James Millar: Treating and accepting politicians as people would improve government

Two Conservative Party politicians have shown their real (if flawed) human personalities this year, and it’s a good thing, writes James Millar.

If the Conservatives started 2022 with Boris Johnson’s premiership looking a bit rocky courtesy of partygate (that was just a year ago!), then they ended it dashed on the rocks, their poll ratings bottomed out, and any reputation for competence sunk.

And, yet, some in the blue team can afford a smile of quiet satisfaction as the year comes to a close. And it’s not necessarily the obvious candidates.

Sure, Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt have sprung from the dustbin of history to occupy the top two addresses in Downing Street, but both are on borrowed time, with only a torrid, Tory-induced recession and a messy election to look forward to.

The two Tories who emerge from the wreckage of 2022 with reputations enhanced are, in fact, Douglas Ross and Matt Hancock.

In defence of Douglas

Scots Tory leader Ross looked a bit hokey-cokey in the first half of the year. He was among the first to call for Boris Johnson to quit, in light of the litany of partygate allegations, only to backtrack when war broke out in Ukraine.

Yet, his insight and instincts are clearly intact. He may have found a more elegant way of expressing it – and, in his defence, he has two small children; he’s probably not had a proper night’s sleep in four years – but, essentially, he lived up to that Tory claim to get the big calls right.

Once it was clear that Boris Johnson had broken his own lockdown rules, Ross called for him to go. Others swithered ’til the summer. The former position was the correct one. The latter condemned us all to six months more of Johnson’s icky administration, degrading the nation and its politics in the name of personal ambition.

Ross also called it correctly that Ukraine must be supported in the face of unspeakable and unprovoked aggression. He failed to triangulate those positions – that the nation must stand behind Ukraine, but the nation’s PM was no good – but, on both fronts, history already agrees with him.

His reward has been to have his Moray seat disappeared by the boundary commission. Still, even that gives him an out ahead of the general election, without having to deal with the difficulty of defeat.

He can gracefully give way and focus on leading the Holyrood contingent, as he looks to shore up the Tory role as the unionist option, in the face of Nicola Sturgeon’s “de facto referendum” at the next election.

Matt might be trickier to vouch for

Matt Hancock is a harder sell. He had opprobrium heaped on his head when it was revealed he was heading to the jungle for I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here.

Once there, he had gunk and offal heaped on his head, and was fed the unspeakable bits of a variety of animals. He was accused of abandoning his day job and his constituents to take the Ant and Dec dollar.

Hancock’s top-line defence was that he wanted to go on the show to talk up his private members’ bill on dyslexia. He mentioned the topic just twice on air.

But, he also claimed he wanted people to think differently about politicians – to see that they are human. And, on this front, he succeeded in making an important point.

The likes of former Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles spoke about how they had to separate Matt Hancock the politician – who fronted Covid press conferences, and flunked the stress test that experience put him through – with Matt the man he shared a camp with, who mucked in and worked and won for the group. But they are one and the same person.

Matt Hancock is a buffoon and a try-hard and a father and a sport and many other things besides.

We ought to expect our politicians to be more human

Too many people perceive politicians as characters in the great Westminster soap opera, and don’t afford them backstories and personalities. If we deny or overlook the humanity of our representatives, it not only makes it harder to see ourselves in those roles – and that rules out talent that would undoubtedly improve things – but we show a fundamental discourtesy that would be shameful if directed against another random profession.

If we all were more forgiving of the foibles of those who put themselves forward to lead and to serve, then our politics and our culture would be improved. (And our social media wouldn’t know what to do with itself.)

While the likes of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss tried and failed to bend legal or economic reality to their will, Douglas Ross and Matt Hancock reckoned with reality – where decisions are complicated, events are unexpected and compromise with others and ourselves is crucial – and they end 2022 more relatable, more successful, more human.

We ought to expect our politicians to be more human. And they ought to expect us to treat them as such.

James Millar is a political commentator, author and a former Westminster correspondent for The Sunday Post