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| Wednesday July 24 2019 |
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By Matt Chorley
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Good morning,
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A prime minister rushing into Downing Street, unsure who will be in the cabinet, unclear about what to do about leaving the European Union, desperate to show that there is more to them than Brexit.
In the Brexit box set, you can skip all three seasons with Theresa May and go straight from the June 24 2016 episode “Johnson set to be PM” and just tune in today.
As for May, she has been doing her goodbyes. Yesterday at cabinet a whip-round organised by Michael Gove saw her receive jewellery and a handbag. She popped into a session of spad school and the special advisers gave her a standing ovation before they had one final photo with their old boss. “It was so awful,” says one melting media adviser. “I can't imagine the quality of that picture. Dishevelled, tired, sweat dripping down our faces.”
More goodbyes and tears today, before being clapped out of No 10.
For now though, and for the last time, Theresa May clings on, obviously. Until lunchtime anyway.
LISTEN: Catch me every weekday morning at 7.30am giving a sneak preview of what's coming up in Red Box with Julia Hartley-Brewer at breakfast on TalkRadio. Listen here
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Listen and subscribe to the Red Box podcast
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The briefing
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- Theresa May faces her final PMQs at noon, before a final lunch with colleagues at No 10, a final speech outside around 2pm, and then a final trip to Buckingham Palace to resign and will be home in Maidenhead in time for tea.
- Boris Johnson will make his own trip to the Palace, before giving a speech to the nation in Downing Street at about 4pm and then heading to the Commons to hire and fire his cabinet away from the glare of the cameras. His girlfriend, Carrie Symonds, is not expected to join him.
- The first job of the incoming PM will be to write his letters of last resort for the commanders of the Trident nuclear submarines, although he will probably write one in favour of launching missiles and one against and then decide which he thinks is the most persuasive.
- Jeremy Corbyn has seen off an attempt by Tom Watson, his deputy, to force Labour to adopt an independent complaints process to deal with antisemitism.
- Watson has other things to worry about: he admitted yesterday that he had made “a real mistake” in believing Carl Beech, the man convicted of fabricating the Westminster paedophile ring conspiracy.
- Corbyn also has other things to worry about: Labour's membership has dipped below half a million after tens of thousands quit the party, PoliticsHome reveals.
- I’m not saying it is hot in Westminster but parliament’s coffee shops ran out of ice yesterday. How can we cope without a frappuccino? Pray for lobby hacks.
- Today’s trivia question: As prime minister, Boris Johnson will have two key things in common with Andrew Bonar Law, who became premier in 1922. What are they? Answer at the bottom of today's email
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‘Britain Trump’
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If your big pitch on day one as PM is that you are all about the women and ethnic minorities, you could probably do without an endorsement from someone currently embroiled in a row for telling four non-white women to “go home”.
Boris Johnson will have winced at Donald Trump’s endorsement of him as “Britain Trump”, in part because it will upset the liberal centrists he claims to want to reach out to, and also because it doesn’t really make any sense. “Britain Trump.” A national instruction for simultaneous flatulence.
“We have a really good man who’s going to be the prime minister of the UK now, Boris Johnson,” Trump told a presumably baffled room of young Republicans in Washington. “Good man, he’s tough and he’s smart. They’re saying Britain Trump. They call him Britain Trump. People are saying that’s a good thing. They like me over there, that’s what they wanted. That’s what they need. He’ll get it done. Boris is good. He’s going to do a good job.”
After wondering aloud where Nigel Farage was, Trump added: “I’ll tell you what, he got 32 per cent of the vote from nowhere, over in UK… thank you Nigel. I know he’s going to work well with Boris, they’re going to do some tremendous things.”
Whatever gave him that idea? "He [Mr Trump] thinks a Johnson-Farage alliance would be unstoppable and would deliver Brexit,” said, um, Nigel Farage.
Johnson is due to see Trump at the G7 in France in August and the UN in September, although an extra trip to the United States could be organised before then.
I should have mentioned by now: Johnson won the Tory leadership contest. I know, shock, right? He got 66 per cent of the vote, higher than Jeremy Corbyn managed in his two leadership contests but one point lower than David Cameron in 2005. Dave will have enjoyed that. It is also worth pointing that with 92,153 votes Johnson won with less support than Ken Clarke had when he lost to Iain Duncan Smith in 2001.
