Maundy Thursday in the time of Johnson

Oh what a tangled web they weave, when first they practise to deceive

Maundy Thursday is the day that the poor elderly receive specially minted coins from the monarch. It is a quaint British custom when the Head of State shows humility by treating all people as equals. Yesterday, the frail Queen was no longer able to carry out the task so the Prince of Wales took on the Royal duty of dispensing the handouts at St Gerges Chapel in Windsor. Whether it was a coincidence that Harry and Meghan dropped by on Maundy Thursday for a secret visit is anyone's guess. 

Meanwhile and elsewhere the whole concept of humility and treating people equally was turned on its head by the Johnson Government.

Asylum seekers who have battled their way across the channel are to be offshored to Rwanda, where they will be 'processed'. Priti Patel announced the new initiative from Kigali in Rwanda where she indulged in one of her fantasies, exporting asylum seekers, or economic migrants as she calls them, as far as possible from the UK at whatever it costs with not an ounce of humility or humanity as she mangled her vocabulary under African skies. 

As mainland Europe absorbed 4.7 million Ukrainian refugees, Priti Patel and the Home Office, through the deterrent of their visa scheme, had kept the number of refugees down to just 1200 in the UK by April 8. What a world-beating miserablist country we live in.

An inflation rate of 7%, soon to rise by 10% as the cost of gas increases by 28% kicks in. This together with the increase in national insurance contributions, food inflation resulting from Brexit, transport costs and the Ukrainian war means that we have prices rising faster than at any time since 1992.  What has Chancellor Rishi Sunak done? Very little other than promising a tax reduction in two years before the next election and writing off £11.8bn of fraud resulting from his ill-thought-out pandemic measures.   

The government has also let P&O Ferries get away with sacking 800 ferry crew to be replaced by Indian workers paid less than the minimum wage. The fact that the ships are all registered in Cyprus, Bermuda and the Bahamas seems to have convinced the government that the lack of notice given by P&O Ferries to the UK authorities and a failure to consult with the workforce doesn't allow prosecution. What is the point of Grant Shapps? Surely, the government should be making laws to prevent this sort of levelling down. 

There is little surprise that two more Tory MPs have been banished as sexual predators. David Warburton, MP for Somerset and Frome, has been suspended for sexual harassment and drug-taking whilst Imran Ahmad Khan, MP for Wakefield, has resigned after being found guilty of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy. With the local election approaching, Tory candidates have churned out leaflets that make no reference that they are in the same party or attended the parties with the PM. They know that his cabinet of charlatans that are scuttling the country faster than the Graf Spee. 

Despite the Prime Minister and the Chancellor being fined for attending parties during the lockdown, the latest opinion polls show that 57% of the public think Johnson and Rishi Sunak should resign. In the House of Entitlement, Tory MPs are clamouring to keep Johnson as PM because there are no electable candidates to replace him and "he has shown leadership in Ukraine". This is a reference to his jolly with President Zelensky to obtain a photoshoot at the weekend. What a Wally, the PM has chutzpah that exudes his every ignoble intent.