Tim Parker resignation overshadows Johnson's dismissal of broken society narrative

Boris Johnson yesterday casually dismissed the chiefly Conservative notion of a broken society and demoralised youth as "piffle" in his Telegraph column, referencing the success of Britain's young athletes. While it would appear obvious that celebrating Olympic success hardly requires denying that social breakdown can exist on a large scale alongside it, Johnson was explicit:

"If you believe the British press, the youth of today is aimless, feckless and hopeless, addicted to their PlayStations, lacking in respect and lacking in the emotional discipline needed to cope with a big match occasion.

"If you believe the politicians, we have a broken society, in which the courage and morals of young people have been sapped by welfarism and political correctness.

"And if you look at what is happening at the Beijing Olympics, you can see what piffle that is."

Johnson has faced conflict with Conservative leaders in the past, with both William Hague and Michael Howard facing flak when Johnson's journalism contradicted the party line. In each case, the damage appeared inadvertent. On this occasion, some of today's press did pick up on the comments after they resurfaced on journalists' blogs yesterday afternoon. But the potential conflict with David Cameron's message was largely overshadowed by the resignation yesterday of the Mayor's deputy Tim Parker.

1pm Addressing Demos for his speech on Fairness, George Osborne was asked about Boris Johnson's comments. To the obvious scepticism of some present, He replied Johnson had made clear his words had been completely misinterpreted, and that Johnson completely agrees with David Cameron. He said that he and Cameron also agree with Boris Johnson that young people need role models.

Comments

[Norm Brainer]

What's your point?
You want it to not be overshadowed and try and make it look like there's trouble that isn't there like the guardian would?

Of course it's piffle that society (that doesn't exist) is definitvely broken, but there are parts that are.
If a part of your car breaks you can still say that you are "fixing your broken car" without implying every part of it ist kaput.

[Tam Large]

What piffle this article is...

Boris was celebrating the commitment, endurance, and indomitable spirit within our young people, using the Olympic athletes as shining examples. Our youth needs encouragement and the knowledge that with effort they CAN break through to greatness and achievement. That is what Boris was doing, in his usual idiosyncratic way. Well done Bozza!

[Charlie Elphicke]

The work done by IDS in the last few years could really transform our country. It is important and will be a strong element of the work I would hope to be part of should I ever hold office.

The paper released by George Osborne yesterday was a complete tour de force. I know he's good, but even so I was shocked at the compulsion and excellence of the analysis.

Uniting the country (including North & South), making us economically and socially stronger in a Britain everyone can be part of is not just clicheed rhetoric. It is a key plank of the change that the country needs.

That said, I'm not sure if Boris' words have been correctly interpreted. We should all wish Boris the best of luck and success in running London.

[Tony Makara]

What I sense coming from Boris is a message of hope in a sea of doom and gloom. He is quite right too, we see the social problems that blight our society in the shape of drunken youths, stabbings, alienation and the like, all very real, but our focus on the negative so often leads us away from the positive. The vast majority of young people in our society are decent and have moral centre of gravity, they respect the law, respect their neighbours, respect themselves and don't do drugs or drink to dangerous levels. We must continue to address the social problems that do exist, but also remember that the vast majority of the young are people we can be proud of.

[onenationtory]

Is he not allowed to express an opinion of his own any more? We always wring our hands when Brown slaps people down for epxressing an honest opinion... He has his own mandate and is entitled to his own point of view.

With regard to Tim Parker - jeez - Boris appers to have been exceptionally ill-prepared for the job!

[The Rifle]

Actually Boris contradicted one of the Party's main messages, calling Cameron's view that society is broken "piffle".

What worries me is that anyone in his team with an ounce of sense would have told him to re-phrase or scrap that part of the DT article.

Are there any Tories in Boris' team?

[Tony Dixon]

I think it was all a sycophantic plot for Boris and David Cameron to get in the Team GB cycling team!!

Tam - its nice to see you on this blog.

Did I tell you that when it looked into matters relating to Howard Flight the 1922 committee found that:

The matter should have been referred to the Ethics and Integrity Committee.

There was a denial of natural justice to Howard Flight.

The Chief Whip did not have the power to conclude that Howard Flight had brought the party into disrepute and withdraw the whip.

Therefore it seems the withdrawal of the whip was unconstitutional.

I suspect this means that all events following the action of the chief whip, including the selection of a new candidate, were unconstitutional and possibly unlawful.

It appears the party has decided
to let the matter stand as an example of it approach to ethics and integrity!

[Malcolm Dunn]

Both Boris and Cameron are correct. Britain at its best is still very, very good as our Olympic athletes show but at its worst its awful as the drunk and feckless show throughout our country.
I wish Boris would not write for the Telegraph, he tries to be oh so amusing and it leads to stories like this one.His 'job'as Mayor should be full time.
As regards Parker, does anyone know the real story yet?

