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Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson has long had an ability to defy political gravity, shrugging off revelations about extra-marital affairs and unusual financial arrangements to remain popular with voters. The question now though is whether his Conservative Party will be damaged by the political demise of Health Secretary Matt Hancock — who quit after he was caught on camera kissing an aide in his office, in breach of his own Covid-19 social distancing rules. The key test will come on Thursday when voters in the northern English district of Batley and Spen elect a new member of Parliament. The Tories had been tipped to win the seat, entrenching their gains in the opposition Labour Party's former heartlands. Johnson's colleagues are expressing concerns that the Hancock scandal is cutting through with voters in the area, putting their campaign at risk. There are reasons the damage may linger. As the public face of the government's health response, Hancock is the highest profile (if not the first) official to be accused of hypocrisy for breaking his own government's rules. Last year, a scientist resigned from Johnson's advisory group over an affair during lockdown, while maverick former aide Dominic Cummings sparked an outcry with a 250-mile family road trip at a time the public was being ordered to stay at home. If a new coronavirus variant emerges that can evade the U.K.'s successful vaccine effort, and Hancock's successor has to impose restrictions again, the public may not be quite so willing to listen. — Tim Ross

Matt Hancock and aide Gina Coladangelo depart 10 Downing Street in May 2020. Photographer: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Europe Click here to follow Bloomberg Politics on Facebook and tell us how we're doing or what we're missing at balancepower@bloomberg.net.

Global Headlines

Tense times | U.S. President Joe Biden ordered airstrikes on Iranian-backed militia groups in Syria and Iraq yesterday at a delicate moment for Washington and Tehran. It is likely to be an early test for conservative Iranian President-elect Ebrahim Raisi, with talks expected to resume as soon as this week on reviving a 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. Fading honeymoon | Biden faces worsening relations with liberals in his Democratic Party as they become increasingly anxious that he won't fulfill their policy aspirations. As Nancy Cook explains, they see little progress on issues such as immigration reform, voting-rights legislation and policies to curb climate change. Beefing up | India has redirected at least 50,000 additional troops to its border with China in recent months, a shift toward an offensive military posture against the world's second-biggest economy. As Sudhi Ranjan Sen reports, India's strategic focus has primarily been Pakistan in the decades since the British left the subcontinent, but it's now seeking to ease tensions with Islamabad and concentrate on countering Beijing. North Koreans broke down in tears at seeing a dramatically thinner Kim Jong Un, state TV reported, in a rare comment on Kim's health in an apparent effort to build support for him as he seeks to revive an economy hit by food shortages. Open race | France's presidential election next year looks increasingly unpredictable after incumbent Emmanuel Macron and far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who are frontrunners in national polls, registered dismal showings in a regional ballot. Exit polls indicate the traditional center-right and left leaning parties fared better amid a record low turnout. Stepping down | Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven resigned, with the biggest Nordic economy mired in a political crisis after the government collapsed following a clash over relaxing rent controls. He urged parties to try to find a workable coalition and warned against holding an early election during the pandemic. What to Watch This Week U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio co-host a meeting in Rome of the Global Coalition to Defeat Isis, ahead of a Group of 20 meeting of foreign ministers tomorrow. German Chancellor Angela Merkel meets Johnson in the U.K. on Friday as more European countries impose quarantines on some British travelers amid a rise in virus cases caused by the delta variant. President Vladimir Putin holds his annual call-in event with Russians on Wednesday as officials impose new restrictions to cope with a third wave of Covid-19. Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari expressed concern about new threats by the Niger Delta Avengers militant group to bomb critical oil and gas infrastructure in the West African nation. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said the government must be on high alert as virus cases begin to rise in Tokyo, about three weeks before the capital hosts the Olympics. The chief editorial writer for the pro-democracy Apple Daily was arrested at Hong Kong's airport, local media reported, the seventh person swept up in a probe of the now-shuttered newspaper. Thanks to the more than 20 people who answered our Friday quiz and congratulations to Jim Story, who was the first to name the U.S. as the country which has called for a scaled-down, in-person gathering of leaders for the United Nations General Assembly in September. And finally ... Danielle Anderson, the only foreign scientist to have undertaken research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology's BSL-4 lab, was there just weeks before the first known cases of Covid-19 emerged in central China. Beijing's lack of transparency over the outbreak has fueled suspicions, so far unproven, that the virus may have leaked from the lab. While Anderson can't completely rule that out, she tells Michelle Cortez why she believes the most likely origin was a natural source from outside the facility. Danielle Anderson. Photographer: James Bugg/Bloomberg

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