Vote conservative, get woke leftism.

Not long ago, during the "long march" of Boris Johnson to the premiership, he penned the famous Telegraph piece in which, as I quote below, he describes firstly the nature of free spirited Danes, then seamlessly moves into critical mode for their somewhat non-conservative measure of banning the wearing of the Niqab or Burqa in public.

"If you tell me that the burka is oppressive, then I am with you. If you say that it is weird and bullying to expect women to cover their faces, then I totally agree – and I would add that I can find no scriptural authority for the practice in the Koran. I would go further and say that it is absolutely ridiculous that people should choose to go around looking like letter boxes; and I thoroughly dislike any attempt by any – invariably male – government to encourage such demonstrations of “modesty”, notably the extraordinary exhortations of President Ramzan Kadyrov of Chechnya, who has told the men of his country to splat their women with paintballs if they fail to cover their heads.

If a constituent came to my MP’s surgery with her face obscured, I should feel fully entitled – like Jack Straw – to ask her to remove it so that I could talk to her properly. If a female student turned up at school or at a university lecture looking like a bank robber then ditto: those in authority should be allowed to converse openly with those that they are being asked to instruct. As for individual businesses or branches of government – they should of course be able to enforce a dress code that enables their employees to interact with customers; and that means human beings must be able to see each other’s faces and read their expressions. It’s how we work.

All that seems to me to be sensible. But such restrictions are not quite the same as telling a free-born adult woman what she may or may not wear, in a public place, when she is simply minding her own business.

I am against a total ban because it is inevitably construed – rightly or wrongly – as being intended to make some point about Islam. If you go for a total ban, you play into the hands of those who want to politicise and dramatise the so-called clash of civilisations; and you fan the flames of grievance. You risk turning people into martyrs, and you risk a general crackdown on any public symbols of religious affiliation, and you may simply make the problem worse. Like a parent confronted by a rebellious teenager determined to wear a spike through her tongue, or a bolt through her nose, you run the risk that by your heavy-handed attempt to ban what you see as a bizarre and unattractive adornment you simply stiffen resistance.

The burka and the niqab were certainly not always part of Islam. In Britain today there is only a tiny, tiny minority of women who wear these odd bits of headgear. One day, I am sure, they will go.

The Danes swim starkers in the heart of Copenhagen. If The Killing is to be believed, their female detectives wear Faroe sweaters on duty, as is their sovereign right. If Danish women really want to cover their faces, then it seems a bit extreme – all the caveats above understood – to stop them under all circumstances. I don’t propose we follow suit. A total ban is not the answer."

These are the words of someone who understands conservatism and its related liberties and responsibilities. What is more the words seriously irritated the woke left, even though he was defending the same liberties that those woken types claim to represent.

Sensing his willingness to pursue conservative policy, MP's and Conservative Party members chose Mr. Johnson as their new leader, and we confirmed their choice by electing him to the premiership with a handsome victory for his party at the recent general election.

Since then we have had the corona virus pandemic, and he has chosen to apply ever increasing strictures not only on what we wear or not in public, how long we can stay out at night (yes a curfew!), how many people we can meet at any one time, what we can say or write and publish... the list of authoritarian edicts issued by this PM is never ending and gets more outlandish by the day... And all under the powers that he granted himself without any thorough parliamentary scrutiny.

The whole thing has been delivered with attached threats that we accepted on the basis that this was an emergency situation. However, as the pandemic ebbed so the restrictions should have ended, and since it failed to save lives any more effectively than some very different policies around the world that did not close nations down and ruin the lives of the continuing healthy majority, any rises in covid morbidity (which has not happened yet) should be looked at in a different way.

The solution as so far applied, does not account for continuing covid "seasons" and the effect that if the sort of measures applied in March are applied again will have on millions of ordinary folk.

In short, he needs to re-examine his conservative principals and relate them to his deeds, which bear no resemblance to conservatism whatsoever.

We should not be forced to walk around looking like letter boxes with a bandage on, any more than we should ban those ladies that want to. The evidence against any benefit that can be derived from their use is just as weak as the evidence that wearing a niqab or burqa is oppressive or even beneficial to those that continue to do so.

Come on Boris, be a conservative!