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| Wednesday June 12 2019 |
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By Matt Chorley
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Good morning,
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Just as the race gears up to replace her, Theresa May seems to be frantically trying to get through her to do list before she leaves office.
Already this week we've had modern slavery, tech entrepreneurs and today climate change. By the end of the week she might have got round to telling us what Brexit means Brexit means.
LISTEN: Catch me every weekday morning giving a sneak preview of what's coming up in Red Box at 7.30am with Julia Hartley-Brewer on TalkRadio. Listen here
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Podcast: Times CEO Summit
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A special edition of the Red Box podcast featuring political interviews from The Times CEO Summit. I spoke to John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, Rachel Sylvester interviews Michael Gove about his leadership bid and Hugo Rifkind went toe-to-toe with Sir Nick Clegg about his new job at Facebook.
Listen and subscribe to the podcast
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The briefing
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- Theresa May isn’t mucking about in her final days in office: The prime minister will today commit the UK to the toughest climate change target of any major economy, overruling the chancellor in the process and laying down a challenge to whoever replaces her.
- So much for working out her notice quietly: the PM’s extra-long cabinet meeting got pretty lively yesterday, with ministers clashing over preparations for a no-deal Brexit. Sajid Javid accused Philip Hammond of ignoring a request for more money. The chancellor disputed it. So Javid went back to his desk and fired off a demand for up to £1.2 billion extra cash.
- And of course it is Wednesday, so May gets to enjoy the weekly pleasure that is PMQs.
- Oxfam must produce a radical reform plan in the next three weeks or risk permanently losing access to hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money.
- President Trump has inadvertently revealed some details of his “secret” immigration deal with Mexico after waving around a piece of paper containing parts of the agreement, the The New York Times reports.
- Today’s trivia question: Of Keir Hardie, Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson, James Callaghan and Gordon Brown, which Labour leader is the odd one out, and why? Answer at the bottom of today's email
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It’s B-Day
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Boris Johnson likes to see himself as Winston Churchill. We know this because he wrote a whole book about him, and himself.
“He was eccentric, over the top, camp, with his own special trademark clothes — and a thoroughgoing genius,” Johnson wrote about Churchill, and himself.
“From his very emergence as a young Tory MP he had bashed and satirised his own party … There were too many Tories who thought of him as an unprincipled opportunist … His enemies detected in him a titanic egotism, a desire to find whatever wave or wavelet he could, and surf it long after it had dissolved into spume on the beach … He did behave with a death-defying self-belief, and go farther out on a limb than anyone else might have thought wise.”
And so on and so on. And so to today. To Johnson’s finest hour, or darkest, depending on how well he performs as he finally emerges from his bunker to tell us why he should move into Downing Street 79 years after Churchill first took charge.
How will he stir the nation, what Churchillian rhetoric has this great wordsmith got in store? What fine prose, indeed poetry, will come from the politician that we are told can reach parts of the electorate that others can't.
“Kick the can and we kick the bucket.”
Sorry, what? Is this what we have been waiting for? While all the other leadership contenders have been out and about, facing TV cameras, radio studios, jogging podcasts, giving speeches and meeting punters, Johnson has been hiding away (no public speech or broadcast interview since March 12) crafting this as the message that he believes will propel him into Downing Street?
“Now is the time to unite this country and unite this society,” he will say before warning of the risks of further delay to Brexit.
“We simply will not get a result if we give the slightest hint that we want to go on kicking the can down the road with yet more delay. Delay means defeat. Delay means Corbyn.
“Kick the can and we kick the bucket.” I mean, honestly.
If Matt Hancock said this, or Andrea Leadsom or Mark Harper (who I guarantee is a real person) it would be merrily mocked and GIFed and shared widely as an example of the ramblings of a lightweight. It is up there with Liz Truss’s “That. Is. A. Disgrace.” cheese fury.
Instead we are expected to believe that this is the positioning of someone who can achieve what Theresa May failed - a better, shinier, more patriotic deal to prove that Brexit is a great success, or storming out of the European Union anyway.
Johnson will get a reminder of just how tough it will be today, when hours after his big launch in Westminster Conservative rebels will join forces with opposition parties in a crucial test of parliament’s ability to block a no-deal exit.
Remember how we all became experts in parliamentary procedure when Sir Oliver Letwin became prime minister for the afternoon and took control of the parliamentary agenda? The rebels are doing it again.
The plan is to vote on seizing a day in the Commons later this month which would be used to pass a law preventing a prime minister from suspending the Commons to push through a no-deal Brexit. Sir Oliver, it is worth pointing out, is backing Michael Gove for leader.
Whatever the excitement of launches and slogans and glossy videos, soon it will be back to the grim reality that this Brexit business is tough, perhaps impossible, for whoever becomes PM.
Johnson has got to get there first. Expect a lot of questions this morning about his own drugs past: was it just icing sugar, did it make him sneeze, why does your story on drugs, like so many things, keep changing? Don’t be surprised if there are also questions on tax cuts, outside incomes, f*** business, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, Darius Guppy, his love life and anything else anyone can think of in the next couple of hours.
