COVID-19: ‘I Have No Fear for the Stability of the UK Government’ – Political Commentator

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been urged to hand over power temporarily if he does not recover quickly after being hospitalised with COVID-19 late on Sunday. The advice comes from Bob Kerslake, a former head of the civil service, who suggested that Dominic Raab the so-called ‘designated survivor’ should take over at No 10 if necessary.

Political Commentator Henry Bolton OBE, has shared his views on the matter.

Sputnik: Boris Johnson has been urged to hand over power temporarily if he fails to recover quickly from the Coronavirus. Henry; what are your initial thoughts on the situation Johnson finds himself? Can we expect Boris Johnson to go through with these suggestions and temporarily hand over power?

Henry Bolton: I think there are two levels to this. One is the personal level and Boris Johnson has been working incredibly hard on behalf of the nation to try and steer us through this crisis and I think the first thing is that we need to sort of wish him Godspeed and rapid recovery. It's a difficult thing for anybody to have to go through particularly with his partner also suffering from the virus. I wish him well for his own sake for that of his family and for the nation but what we're talking about here really is the politics and the institutional side of it.

The UK has a very well established and resilient form of government and the cabinet system in the UK is also incredibly resilient and has a great depth of support, administrative institutional support around that, as well as some competent ministers. I have no fear for the stability of government or the ability of the Conservative government to continue to be able to manage this crisis in an appropriate and effective manner.

Sputnik: If Johnson goes ahead with this advice, what effect will this have on his leadership both as Prime Minister but also within the party?

Henry Bolton: No. As I'm trying to say the prime minister will still be giving direction. He is still the Prime Minister and this isn't a situation where officially he's handing over the Prime Ministerial office to somebody else. That's not happening. It's not like in the American system where if the President is incapacitated, the Vice President takes over. Of course, there is a succession in the UK but we're nowhere near that point yet.

If that occurs then I'm sure the country will be briefed accordingly by whichever minister in the Cabinet and it probably would be Dominic Rabb but we're not there yet. I don't know that he's being advised to hand everything over. If he is then that is actually news to me. I think we're simply not there yet. He's still in for tests as far as I'm concerned.

Sputnik: Whilst this move makes a lot sense from both a medical and political point of view; are there any other options that the Prime Minister or Government could undertake to ultimately protect the health of Boris Johnson but ensure he still remains PM?

Henry Bolton: I think that everything is being done. Of course, all the stops will be pulled out for Boris, as for anybody else to preserve life and to make sure that somebody whoever it is recovered effectively from this infection if they've indeed got it. Our system of government is such that there is a lot of delegation, the ministers, the secretaries of state have a great deal of authority as to how they run their different government departments and of course they've already been briefed on the policy framework that the Prime Minister wishes to see but he's not directing every affair of state at the moment of government.

That is done by the ministers in the cabinet, the day to day work supported by the civil servants, so even if you remove the Prime Minister out of the equation for a little while or he's less able to be directly involved, the system still functions in an entirely effective way. So, I have no fear for that whatsoever. I think we absolutely rock solid on that now as we were a month ago.