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A week tomorrow, Saturday July 24, will mark Boris Johnson’s second anniversary as Prime Minister. Those two years have been so eventful that it feels like so much longer. In July 2019 the

general election and the reality of Brexit still lay in the future. In America, Donald Trump was still President, with every expectation that he would be re-elected; here, Jeremy Corbyn was

still Leader of the Opposition, with every hope that he would put an end to a Tory decade and hand Britain over to the far-Left.  Though weary of years of political deadlock over Brexit,

people were getting on with their lives, oblivious of what lay in wait. Apart from a few scientists, nobody was concerned about the danger of a new coronavirus. The world had no inkling that

it stood on the brink of a pandemic. We know what happened next. Opinions vary wildly about how the Government has handled the greatest peacetime crisis this country has known. Boris

Johnson has been tested as few Prime Ministers have been tested before him. He was almost killed by Covid, yet has emerged seemingly unscathed.  Indeed, this week he has come out fighting,

with an undiminished appetite to “level up” Britain, as he promised to do two years ago. In a speech at a battery plant in Coventry, he renewed that promise. He did so, moreover, with his

trademark sense of humour, pointing out that, for example, Heinz would soon be manufacturing its tomato sauce in Wigan — “the ketchup of catch-up”. The old Boris is back, alright — the one

that rivals and enemies underestimate at their peril. As Monday’s so-called Freedom Day approaches, the chorus of criticism of the PM has been deafening. Here at _TheArticle_, we have

published critiques of every aspect of the Government, its policies and its leader. Today, for example, our regular contributors Ian Linden and Alain Catzeflis — respectively an academic and

a journalist, both of great distinction — will deliver their latest broadsides against the Johnson administration. Nobody can deny that this platform serves you, our members and readers,

with the broadest possible range of views as we seek to cover every angle. Nobody can deny that we give this Government the roughest of rides. Yet this is a time for reflection, too, about

what has been achieved. Boris Johnson showed ruthlessness in defeating his Conservative critics, but he did win the election by an unexpected landslide, banishing the threat of what he still

likes to call “the loony Left”. He did “get Brexit done”, even if the consequences remain unclear. He made many questionable decisions as we grappled with the “invisible enemy” of the

pandemic, but he got the biggest one, to gamble on an accelerated vaccination programme, right.  The pandemic now poses less of an immediate threat to life. The PM has been very clear that

it is not over, with the Delta variant causing more than 40,000 new cases a day — an unenviable new global record for the UK. Next week’s lifting of restrictions does represent a calculated

risk, but it is clearly the right decision for the economy and especially for younger generations. We shall just have to hope and pray that the experts who gave the green light to the

Cabinet have got their modelling right this time. Attention is now turning to the many problems that were shelved when the pandemic struck — the normal stuff of politics. Some of these

problems have already been greatly exacerbated, notably in health and education; others will be affected in the future by the ongoing cost of the Covid crisis. Inevitably, the losses are

unevenly distributed and inequalities have widened. The stock of public goodwill built up during recent months due to the vaccine rollout may now be running out. It is time for vision and

for action. With Parliament becalmed and Whitehall overwhelmed, such legislation as there is in the pipeline has been unavoidably focused on the crisis. One exception is the Higher Education

(Freedom of Speech) Bill, now making its way through the committee stage. This should protect academic freedom as well as free speech, placing obligations on universities to maintain, and

if necessary restore, Britain’s reputation as the homeland of intellectual liberty and excellence. There may be institutional resistance, but a new Director for Freedom of Speech and

Academic Freedom will be created to act as an ombudsman at the Office for Students at the Education Department. Such a watchdog is long overdue and once the Bill becomes law, the post should

be filled with the utmost urgency. Nigel Biggar CBE, Regius Professor of Moral Pastoral Theology at Oxford and a regular contributor to _TheArticle_, has suggested here that the Bill needs

to be strengthened. This could be done in several ways: by extending freedom of speech for academics beyond their fields of expertise; by permitting open academic discussion to be curtailed

by accusations of “harassment”; and by denying academics access to employment tribunals when universities penalise them for exercising their freedom of speech or research. We can only hope

that ministers are listening to voices like Professor Biggar’s; but there is reason to believe that in Number Ten, they are. Outside the groves of academe, a daunting list of challenges

awaits the Prime Minister: controlling everything from debt and inflation to crime and immigration. One of the most urgent, social care, is apparently high on his to-do list. Neglected by so

many PMs, it nearly brought down his predecessor, Theresa May, and was then kicked into the long grass. As he stood on the steps of 10 Downing Street in what now seems like that halcyon

summer of 2019, Boris Johnson pledged “to fix the crisis in social care once and for all”. The pandemic highlighted that crisis, when thousands of residents of care homes fell victim to

Covid and the then Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, seemed to be in denial about their plight. If the Prime Minister is finally giving this most intractable of long-term problems his full

attention, that is to be welcomed. There are few votes in it, but it matters hugely to millions. Boris may or may not be as fallible as his critics claim, but his heart is indubitably in the

right place. That is why the British people still have confidence in the captain who took the helm two years ago to finish the job. A MESSAGE FROM THEARTICLE _We are the only publication

that’s committed to covering every angle. We have an important contribution to make, one that’s needed now more than ever, and we need your help to continue publishing throughout the

pandemic. So please, make a donation._