If the other launches have been a bit of fun (Harper was asked by the Mirror who would win in a fight, a lion or a bear? He said lion) today’s is more serious. The frontrunner has some difficult questions to answer on Brexit, and he must answer them in a way which keeps his supporters, such as the ardent Brexiteer Steve Baker and ardent Remainer Robert Buckland, all happy.
He will be buoyed by more endorsements today. Steve Barclay, the Brexit secretary, backs Johnson in the Daily Mail. Liz Truss, the chief secretary to the Treasury and early Johnson backer, told the Today programme that her man has “nothing to hide”. Writing for Red Box, Lucy Frazer, Richard Drax, Marcus Fysh and Damien Moore argue that he is the only candidate who can sell a one-nation vision for Britain "that excites in Sunderland just as much as it does in Somerset”.
It takes Johnson’s tally of backers to well over 70 – more than double his nearest rival. This is an unstoppable bandwagon, get on board. Never was so many endorsements given by so many when so few can be sure they are doing the right thing.
There is no doubt that he is way out in front. A rather breathless “scientific analysis” of polling in the Telegraph suggests that its £270,000-a-year columnist would win a 140-seat majority against Jeremy Corbyn. If you believe that, I’ve got a leather-bound collection of Theresa May’s 2017 polling leads you might like to buy.
Sir Lynton Crosby, the Tory election guru who worked with Johnson on his first London mayoral campaign and has been close to him since, writes for Red Box on the importance of compromise and consensus (which is interesting from the king of master of divisive politics). “We need a leader of the UK who deals in hope,” Sir Lynton writes.
Although, as Churchill himself once put it: “Nourish your hopes, but do not overlook realities.”
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Leadershipwatch
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RUNNING
- 11am launch: Boris Johnson (4/7) launches his bid for No 10, trying to present a serious pitch to be prime minister, with less emphasis on the joke and coke.
- 3.30pm launch: Sajid Javid (20/1) will urge Tory MPs to look beyond their “comfort zone choice” in a speech setting out his stall as a leader who can widen the party’s appeal. “A leader is not just for Christmas, or just for Brexit,” he will say. “We need tomorrow’s leader, today.”
- Michael Gove (12/1) questioned Boris Johnson’s suitability to be prime minister as he tried to put an end to the drugs row that has derailed his own campaign for the job.
- Mark Harper (200/1) said that tax cuts should be focused on people at the “lower end” of the spectrum. “I don’t think we should be promising more money to higher-rate taxpayers,” he said.
- Rory Stewart (20/1) attracted 600 people to the Spiegeltent on London’s South Bank, where he asked if Johnson was a man who could be trusted with the nuclear codes. The Telegraph’s Steve Swinford described this as “going for the jugular”, though in a circus big top it is better to go for the juggler.
- Andrea Leadsom (8/1) described herself as an optimistic and realistic Brexiteer and said that she regarded leaving on October 31 was a “hard red line”. She refused to rule out a second Scottish independence referendum and also gave a very funny speech at a parliamentary press gallery lunch, including joking that new legislation on driverless cars “would have been useful over the last three years”.
- Matt Hancock (100/1) used an outing on the Today programme to wonder aloud why certain people were not doing the same. “Everybody who puts their name forward to be prime minister should be open to scrutiny, should be accountable, should come on the Today programme and other broadcast programmes.”
- Jeremy Hunt (9/2) has been branded “pathetic and childish” after he withdrew Foreign Office support for Nicola Sturgeon’s trip to Brussels yesterday.
- Esther McVey (100/1) risked having her campaign derailed by Lorraine Kelly. Fiona Phillips, another former GMTV colleague, tells Mail Online that the feud began when McVey wrongly claimed she had been promoted to present the breakfast show permanently.
- Dominic Raab (25/1) has refused to say whether he would lift a nondisclosure agreement he entered into as part of a settlement with a woman former colleague, BuzzFeed News reports.
* Latest leadership odds from Ladbrokes.
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Picture of the day
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Andrea Leadsom used her speech at a parliamentary press gallery lunch yesterday to insist she would not use the "B-word", before ending it by holding up a sign making clear her views on the Commons Speaker. (Pic: Matt Dathan)
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The Sketch
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Tale of a dog shaggier and blonder than Boris
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Quentin Letts
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Dirty trick by Sajid Javid in the Tory leadership election: he played the fluffy-dog card. Mr Javid released a soft-focus promotional video featuring Bailey, his family’s spaniel-poodle cross, shaggier, blonder and somehow even more adorable than Boris Johnson. “Woof woof,” commented Bailey, nosing a ball in the Javid home before his master left for work to a shout of “don’t forget samosas” from one of the children.
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Read the full sketch
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Chart of the day
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The highs and lows of a campaign: Times data journalist Daniel Clark has been looking at the Wikipedia page views for each of the leadership candidates.
Boris Johnson and Rory Stewart saw the biggest spikes around the time of Theresa May’s resignation, while interest in Esther McVey peaked this week, which is presumably people trying to find out what went on with Lorraine Kelly all those years ago.