[Dorian Grape]

Cheer up. Here’s some good news from where it might not be expected in a review, yesterday, of Boris Johnson’s performance to date.

‘Inevitably, there have been some stumbles in the transition between mayors but Boris is already showing he is his own man with strong views on how to improve London and with a real feel for Londoner’s needs and aspirations. He has already brought rigour and verve to the job. He is building a strong team and he and they are willing to listen and respect the political mandates that the boroughs have.

Now that has to be a change for the better.’

http://www.publicservice.co.uk/

The piece even highlights:

‘Indeed, the Mayor’s (Livingstone) empire-building culture in City Hall had so outgrown a building intended for 450 that by the end it housed over 750 functionaries, with more in nearby offices.’

Functionaries? From Public Servant?

[London Tory]

Over the last couple of days the Left has started to highlight the highly tenuous link between Team GB's success, and the merits of public spending in general.

Stand by for a Labour Conference announcement on a New Deal For Olympians. or maybe a Sure Start for Athletes.

As for Boris, we should all just be pleased that what Conservative politicians say actually matters these days. We were totally ignored for 8 years.

[RichardJ]

"If you believe the British press, the youth of today is aimless, feckless and hopeless, addicted to their PlayStations, lacking in respect and lacking in the emotional discipline needed to cope with a big match occasion"

A lot of them are!

Most of the ones I know aren't but then I don't live on an inner city estate.

[Annabel Herriott]

Some NUlab hack has pored over BJ's article looking for bits it can re - interpret to suit the guardianista agenda. Doesn't take much fisking of the nulab stuff to spot it either.
BJ was not running DC down, he was making some valid comments about the youth that has and is doing something right.

[Ulster Tory]

If you believe the British press, the youth of today is aimless, feckless and hopeless, addicted to their PlayStations, lacking in respect and lacking in the emotional discipline needed to cope with a big match occasion."

As a 17 year old, I don't need to read that in the paper to know that alot of it is true. Although it doesn't apply to a majority, it applies to a concerning amount.

"If you believe the politicians, we have a broken society, in which the courage and morals of young people have been sapped by welfarism and political correctness."

Again, that is quite true - for a concerning amount of young people. Alot of the youth of today, think of themselves and what can be done for them first.

Despite being a huge Boris fan, I feel he could have expressed his viewpoint differently - that we should be encouraging, helping and inspiring the younger generations in a way that our young athletes were.

Malcom Dunn summarises this correctly in my opinion when he says, "Both Boris and Cameron are correct. Britain at its best is still very, very good as our Olympic athletes show but at its worst its awful as the drunk and feckless show throughout our country." We need to be encouraging people to be like the best, not doing the old leftie trick of forcing the best to become as bad as the worst in the name of "equality".

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

I think it's healthy for the Conservative Party and for politics in general that Boris and David do not always sing for the same hymn sheet. Let's not forget that Boris's employer is the London electorate, not CCHQ.

For what it's worth, I think Boris was saying, 'When Britain's good it is very good and when it poor...'

Essentially, I think Boris was looking on the bright side and, echoing a certain American, in basically saying, 'it can be done'. I doubt Cameron would disagree with that. Let's all be positive and invest hope in tomorrow's adults.

Sadly, this is another example of ConHome making a mountain out of a molehill.

[ACT]

Society isn't 'broken', it's merely imperfect, much as it always has been and always shall be. Telling the lie that 'society is broken' rightly discredits those who mouth it.

[Nicholas Keen]

The question remains whether Johnson has the potential to supplement his undoubted skills as a writer, media personality and bon vivant with the inspiring leadership and management skills he needs to master his current job. A somewhat rocky start.

[JS]

Whether 'Society' is broken or not it should be left alone from interfering nannying politicians. If being Conservative means anything it means believing in individual freedom for people to live how they want with any Government telling them what to do. A lesson, I'm afraid, that the present leadership has not learnt.

[London Tory]

Boris justified his return to the Telegraph by saying that he writes his column at the weekend. The trouble is that its impact is felt all week.

[Richard Nabavi]

Look, everyone knows that trying to keep Boris 'on-message' is like trying to herd cats. No great surprises there, and in any case his article, taken as a whole, was fine. No great story here, I think.

[Tony Makara]

Youth is not inherently bad, but youth is easily open to impression, to influence, to bad ideas, negative role models and so on. The influence of these factors is compounded by peer pressure and a situation develops in which the victims of a decadent media culture become the agents of a decadent culture, spreading theses destructive traits among their own circle.

