DAN HODGES: As the Honiton by-election approaches, true blue Devon’s farming folk aren’t quite ready to kiss Boris Johnson goodbye
When it was announced Tory MP Neil Parish was resigning after watching porn on his phone in the Commons chamber – while claiming to search for images of tractors – the mood among the staff and customers of The Barber Shop on Tiverton’s high street was one of resignation, rather than shock.
‘Everyone round here was saying, “Why do these things always happen to us?” ’ hairdresser Hette tells me. ‘It was all a bit NFT.’
What does NFT mean? I ask. ‘Well, when local doctors used to fill in prescriptions, they’d write NFT on them. It meant Normal For Tiverton.’
I’m here in this true blue Devon constituency because something distinctly abnormal is happening.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson and George Eustice MP, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs attend the Royal Cornwall Show
Prime Minister Boris Johnson buying a bottle of wine at the Royal Cornwall show at Whitecross near Wadebridge
Prime Minister Boris Johnson during his speech at Blackpool and The Fylde College in Blackpool, Lancashire on June 9
Neil Parish confirmed that he was resigning in an interview with BBC South West over the weekend, blaming his actions on a ‘moment of madness’
In two weeks, the residents of Tiverton and Honiton will elect Parish’s replacement. And the feeling among Boris Johnson’s enemies – and, to be fair, many of his allies – is that the by-election will deliver the blow that terminates his premiership.
One Minister had warned me the by-election being held in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, on the same day ‘is lost’, adding: ‘Our numbers in Tiverton are also looking very bad. If we lose there, it’s over.’
The Tories are defending a 24,000 majority in Devon, and a 3,300 one in Wakefield. I’d been told that anger over the Partygate scandal was driving this Blue Wall insurrection. So how does hairdresser Hette feel about our embattled PM?
‘To be honest, I quite like him,’ she confides. ‘Yes, he broke the rules. But then most of the country did.’
Jeremy Hunt was one of the leading figures in the revolt against Mr Johnson this week
Around the corner, I talk to Geoff, who runs the newsagent. ‘Maybe Boris should have resigned,’ he tells me. ‘Someone else might have done so in that position. But this is a solid Tory area. To be honest, I can’t see it changing much around here.’
The sprawling rural constituency cascades all the way from the wilds of Exmoor down to the rugged Jurassic Coast. But I’m beginning to think reports that it will provide the backdrop to the Prime Minister’s political demise have been overstated.
Then I wander across the pebbled beach that skirts the picturesque fishing hamlet of Beer, and bump into Ros, a former Royal Marine – ‘I used to chase pirates around the Indian Ocean’ – who runs a local cafe.
‘Boris lied as an MP. He lied as Mayor of London. He lied as Foreign Secretary. Then he gets caught lying as Prime Minister – and everyone acts shocked,’ he says.
Westminster’s focus has been on Partygate and the abortive Jubilee Coup when 148 Tory MPs voted unsuccessfully last Monday to oust the PM. But Ros, like many others I speak to, is far more concerned about bread-and-butter issues.
‘My wife and I work six days a week. We start around 7am and finish at 8pm. And we don’t seem to have anything to show for it. This is a rural area. The local transport isn’t any good, so you have to have a car. But look at what’s happening with petrol. The 5p fuel duty cut was gone in about a fortnight.’
I ask if Ros knows how he’ll vote on June 23. ‘I’m tempted to write “None of them deserve it” on my ballot,’ he says.
Before visiting the area, I was told that while market towns such as Tiverton, Honiton and Seaton receive much of the media attention, the by-election will be decided in the dozens of villages scattered across the constituency.
So I drive back along the sweeping fields and narrow lanes that represent Boris Johnson’s last line of defence. On the wall of The Ostler Inn in Uffculme, there’s a quote from the Anglo-French writer Hilaire Belloc: ‘When you have lost your inns, drown your empty selves, for you will have lost the last of England.’
