I am surprised this morning to find Dominic Cummings still in post. The revelations yesterday came thick and fast. First it emerged that he broke the lockdown rules by travelling with his wife and son 270 miles to his parents farm in County Durham, apparently when both he and his partner apparently had coronavirus. This was defended by No 10 in an ever-changing and increasingly convoluted and implausible story that became flimsier by the hour. There was a Twitter storm the likes of which I never saw before.
After a day of fevered speculation Nick Robinson at the BBC tweeted:
The worrying thing from Cummings point of view at this point (8:49pm last night) was the lack of support from Tory MPs. As far as I could see the only supporting tweets (all remarkably similar) came from ministers who were presumably doing it through gritted teeth at gunpoint. Cummings is not a man overburdened with friends.No 10 threw everything at protecting Dominic Cummings today. Nevertheless this story is very far from over https://t.co/E5uWftlJjA— Nick Robinson (@bbcnickrobinson) May 23, 2020
Even The Spectator (edited by Fraser Nelson, a position once occupied by Johnson himself) published a story by Alex Massie saying Cummings must go.
MI6 Rogue, a Twitter account apparently inside the government somewhere, claimed the whips had lost control (excuse the language):
More revelations then came out that he had done the same 270 mile journey twice. This was reported both by The Sunday Mirror and The Observer when eye witnesses said they had seen Cummings and his wife in the locality on a different date.The last info I heard about whats is currently going on in No10 is the whips had lost control & were telling ministers MPs were telling the whips to 'go fuck' when phoning/Emailing to defend Cummings. #sackcummmings— MI6 Rogue 🇬🇧 (@mi6rogue) May 23, 2020
After that, someone else claimed they had seen the pair in Barnard Castle, 30 miles from where Cimmings was supposed to have been staying!
At 11:00 pm Beth Rigby at Sky News Tweeted:
Weekend newspapers are full of Cummings. It is the only story in town and he is at the epicentre of it. I cannot see how he will be able to survive more than a day or two. This is The Sunday Telegraph:No Conservative MP or minister spoken out (other than in support) for Cummings. But privately there is anger and incredulity. Senior minister told me tonight Cummings has to go because he’s ‘damaging the team and the policy’. PM using up a lot of political capital— Beth Rigby (@BethRigby) May 23, 2020
Even Steve Baker of the ERG has called on him to go.SUNDAY TELEGRAPH: Cummings faces fresh claims that he broke lockdown as row engulfs number 10 #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/rrFYMgN7uJ— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) May 23, 2020
The Downing Street line this morning is that the eye witnesses are wrong or liars and that Cummings never made the second (or third) trips at all. They intend to brazen it out:
The longer Boris Johnson delays making a decision the more it damages him, his judgement and his government. Cummings will have to go and Johnson himself will face questions about how much he knew of Cummings' movements.Astonishingly naive response from Number 10...copying Trump.. but in a way that makes Trump seem subtle.. https://t.co/S85siXASnz— steve richards (@steverichards14) May 23, 2020
I don't know which ministers or Tory MPs will be on Andrew Marr or the other political shows this weekend - I don't watch them anyway - but God help them.
Cummings cannot survive this.
The problem for Johnson is that Cummings was effectively - the government. The PM is in BIG TROUBLE.