How often in contemporary films characters are seen casually taking drugs, casually engaging in promiscuity and casually engaging in random violence, even to the point of torture. Listen to the lyrics of many modern pop songs, so many of the messages are destructive, often disguised by a catchy tune or an attractive performer. It is true that not all the younng are given over to imitating the decadent lifestyles, both real and ficticious, portrayed in films and pop culture. However enough are influenced as to still present a problem. When David Cameron spoke about making the music industry clean up his act, I saw a man who was brave enough recognize that there is a problem, the same goes for Michael Gove and his critique of 'lad mag' culture. Thank heavens that there are politicians who will speak out, remember moralizing is not a dirty word, it means standing up for what is moral, what is right.

Boris is right to promote the positive, most of our youth are good, model citizens, however we need to bring those thast are 'lost' back into the mainstream. That means cleaning up the media culture that is leading so many astray.

[ugh]

Ugh. Can we have a new Tory Mayor? If he stepped down, would we have to have an election, or could one of the remaining deputies do it?

[david1]

The concept of a 'broken society' is an absurd one. The vast majority of people in this, (or any country) do not cause problems. Unfortunately there will always be a small minority who do; even more unfortunately that small minority will get more than its fair share of attention.

As for Parker,it is obvious that Boris is so scared of Crow, that he was terrified that Parker was looking for confrontation, Parker had to go!

[Sally Roberts]

I am normally a huge Boris fan but what the **** is going on here! He seems to have gone off the rails somewhat!!

[passing leftie]

This is a welcome antidote to the slow drip of anti-British poison from the Tories decrying our youth and the strength of British society, despite record drops in crime and high levels of employment.

I live in the inner city and the problem isn't youths; if there is a problem, it is peoples' fear of them.

Perhaps Cameron and his privleged cronies can start praising our youth instead of knocking them at every opportunity.

[Ulster Tory]

Passing leftie actually makes a good point. Suppose there had to be a first time...

Most youths aren't of the type that the media concentrate on. But enough of them are to be a concern. Maybe DC should take this into consideration and express that explicitly in his speeches rather than say society in general is broken. Parts of it are.

[Londoner]

I read the Telegraph article yesterday and commented to my wife last night that it was interesting that Boris had gone out of his way to rubbish a phrase that was all Cameron's own, "the broken society". There is no way that it could not have been deliberate.

I am totally on Boris's side on this one. A "broken society" is an example of a nice sound-bite which is complete piffle. I think the intention is to equate it with the "broken economy" of the 1970s that Mrs Thatcher dealt with but, just as the total economy was not broken then, nor is the whole of "society" "broken" now. Sure, there are social problems to be addressed but this pessimistic mantra should be ditched.

Not that Olympic success has got much to do with it either way. If some people think that it is a good use of public money to "buy" Olympic gold medals for elite athletes, won largely apparently by private educated young people, then that might actually be part of the problem of warped priorities rather than the solution. This is ameliorated by the thought that maybe it's just lottery money. In which case, like most of the middle classes (and indeed the allegedly public school educated beneficiaries), I rarely buy lottery tickets so it is not my money. Perhaps it is a case of the masses buying their own circuses to go with their beer!

[Colin]

Passing Leftie,

"I live in the inner city and the problem isn't youths; if there is a problem, it is peoples' fear of them."

I'm surprised you mad lefists have the gall Is my grandmother, a frail old lady of 85 irrationally afraid of crime? She has had her handbag stolen in broad daylight (in Kilburn, not very inner city) twice in the last three years. If she didn't obey the de facto curfew imposed upon the elderly by the feral young, and walked out after dark by herself, most would take it as a sign of senile dementia. If she was mugged at night, the police, directly condradicting you, would probably tell her henceforth to stay indoors after dark because it's too unsafe. When I was working at my MP's office this is exactly the type of standard reply I would have to forward on from the police to elderly crime victims in the constituency. It was the most demoralising thing about that rather easy, cushy job; the knowledge that so many people's lives are dominated by a permenant sense of insecurity and there is nobody in authority who is prepared to relieve them from it.

Actually if there's a problem it's leftist liberals such as you who are indifferent almost to the point of sadism.

[Gnosis]

Boris' comments have proved to me that he may have an air of being a big buffoonish and daft but he certainly is not stupid,good on you Boris,remember you are the only tory with real "power" in the land and i like to hear alternative veiws from you instead of the dip feed cchq seves up each day

[Gnosis]

being a bit buffoonish (sorry typo)

[Gnosis]

instead of the drip feed cchq serves up each day (soz again)

[passing leftie]

Actually if there's a problem it's leftist liberals such as you who are indifferent almost to the point of sadism.

Generalising from anecdotes, rather than studying the evidence carefully and reaching is conclusion is a hallmark of Daily Mail-driven policy making. Incidentally, I am sorry your grandmother was mugged.

The "permenant sense of insecurity" which is out of all proportion to the risk is exactly what I was talking about.

[Lifelongtory]

It is time for Boris to make his mind up whether he's a senior Conservative politician and Mayor of London or a journalist who can say with impunity the first thing that comes into his head in order to fill the required number of column inches and keep people reading. I don't think he can credibly do both.