Initially, it seems there’s little danger of Boris Johnson losing the patrons of The Ostler.
Simon, who used to import Cornish slate, tells me: ‘This is a working village. You’ve got a couple of mills down the road and the big farming estate nearby.’ As a result, he believes people will forgive, if not forget, the PM’s crimes. ‘I think we’ll have to stick with him,’ he says. ‘Yes, he’s done things that are wrong. But who else is there?’
Then I get chatting to the pub’s landlord, also called Simon. ‘I’ve lived here 20 years and it’s always been very blue. But the Lib Dems could win. I think people might be up for a bit of a protest vote.’
That’s certainly what Uffculme resident Richard Foord hopes. The former Army major, who served in Iraq and the Balkans, is the Lib Dem candidate.
A grim poll showed Labour doubling its lead over the Conservatives to eight points in the wake of the coup attempt
His Tory challenger, former head teacher Helen Hurford, has been hidden away from the press after refusing to say that she would have backed Boris in last week’s confidence vote.
But Foord is happy to meet, and as we settle down in a cafe in Honiton still proudly festooned with Jubilee bunting, he seems the perfect choice.
‘There’s a real parallel between military service – which is about self-sacrifice and a public service ethos – and serving as an MP,’ he says. ‘You’re trying to look out for people and stick up for them.
‘As an Army officer, you need to look after the people you’re charged to command. As an MP, you need to spend your every waking moment thinking, “How can I better improve the lives of the people I live among?’’ ’ The 44-year-old is measured about his prospects. ‘I’m not for a moment suggesting this is easy – we’re going to have to fight damned hard for every vote,’ he tells me.
But there is one issue that gets him slightly agitated. It’s when I raise the question of a Lib Dem-Labour pact.
At the last General Election in 2019, Labour, not the Lib Dems, came second to the Conservatives in Tiverton and Honiton.
But in this by-election, Labour appears to have abandoned the seat. Labour MPs tell me they have been told to canvass in Wakefield instead. Conservative officials report no sign of Shadow Ministers here drumming up support for the candidate, businesswoman Liz Pole. Indeed, the Tiverton and Honiton Labour website has no mention of a by-election even taking place. And the ‘latest news’ on the campaign website is blank.
When I suggest there’s a national deal between Labour and the Lib Dems to carve up seats such as this, Foord hastily interjects: ‘Sorry to interrupt, but there is no pact… no, no, no… I mean really, there is no pact.’
Perhaps Sir Keir Starmer and Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey should admit to one. Because it’s clear there’s discontent to exploit here – towards both Boris Johnson in particular and to the Tory Government in general.
That said, I’m not detecting the sort of visceral anger over Partygate, or other issues, I was told to expect. It’s true the Lib Dems have the most visible presence. There are fields and barns displaying their distinctive orange signs proclaiming ‘Winning Here’.
But are they?
On my last evening, I stop in the tiny village of Broadhembury, composed of thatched cottages, a church and a well-tended war memorial. I ask a farmer called Mike what he thinks of the idea that this might be the site of Boris Johnson’s downfall.
‘I’m not really hearing it. I think he’s done OK,’ he tells me.
In an interview with BBC South West, Mr Parish said that the first time he viewed the material it was accidental and he was trying to look at tractors
‘I’ve got a lot of sympathy with him. I wouldn’t want his job. After a hard day’s work, I can nip into the pub and relax with a few drinks. But Boris can’t.’
He pauses and laughs. ‘Well, I suppose he did a bit. But were any of the other lot any different?’
In two weeks, this south-west corner of the country once famed for lace-making will deliver a brutal political shock.
Either a former Army major who received three campaign medals will become the new MP, with the curtain poised to fall on the Johnson premiership. Or the Conservatives will cling on, and Boris Johnson will have again defied the pundits, and his would-be parliamentary assassins.
But whatever happens, it will be NFT. Normal For Tiverton.
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