At the QEII centre in Westminster Johnson gave a strange, strangely underwhelming acceptance speech. Aren’t they always? He acknowledged that there would be “people around the place who will question the wisdom” of Tory members’ decision. “And there may even be some people here who still wonder quite what they have done.” Always worth remembering: this is a politician who wants to be liked. No harm in that but it does mean that he is someone who will think of the 112,664 who didn’t vote for him, as well as those who did.
He asked the audience if they felt daunted. Silence. Perhaps they do. Then there was some stuff about the Financial Times and adding Energise to his campaign slogan of “Deliver, Unite, Defeat” to spell “Dude” and a slumbering giant pinging off the guy ropes of self-doubt and then that was it. The easy bit. The hard stuff starts today.
Overnight there have been more meetings and calls about the cabinet reshuffle. The one name we know is that Mark Spencer will be the chief whip. Before you scramble to google him, you need to put quote marks around his name or you’ll get lots of results for a department store. Unless the new chief whip does actually have 70 per cent off frocks and undies.
What do we know about Spencer? He was a dairy farmer, he was a government whip, and nobody knows who he is. I’m told he has been popping in and out of Johnson’s campaign HQ in Great College Street without anyone noticing. “It’s great, isn’t it,” he joked to a colleague after walking past photographers who didn’t even pick up their cameras.
Also on board is Andrew Griffith, a former investment banker and chief operating officer at Sky, who will become Johnson’s chief business adviser to help to rebuild bridges with industry after the “f*** business” business.
So who else will get the call-up today? The main briefing from the new administration is that Johnson will today unveil a “Cabinet for Modern Britain”, which sounds a bit like Ikea have got a new sideboard, but is actually an effort to reassure the doubters that this is not some retro, reactionary regime.
Johnson is expected to welcome a “record number of ethnic minority politicians around the cabinet table, and increase the number of women attending as full cabinet members”. But you know this because my Times colleague Henry Zeffman wrote about it on Saturday.
“Priti Patel and Alok Sharma are both expected to be promoted to Mr Johnson’s new team,” says the briefing, although this news seems to have come as a shock to them both. Patel, you might remember, had to resign from May’s cabinet for going on a terrible sounding holiday to Israel and meeting lots of government ministers and officials without her own government knowing about it. She is tipped by some to be home secretary. Which sounds fine. If you want to bring back hanging.
There are also promotions due for Rishi Sunak and Tracey Crouch (who turns 44 today), along with Robert Jenrick and Oliver Dowden, who are not exactly non-white women but still, rising stars. Things are looking less rosy for Jeremy Hunt, who wants to stay as foreign secretary but has been offered defence instead, a demotion he won’t accept. Talk of a comeback for Grant Shapps also seems wide of the mark. Matt Hancock wants to move from health, and he was out doing the pro-Johnson media round this morning. He has been helping with the transition and friends suggest that replacing David Lidington as de facto deputy PM could be on the cards.
Michael Gove is tipped for promotion but the big one is the fate of Chris Grayling: there is a rumour that the 8ft traffic cone's departure from the cabinet might be subject to delays and possible cancellation.
What is clear is that there has been a live debate about the nature of the cabinet. One cabinet minister tipped for both a job and the sack said: “There are two competing views: one is that you have a cabinet of Brexit believers, or you have a wider range of people with expertise and experience to actually do some difficult jobs. It is not clear which thought has won the day.” It is possible that it will be a bit of both.
What is also clear is that Johnson has a huge decision to make on Brexit: does he immediately embark on trying to get a deal (albeit one that looks quite a lot like May’s deal but with more pictures for the dimmer Brexiteers) and risk alienating those who thought he was a hardliner but win over increasingly panicked Labour MPs in Leave seats?
Or does he abandon the idea of a deal and go full-steam ahead for no-deal, and risk alienating even more Tory Remainers who could unite with opposition parties to bring down his government before he has even finished appointing it? For what it’s worth I think the former is more likely, and has a decent chance of success.
There is a real sense that everyone from Philip Hammond to Jacob Rees-Mogg just want Brexit to be done. Johnson is perhaps the only person who can convince both to vote for a deal. (Yes, I know what the EU has said and what he has said, but it’s amazing what can be done with a bit of political will, clever spin and can-kicking.) All the talk of optimism and a “spirit of can-do” can be grating but let's at least allow ourselves one day of thinking that this may not be doomed from the start. You may not like him but he is now the only person who is in a position to prevent a disaster.