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Yesterday I asked whose side you were on: Boris Johnson or Michael Gove. With a lot of abstentions and emails demanding a "none of the above", Team Gove won out with 77 per cent of the vote. Full result here
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Have your say
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Yesterday I asked who you thought would be the best negotiator with the EU among the Tory leadership candidates.
Guy Clapperton said: "Rory Stewart by a country mile. He wouldn't actually be terribly fierce but a British PM actually listening to the other side and thinking before replying might be such a surprise to them that they'd be shocked into doing the same."
Paul Tebble said: "Boris ... surely if the majority of English can't understand half of what he says, what chance the rest of the EU? This probably means he could get them to agree to something without them realising what they have agreed to!"
David Greenwood said: "I nominate Michael Gove for his quick wit and ability to think."
John Rowell said: "None of the above. The EU will not be listening."
TODAY: What should Boris Johnson say at his leadership launch today? 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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Need to know
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TAX FEARS: Business would not face crippling taxes under a Labour government, John McDonnell insisted, as he rowed back on plans to give the Bank of England a productivity target. I interviewed the shadow chancellor at The Times CEO Summit, where he also discussed antisemitism, Brexit and (not) taking drugs. (The Times)
PULLING TEETH: One of the country’s most densely populated cities does not have a single dentist able to take on NHS patients. (The Times)
LABOUR INFIGHTING: One of Jeremy Corbyn’s most important allies, Ian Lavery, hit out at the Labour leader’s critics yesterday after the party’s divisions were exposed yet again over Brexit and antisemitism. (The Times)
DON’T LIKE: Sir Nick Clegg has intervened in the debate over how to rein in powerful internet companies, claiming that Facebook should not be regulated in the same way as a traditional publisher. (The Times)
JUST SAY NO: A government minister vetoed the appointment of an expert to a public body after vetting found that she had criticised the Home Office and called for drug policy reform, it has emerged. (The Guardian)
WAITING GAME: Health leaders are demonstrating a “troubling” lack of understanding about the harm to patients from lengthening waiting lists, a Commons spending watchdog has warned as it called for urgent action to improve NHS performance. (Financial Times)
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| Quote of the day |
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“I’m a working class kid, I could never afford Class A drugs. I wouldn’t want to.”
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John McDonnell at The Times CEO Summit
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Now read this
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Venezuelans are being forced to sell their homes for a song (or a car). Property prices have fallen by 70 per cent as rampant inflation and a political crisis show little sign of ending. Stephen Gibbs and Laura Dixon report.
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Read the full story
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The agenda
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Today
- Boris Johnson, former foreign secretary, and Sajid Javid, home secretary, launch their respective campaigns to be the next leader of the Conservative Party.
- John Glen, economic secretary to the Treasury, addresses an event organised by Which? on the future of cash.
- The UK's stance on post-Brexit sanctions is "unclear, fragmented, incoherent and risks national security", according to a report by the foreign affairs committee.
- The Food Standards Agency and other departments must work together to ensure food sustainability, according to a report by the National Audit Office.
- More must be done to tackle hate crime and sexual harassment on campus, an evaluation by the Office for Students finds.
- The next prime minister must build a "new national consensus", Sir Lynton Crosby, political strategist, writes in a foreword to a Policy Exchange project.
- 9am Matt Hancock, health secretary, addresses the CogX festival exploring artificial intelligence and emerging technology.
- 9.30am Will Quince, work and pensions minister, and senior department officials give evidence to the work and pensions committee on universal credit.
- 9.30am Victoria Atkins, Home Office minister, hosts a roundtable on tackling modern slavery in the construction industry.
- 9.50am Mental health professionals give evidence to the women and equalities committee on the mental health of men and boys.
- 10.40pm Philip Hammond, the chancellor, and Jeremy Wright, culture secretary, (12.35pm) speak at Bloomberg's annual technology conference.
- 3.15pm Ian Trenholm, Care Quality Commission chief executive, gives evidence to the joint committee on human rights about conditions in learning disability inpatient units.
- 6pm Liz Truss, chief secretary to the Treasury, gives a lecture to the Economic Research Council.
- 9pm Esther McVey, Conservative leadership candidate, takes part in an LBC radio phone-in.
House of Commons
- 11.30am Women and equalities questions.
- Midday Prime Minister's Questions.
- Ten-minute rule bill on parental leave and premature and sick babies.
- Debate on inequality and social mobility.
- Debate on discrimination in sport.
- Adjournment debate on Cornish wrestling.
House of Lords
- 3pm Questions on sexual violence in conflict, the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in 2020, probate granted to non-professional claimants, and Hong Kong.
- Third reading of the Age of Criminal Responsibility Bill.
- Committee stage of the Holocaust (Return of Cultural Objects) (Amendment) Bill.
- Debate on constitution committee reports on preparing legislation for parliament, and on the delegation of powers.
- Debate on a communications committee report on regulating in a digital world.
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Today's trivia answer
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James Callaghan, who went by his first given name, James, while all the others were called James but went by their middle names. Thanks to Wes Ball for that one.
Send your trivia to redbox@thetimes.co.uk
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@MattChorley
