Boris on the brink: how Johnson reached the edge of disaster

 https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/dec/12/boris-johnson-on-the-brink-sleaze-partygate-covid

 Several MPs said that Johnson’s weakness was all the greater because he lacked any die-in-the-ditch allies. “He has nobody who will stand for the last bit of hand-to-hand combat. He’s on the field alone. The emperor doesn’t have new clothes. He is just wandering around stark bollock naked,” observed another MP.

“I’ve got members, my colleagues are saying they’ve got members, saying, ‘I voted for Johnson as I thought he was brilliant. I was duped. He’s a clown. He’s got to go.’”

As our Opinium poll shows today, support for Johnson is fast ebbing away. In just a few weeks, a comfortable Tory advantage has turned into a nine-point lead for Labour. One senior Tory MP said that in the current atmosphere he would not be surprised if his party lost. “Boris will be praying that we hang on, so he can get through to Christmas and then regroup. But there is a lot of anger out there. We thought he was an electoral asset. But this is the worst possible time for the Tory party led by Boris to be asking the electorate to keep the faith.”