Having delivered a Brexit of sorts in October, he could eye a spring election with something more than a sense of dread, having starved both the Brexit Party and the Lib Dems of much of their oxygen.
It won’t please everyone. In fact, half of the country will hate him and will lose their s*** every time he says something that they think is not entirely true, and Twitter will become unbearable.
And the other half will think he is marvellous and shout down critics and his personal ratings will rise.
You may think that he will be “Britain Trump”. But like I said, that doesn’t make sense.
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Need to know
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THE DAY: From how Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt found out the result in their own private envelopes to Theresa May’s tearful standing ovation at cabinet, this is the inside account of the most extraordinary day in politics since the last one. (The Times)
THE IN-TRAY: It’s not only Brexit, there is also the economy, the Iranian crisis, Huawei, defence, Scottish independence, Irish reunification, Heathrow, HS2, social care, the environment, crime, schools funding, the NHS, and those are just the predictable things that welcome the new PM. (The Times)
THE MAN: Francis Elliott’s profile of the new PM is a must read: Johnson is more status-conscious and more prone to nurse a grudge than his image as a carefree maverick might suggest. But then, a lifetime winning and then losing the approval of the establishment has made Britain’s next prime minister the insiders’ outsider. (The Times)
THE POLICIES: What do we know so far? More money for schools. A plan for social care. Protection from persecution for veterans of the Troubles. A visit to Scotland.
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Tweets of the day
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Out with the old
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So farewell, then, Theresa May. It’s been, um, three years.
From burning injustices and Brexit means Brexit, to high-fives and jives; from novichok to no deal is better than a bad deal; from crush the saboteurs to losing ministers like I lose phone chargers; from strong and stable to weak and wobbly; from holding Trump’s hand to her conference cough; from promising to resign if she got her deal through to agreeing to resign when she didn’t. History may well be kinder to her than the snap judgment. It could hardly be worse.
But, as we prepare to do it all over again — new PM, reshuffle, Brexit plan, clock ticking — but in three months rather than three years, how long will we be on the thundering Johnson rollercoaster before some become wistful for the gentler days of going round in circles on the May tea cups?
Gearing up for life outside No 10, May has apparently been talking to David Cameron, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, according to The Atlantic.
Gavin Barwell, May's chief of staff, said she would be leaving with "huge frustration" at not managing to secure Brexit. He told the Today programme: "The numbers in parliament are not going to change, the EU's negotiating position is not going to change, but her successor has a clear mandate and right to try his own approach."
One of her last acts will be to take delivery of several resignations, although perhaps none will be quite so spectacular as that of Gareth Arnold, the communications officer for Jared O’Mara, MP for Sheffield Hallam, who last night signed off using the MP’s Twitter account with a torrent of expletives directed at his former employer. “Jared, you are the most disgustingly morally bankrupt person I have ever had the displeasure of working with,” the tweets coming from the account @jaredomaramp began, before going on to describe him as a “selfish, degenerate prick”. No one would say that about the prime minister. Would they?
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What the papers say
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THE TIMES: “Before everything else there is Europe. The only way to avoid a funeral oration is for Mr Johnson to find the answer that has eluded his predecessors, to answer the vexatious question to which he owes his elevation to the highest office.”
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: “Three years on and what should have happened then has happened now. Mr Johnson will today go to Buckingham Palace to kiss hands with the Queen and return to Downing Street as prime minister. But those wasted three years have made a task that was difficult enough at the time much harder.”
THE GUARDIAN: “Populist movements want to overturn constitutional governments so that the groups they define as enemies of the people can be targeted. That’s why they need to be confronted, within and without the Tory party. Mr Johnson plays the clown. But the circus will move on, only to leave a broken country in its wake.”
THE INDEPENDENT: “According to Boris Johnson himself, his government will be a “DUD” — Deliver Brexit, Unite the country and Defeat Jeremy Corbyn. He has exactly 99 days to deliver the first, the pre-condition of the others. Though it is very likely he may well end up failing on all three.”
FINANCIAL TIMES: “A no-deal departure must be avoided at all costs. Mr Johnson has no right to pursue such an option without seeking a genuine mandate from the British people, either in a general election — risky for his party — or in a new referendum.”
