Never mind the logic: Boris Johnson’s bizarre Blackpool speech

Instead of a single message, there was a slogan repeated several times and attached to a list of different subjects, writes John Rentoul

‘Getting out of the way’ while being ‘on your side’ turned out to mean an unwise scheme to use state benefits to subsidise a further burst of house price inflation (via Reuters)

For most prime ministers and their teams of advisers, writing a speech is an arduous job. Decide the central message, work out the argument, negotiate the competing demands on the government and adjudicate between them.

Boris Johnson approaches the task differently. He puts everything in without any attempt to reconcile contradictions, and hopes it will hold together by delivering the words at speed, with energy and conviction. Instead of a single message, there was a slogan repeated several times and attached to a list of different subjects: “On your side.” And a policy, distantly related to the slogan, of letting people borrow against benefit income to buy homes.

Instead of an argument, he made several different arguments, any one of which could have been the spine of a speech, but all of which made for confusion.