Standing in for Mark Littlewood, Andrew Allison, Head of Campaigns of Popular Conservatism looks back at a week where trust in politics and politicians has reached a new low. 

In June 1972, five men were caught breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C. The men were linked to Pres. Nixon’s re-election campaign and over the next two years journalists (notably Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein of The Washington Post), the FBI, and a Senate committee uncovered the truth.  

The smoking gun that brought Nixon down was a tape which revealed that he tried to use the CIA to obstruct the FBI’s investigation. The game was up, and Nixon eventually fell on his sword in August 1974.  

The moral of the story is that the cover-up was worse than the crime. One would think that politicians would have learned that lesson a long time ago, but the revelations this week prove once again that (to paraphrase a character from Eugene O’Neill’s play, ‘A Moon for the Misbegotten’), there is no present or future - only the past, happening over and over again now.  

In February 2022, a Royal Marine emailed various contacts to check if Afghans on a list were suitable for relocation to the UK. It was supposed to be a short list, but instead a huge spreadsheet was shared with tens of thousands of names on it – around 100,000 when family members are included. But no-one at the time knew that the error had occurred. It wasn’t until 18 months later, when a member of the public emailed the then Armed Forces Minister to alert him, that ministers became aware of the cock up and the Government went into panic mode.  

The then Conservative Government sought a super injunction to not only prevent the public from finding out about the leak, but to make sure that we didn’t find out about the tens of thousands of Afghans being moved here under the cloak of secrecy.  

The safety of those Afghans who assisted our armed forces is, of course, important, and questions must be asked as to why these people hadn’t been relocated earlier. We knew that they had targets on their heads. We knew that the Taliban would love nothing more than to torture and kill them and their families.  

But the story gets worse. Johnny Mercer, the former Veterans Minister, wrote in the Telegraph that, for reasons he cannot fathom, “the Ministry of Defence has tried at every turn to cut off those from Afghan special forces units from coming to the UK” and “the net result of this spectacular cluster is that we’ve let into this country thousands with little or tenuous links to the UK, and still some Afghan special forces we set up the bloody schemes for remain trapped in Afghanistan, Pakistan or worse, Iran.” 

I understand why the Government wanted a temporary media blackout whilst the Ministry of Defence gathered and safely relocated those Afghans who fought bravely with us, but that was not the purpose of the super injunction. Its purpose was to save the Government’s blushes. Ministers and civil servants were more interested in saving their own skins than they were in saving the lives of Afghans who fought with us, as highlighted by Mercer.  

This super injunction was in place for two years and for half of that time we have had a Labour Government. Both Labour and the Conservatives are explicit in this cover-up. Labour is attempting to put the blame firmly on the Conservatives, but that will not wash with voters. The injunction was convenient for them, too. Nor is the harsh criticism of former ministers such as Robert Jenrick and Suella Braverman justified. They could not have blown the whistle and revealed that there was an injunction in place. They could have gone to prison for doing so.  

For the Conservative Party, this could be an existential moment. Not that it is any better for Labour, either. This omnishambles of a Government is driving us off a cliff edge. Unemployment up. Inflation up. Taxes up. Spending up. The only thing that isn’t going up is trust in politicians and in the political process which is at the lowest level it has been in my lifetime. Just when I thought that it couldn’t get any lower, this happens. 

This has been a sorry week for politics, but it highlights why PopCon’s mission is vital and it is a reason why I have some hope for the future, because the institutional changes we are campaigning for are striking a chord with the British public who are sick and tired of government via Quangos, civil servants, committees and judges. Although at this rate we are going to need ‘Starkey on Steroids’ to get us out of this mess!  

Keep fighting for freedom!