THE SUN: “Hardest of all will be to unify his party, with a swelling army of mutinous Remainers threatening his tiny majority. An early election looks inevitable. So far Boris is just an inspiring blast of optimism after years of purgatory.”
DAILY EXPRESS: “This is an epic challenge but it is a mistake to think that a leader with a superlative sense of humour is not well-equipped for such a serious task.”
DAILY MAIL: “In the first act of Henry V, the Archbishop of Canterbury marvels at the metamorphosis of the shallow, feckless Prince Hal into a wise and judicious king. Amazed by Henry's newfound political dexterity, he says: 'Turn him to any cause of policy, the Gordian knot of it he will unloose.' If Mr Johnson can unloose the Gordian knot of Brexit, his own transformation from court jester to statesman will be complete. If he can't, he could be the shortest serving prime minister in modern history.”
DAILY MIRROR: “Boris Johnson's clown act ceased to be funny years ago — with people laughing at, not with, the conceited fool. Now the Tory twister is poised to stumble into Downing Street by a backdoor the Conservative Party opened rather than the front door after a general election.”
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VOTE: Who will be in Johnson’s cabinet?
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I asked what Jo Swinson’s chances were of becoming PM. Half said zero, while a quarter thought it was more likely than not. Full result here
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Have your say
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Yesterday I asked how Theresa May should sign off her final PMQs.
Ralph Jackson said: "I think she should appropriate the two Ronnies' sign-off by saying, ‘It’s a goodbye from me… and it’s also goodbye from him’, staring across the dispatch box madly and laughing like a hyena."
David Altaner said: "She should just fade to black, like Tony Soprano. But instead of fading to Don't Stop Believin' she should fade to Iron Maiden's Two Minutes to Midnight."
James Harbord said: "Sorry Boris, I’ve bagged the last bit of wall space on the No10 staircase for my picture… but there is plenty of room on the wall down to the cellar."
Kim Golding said: "How about a moonwalk dance across the chamber?"
Rachel Williams said: "I mean it's got to be another dance surely? Lead a conga line of the resignations out of the House to the strains of Winner Takes It All?"
TODAY: What should Boris Johnson say on the steps of No10? Email redbox@thetimes.co.uk and we'll use some of the best tomorrow.
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The cartoon
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Today's cartoon from The Times by Peter Brookes
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The agenda
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Today
- Theresa May delivers her final statement as prime minister this afternoon before travelling to Buckingham Palace to formally tender her resignation.
- The new prime minister delivers his first address outside Downing Street today following a formal audience with the Queen.
- The government will fail to meet key land disposal targets, a report by the public accounts committee finds.
- Protesters mark the appointment of Boris Johnson as prime minister with a street demonstration.
- 10.15am Amber Rudd, work and pensions secretary, gives evidence to the work and pensions committee on executive pensions.
- 2pm Jeremy Corbyn, Labour leader, gives evidence to the home affairs committee on Islamophobia.
- 3.30pm Lord Ahmad, Foreign Office minister, gives evidence to the foreign affairs committee on global media freedom.
House of Commons
- 11.30am Scotland questions.
- Midday Prime Minister's Questions.
- Ten-minute-rule bill on dockless bicycles.
- Consideration of Lords amendments if necessary.
- Remaining stages of the Kew Gardens (Leases) (No.3) Bill.
- Debate on the role and sufficiency of youth services.
- Adjournment debate on water safety and tampering with life-saving equipment.
House of Lords
- 3pm Questions on persecuted Christians, human rights in Bahrain, impact of climate change on the Sahel region of Africa, and HS2.
- Report stage of the Birmingham Commonwealth Games Bill.
- Debate on the contribution of members of the House of Lords to the work of the Council of Europe.
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Today's trivia answer
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Today’s trivia question: As prime minister, Boris Johnson will have two key things in common with Andrew Bonar Law, who became premier in 1922. What are they?
Answer: Boris Johnson will be the first prime minister since Bonar Law to have been born outside the UK (United States and Canada respectively) and the first since Bonar Law to have been on the backbenches immediately prior to entering No10. Johnson will need to serve until February 2020 to outlast Bonar Law, the shortest-serving prime minister at seven months.
Thanks to Jake Nichol and Michael Crick for inspiration. Send your trivia to redbox@thetimes.co.uk
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@MattChorley
