has sat on those allegations, it has spent a large part of that time attacking Labor Party deputy leader Angela Rayner about the sale of a house and a potential outstanding tax bill of £3,500. ,
Under political pressure from Tory MPs, the police have been called in to investigate Rayner, and the Prime Minister was so excited by the prospect of striking Keir Starmer that he was taunting the Labor leader from the despatch box.
At PMQs, the day before Menzies’s allegations became public, when Keir Starmer asked about Truss’s book, the Prime Minister replied, “I would just say that he should spend a little less time reading that book and It should take a little more time.” Deputy Leader’s Tax Advice.”
And here’s the hypocrisy of it all – Sunak could have said these words at PMQs despite knowing that there were far more serious allegations against one of his own MPs, about which – at the time – he did nothing. He also made his comments about “tax advice” while knowing that through the use of “non-dom” status, his wife, the daughter of a billionaire, had significantly reduced her tax bills in the UK. .
Therefore, Sunak is a hypocrite and hypocrisy is not a good look. Consider the latter stages of John Major’s tenure, when he launched his infamous “back to basics” campaign, calling for Britain to return to a shared sense of common decency and traditional family values.
That campaign was doomed by Tory sex scandals, which made the party look not only sleazy, but hypocritical – the government was asking people to do one thing, while secretly the Tories were doing all sorts of other things. It was later revealed that the Major himself was having an affair with his colleague Edwina Curry.
Boris Johnson was also brought down by his outstanding commitment to hypocrisy. There are too many examples to choose from, but perhaps the winning entry is that he imposed a nationwide lockdown, as well as overseeing a packed schedule of Number 10 piss-ups, including suitcases full of alcohol, wall-to-wall vomiting and Nobody was there. Social distancing. It was the hypocrisy of Partygate that did it for him.
The problem hypocrites face is that the moral compass of their wrongdoings is very clear. You shut down the country and had parties. You said back to basics, but secretly you were all in on it. You went after Angie Renner when you knew all about Menzies and did nothing about it. You grumble about other people’s taxes – what about yours?
The shameless hypocrisy of Major and Johnson became a sign that his administration was in its last stages of collapse. And it’s the same with Sunak. Not long to go now. Soon, the casino will be closed and everyone will be thrown out.