IS it as bad as it looks? We’ve had to ask that question a lot since Boris Johnson became Prime Minister. Suspending parliament, pledging to break international law, rejecting independent reports on ministerial wrongdoing: each time Boris Johnson ignores the rules, the response of a thinking person is naturally to ask: what’s really going on here?

For a Prime Minister who glories in riling the righteous and baiting the “woke”, is he just rattling cages? Could the offence be less serious than it looks? Politics being so polarised, the thundering condemnation of the opposition is no reliable guide.

So we have to do due diligence on the outrages. We always have to ask: is it really as bad as it seems?

Usually, I find, the facts tend to reinforce the sense that this government is adrift from its ethical moorings. But this time, things are possibly even worse than they first seemed.

Owen Paterson, the former environment minister, was found guilty of “egregious breaches” of rules on lobbying that forbid MPs from undertaking paid advocacy in the House of Commons, rules that have been in place since 1695.

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These rules are so morally stark, a child could have drawn them up. They codify for the hard of conscience that it’s not OK to lobby ministers on behalf of someone who’s paying you.

Paterson, who was paid £100,000 a year by two companies, was found to have lobbied on their behalf at least 14 times. His emails were described by chairman of the standards committee Chris Bryant as “essentially sales pitches for the firms”, adding that Paterson had tried to get competitors’ products banned or relabelled.

The standards committee of cross-party MPs and lay members was unequivocal in finding him guilty and even his supporters were silent over the matter of his guilt, in the face of the evidence, though Paterson insisted (and still insists) on his innocence.

His recommended punishment was a 30-day suspension from parliament which could have triggered a recall petition and byelection.

But the government wasn’t having it. MPs have never before rejected a recommended sanction, but on this occasion, Tory MPs were whipped to back an amendment that would not only have ensured Paterson evaded punishment but trashed the whole decades-old system that holds MPs to account.

Some 250 Conservative MPs – and only Conservatives – voted on Wednesday for a new committee to create a different scrutiny mechanism – a committee with an in-built Tory majority, no less.

The business minister Kwasi Kwarteng then hit the studios to pressure standards commissioner Kathryn Stone to resign. Let’s just let that land for a moment: a government minister defending a party colleague found guilty of misconduct and trying to get rid of the independent examiner who found against him.

Well, it didn’t last, but not because the government rediscovered its ethics. Incredulous opposition MPs refused to have anything to do with the new committee, forcing the government to backtrack by yesterday lunchtime. Jacob Rees-Mogg said the Tories would consult with opposition MPs before bringing forward proposals, and conceded that a separate vote would be held on Paterson’s punishment.

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Not long after, an exhausted Paterson finally resigned. It drew a shoogly line under the matter, but not before a huge amount of damage had been done both to the Tories and to parliament.

How daft do they think we are? If the system were so badly broken, then why had they not acted to fix it in the 11 years they had been in government, instead of in such a way as to help their colleague?

If the government’s intention was so benign, why did dozens of Tory MPs either vote against or abstain? Meanwhile, 22 of those who voted with the government are either currently under investigation by the standards commissioner or have had allegations against them upheld. “Compromised” doesn’t quite cover it.

And what of the Prime Minister himself? Well, he was investigated by the commissioner over a holiday in Mustique and is said to have been irritated by the whole business.

And I suspect that’s really the nub of the issue. This isn’t just about one MP; it’s about the sense of entitlement among senior Tories and their apparent belief that rules should not stand in their way.

Under Mr Johnson’s leadership, there has been a clear pattern of disregard for legal constraints and ethical rules. This week’s debacle is just the latest. Incidents like the prorogation of parliament (ruled unlawful by the Supreme Court), the pledge to break international law if the EU didn’t do what ministers wanted (the government’s top lawyer resigned in protest), ignoring an independent inquiry finding that Priti Patel was guilty of bullying (the independent investigator resigned in protest), the desire to block the right of judicial review against the government and attacks on the BBC, show a disdain for any kind of constraint and a mistrust of institutions outwith the government’s control.

We’ve had governments before that have overreached themselves: Tony Blair’s desire to extend so-called Henry VIII powers, the ID cards debacle and detention without trial, all caused widespread alarm.

With Blair, it felt coordinated; this by contrast feels expedient and capricious.

But that doesn’t make it any less ominous. I’m not suggesting Johnson is in any sense a wannabe dictator, but he displays the same instinct to ignore checks and balances as some of the more dangerous populists undermining democracy in Europe. Viktor Orban has strengthened his party’s hold on power in Hungary by increment, with covert attacks on the judiciary and the media. He has divided his country and regards his supporters as biddable, confident they will support him in anything so long as he can produce a figleaf excuse. There are clear echoes of that behaviour in Boris Johnson.

But voters don’t like being taken for fools. In the last 48 hours the government has succeeded in making itself look both corrupt and incompetent. It has been accused of trying to legitimise or at least destigmatise “cash for questions” – what Mr Bryant calls “the definition of corruption” – and has only been derailed in those plans because Labour, SNP and Lib Dem MPs forced it to backtrack.

Boris Johnson may have formed the impression that u-turns erase sins in the eyes of the public, having clocked up so many. Well, this time he may just be in for a shock.

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