Boris the builder mustn’t buckle over planning reform

The government will pass the test it has set itself: schools in England will return next week. Pupils may well have to wear masks at times, but they will be back in the classroom. Yet ministers privately acknowledge this isn’t the real challenge. The bigger question is what effect the return of schools has on the prevalence of the virus and what happens to education in the case of further local outbreaks.

The exams grading debacle and the various other summer U-turns have been damaging. As one minister concedes: ‘There’s only a limited amount of time before the “incompetence” label sticks. It hasn’t yet — but we can’t afford many more mistakes.’

The Tories are still ahead in the polls, but the past few weeks have hurt the government’s standing with its own MPs. Refusing to make a U-turn before doing just that is a spectacle they will not forget in a hurry. Whips will find it far harder to nip rebellions in the bud by saying that Downing Street simply isn’t for turning on an issue.

Many MPs will return to Westminster next week in a strange mood. One senior Tory backbencher tells me that ‘the continuing weirdness of people’s lives is taking a toll’. Many have felt that their constituents have been watching them eagle-eyed in recent months to see if they are following social distancing rules. This is particularly true for Tory MPs in areas that have been hit by local lockdown and other restrictions. One consequence of this is that they’ll be reluctant to defend unpopular decisions.

In a sign of the febrile mood, two of Boris Johnson’s most enthusiastic backers in the Tory leadership election sat down recently to make a list of which MPs were most likely to cause problems for the Prime Minister this autumn.