Johnson at 10: The Inside Story: The Bestselling Political Biography of the Year

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Covid and Cummings are the central two chapters of the book and they complement one another perfectly. Covid would have been difficult for any PM but did not suit Johnson as it commanded too much detail. Cummings ended up running the show, and it was obvious from the daily briefings at the time that officials were having an enormous say in the decision-making during the pandemic. There are a couple of points to be said in Johnson’s favour. He did win an election with a clear majority, which is a notable achievement even in the supposedly decisive British system (helped of course by the incompetence at the time of Labour and the Lib Dems). He was seriously committed to Net Zero, and was ready to argue the toss on climate with sceptics in his own party, though less good at doing the preparatory legwork for the Glasgow COP meeting. He came in early and strong on Ukraine’s side in the war, and helped consolidate the G7 and NATO in support. (Though there too, the UK is a smaller player compared to the US and the EU.) Partygate, the most important of the scandals that finished him, was an appropriate nemesis for such a lawless regime.

This book is truly an eye opener as to the inner workings of a government in crisis from the day Johnson came into power, a man in his own eyes who could do no wrong or make no wrong decisions, instead he was making them daily. History will not remember him kindly, nor should it, as I said in my first sentence we are a country now lower in world statistics in virtually all areas since Johnson was elected to power. The conservative party are still in disarray even though he has left. The next government whoever it may be has a very very long road to go down to bring us to where we were a decade or so ago, and with no extra money in the pot. I am now so disillusioned with government and democracy as I cannot see which political party can get us out of the mess that was Boris and take us forward. Everyone he dealt with sooner or later found him dissembling, because he was only ever willing to commit to a position if he thought there was some immediate personal advantage or because his hand had been forced. One of his officials says he lied “morning, noon and night”. He lied not just to the public, but also and often to his closest associates.A desperate desire to hold court/power over his court. In some way BJ revelled in the chaos of having three different factions within his team, as shown by the story of Carrie and DC. It actually gave him protection and an ability to blame others. Similar to Hitler, who was well aware of the egos/dislike many German generals had for one another. This is the latest in the long and distinguished series of "immediate" accounts of recent British prime ministers. Anthony Seldon is a fine historian of British politics and the constitution. His judgments of political figures are invariably sound and reasonable. So it is with this account of the turbulent premiership of Boris Johnson. During one of many episodes of derangement in Downing Street, Johnson is to be found raving: “I am meant to be in control. I am the führer. I’m the king who takes the decisions.” The would-be great dictator was never in control because he was incapable of performing even some of the most basic functions of a leader.

The related tragedy was the national one, in which we are still living. Whatever you thought of Brexit, Seldon argues – he thought it was a bad idea – it did provide “the overdue opportunity to modernise the British state and Britain’s institutions. There was a desperate need to bring the civil service up to date,” he says. “To forge better connections between universities and public life, to rejuvenate professions.” What motivated Javid and Sunak’s resignations as former and current Chancellors? Did the Chris Pincher scandal prove a step too far or were there other motives to topple Johnson?Johnson got away with the big things where others bailed him out but it was the smaller decisions which were just down to him which really let him down, and ultimately lost him his dream job. Barnard Castle was the perfect opportunity to get rid of Cummings but he dithered. It was the same with Patterson, Partygate and Pincher - all things which could have been dealt with far better but blew up into much larger issues than they actually were. Secondly, it refutes the dangerous myth that Boris Johnson was foiled by a remainer establishment, rather than his own incompetence. His former chief of staff Eddie Lister declares that there is “no evidence that the civil service impeded the delivery of Brexit” and the authors conclude that if Johnson didn’t always get what he wanted from Whitehall, that’s because he led it poorly.

A myth peddled that he was the best leader given the toughest brief and any failures are to do with others (Trump often blames is failures on his predecessors). Evidence proves his personal floors were such even if he had become PM at the 1st time of asking, it would likely still have been a disaster. We can agree on that much, I suggest. But does he really think that the lessons of Johnson’s government have been learned? Politics Inside 24 hours of Westminster chaos as Boris Johnson tried to spin the Sue Gray report to MPs Read MoreThe fact is,” he says, “people come into No 10 knowing less about [complex organisations] than most people running companies employing less than 20 people. That’s forgivable. What is unforgivable is that almost without exception, they do not want to learn how to do it. They think they know best. They are often snide, poisonous, dismissive of previous teams, particularly teams from their same party. And they come in with frothing adrenaline and swagger.” Boris Johnson and wife Carrie on their final day in Downing Street. Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images