Boris Johnson could exact vengeance on defeated opponents but he needs to keep his party as together as possible
BY Thursday, more than 60 per cent of Tory members will have voted in the party’s leadership election. The contest will effectively be over.
The Boris campaign is bullish. One very senior figure in it is privately predicting that they will win by a more than 20-point margin.
The Hunt campaign is adamant this isn’t right and that the contest is tightening every day. But interestingly, even several of his Cabinet supporters aren’t trying to claim that the race is close.
One tells me: “Let’s face it, there isn’t much doubt about what the result is going to be.”
Strikingly, Ruth Davidson — the leader of the Scottish Conservatives and perhaps Hunt’s best-known backer — didn’t speak at his event for Scottish members yesterday. Instead she chose to honour a long-standing family commitment.
While Jeremy Hunt has fought a spiky air war, the Boris campaign has concentrated on its ground game. A surrogate’s programme— involving grassroots favourites Jacob Rees-Mogg, Priti Patel,
Michael Fallon, Liz Truss and Iain Duncan Smith — has enabled them to hit up to ten constituency associations a day, pulling in support for their candidate.
In Boris Johnson’s Commons Office, there is a picture of Winston Churchill on the top bookshelf. If Boris does win, he must remember Churchill’s dictum: IN VICTORY, MAGNANIMITY.
It would be tempting for the Boris campaign to exact vengeance on its defeated opponents. To punish Jeremy Hunt for his tough campaign rhetoric and the, frankly juvenile, push to report Boris Johnson’s team to the Information Commissioner.
But Boris must remember that, even with a large mandate from party members, he is still operating in a hung Parliament and needs to keep his Parliamentary party as together as possible.
Boris is right to insist that all members of his Cabinet sign up to his policy of leaving on October 31 come what may.
The Government will have to speak with one voice, and be able to carry Parliament, if it is going to find out whether the Irish and the EU are prepared to compromise on the backstop to avoid a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.
Boris, though, doesn’t need to open windows into men’s souls.
One Cabinet minister wary of the October 31 pledge tells me they will sign up to it with “our fingers crossed behind our backs.” As long as they stick to the line in public, and do what is needed to prepare for No Deal, that should be enough for Boris.
Those around Boris say other Cabinet ministers could learn from the enthusiasm with which Matt Hancock has embraced the project since dropping out of the leadership race. But a simple willingness to be loyal in public and private for as a long as he is PM should be sufficient.
The Tory party doesn’t have enough talent to have, say, Michael Gove on the backbenches.
Boris must also be careful to ensure that his Cabinet doesn’t look factional. As one of those who knows the Tory Parliamentary party best warns, if it does: “There’ll be an equal and opposite reaction.”
This magnanimity must go both ways, though. Philip Hammond and other Cabinet ministers who will be out as they won’t sign up to leaving on October 31, must give Boris’s Brexit plan a chance to work.
If they force on the Government another delay, then there will be a general election which could well result in a Jeremy Corbyn government — and that would be FAR MORE DAMAGING to the UK than the disruption of a no-deal Brexit.
Border! Border! Boris prepares...
I UNDERSTAND that from Thursday, the main attention of Boris’s top team will shift to preparing for government. Most of the votes will have been cast in the leadership contest by then so this is the time to change their focus.
There are various different bits of work going on at the moment. Matt Hancock, Health Secretary and enthusiastic Boris convert, is devising a 100-day agenda designed to allow the Government to hit the ground running.
But perhaps most important is the work that Geoffrey Cox, the Attorney General, is doing. He is in charge of working on Brexit strategy, both in terms of how to negotiate with the EU and how to deal with Parliament.
A sign of how different Boris Johnson’s approach will be to Theresa May came this week, when he told The Spectator in an interview that even in the event of No Deal he would not build border posts on the Irish border. This is designed to challenge Dublin and the EU to say what they would do in these circumstances.
The fundamental problem with the backstop is that by making it impossible for the withdrawal agreement to get through Parliament, it might cause the thing it is designed to avoid: A hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.
Time for Corbyn to shift
JEREMY Corbyn's position as Labour leader is in more danger than it has been at any point since the last General Election.
The fence-straddling on Brexit, which served him so well in 2017, isn’t working any more. Labour came a poor third in the European Elections and is struggling in the polls, down at 18 per cent in one this week.
Even those who are normally his most loyal backers in the Shadow Cabinet are critical of his position. They argue that he must now move to fully backing Remain and a second referendum if Labour is not to keep on losing support.
However, they are not yet prepared to pin the blame on Corbyn for Labour’s troubles, instead preferring to blame those around him.
One Shadow Cabinet member who is close to Corbyn politically, tells me: “Jeremy doesn’t like confrontation. But he is going to have to confront Karie and Seumas over this,” a reference to Karie Murphy and Seumas Milne, two of Corbyn’s closest advisers, who are both passionately opposed to a shift to a Remain position.
In truth, though, there are no easy answers for Labour on Brexit. A shift to full-on Remain would be a risk – 16 of their 20 most vulnerable seats voted Leave.
But with the Lib Dems and Greens eating into Labour’s Remain vote, Corbyn is going to have to properly come off the fence soon.
Incoming PM can deal with wary DUP
THE new Prime Minister has one great advantage in dealing with the DUP: They are acutely aware that having helped bring down one PM, it would be very dangerous for them to bring down another.
Add to this that their leadership is very wary of leaving on No Deal and it is clear the incoming Prime Minister has a chance of winning them round if they can get a genuine change to the backstop.
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Jog on, Boris
BORIS Johnson’s protection team have a dilemma. When he goes out jogging, what should they do?
As he himself admits, he runs very slowly. They could keep up with him just by walking.
But there is concern it might look a bit odd – embarrassing even – for them to be walking as he’s jogging.
- James Forsyth is political editor of The Spectator