Yesterday was a mixture of farce and disaster in Downing Street. Four of his most senior staff resigned on the same day while he was on a visit to Blackpool and last night his 'shadow whips' (a description that includes Nigel Adams, the most deluded of his stooges) were briefing that this was part of the 'clear out' Johnson had promised his MPs on Monday. This was after Johnson himself has been telling everyone else to wait for the Metropolitan Police to report. Nobody seems to believe any of it was actually planned by the PM - although with him it can often be hard to tell.
Cummings tweeted half way through that the bunker was collapsing and I think it is:
Moral courage from Munira who has done her best to make progress with a professional team throughout the horror since 11/20. It's also an unmistakeable signal the bunker is collapsing & *this PM is finished*.Flicker of moral courage from Cabinet & Cabinet Office asap please— Dominic Cummings (@Dominic2306) February 3, 2022
Someone suggested it was like Harold MacMillan's night of the long knives - but in reverse.
It must be clear to Johnson his time is up. People he wanted to bring in like Antonia Romeo and Lynton Crosby turned him down even before yesterday's events which must make Downing Street an even less enticing prospect than it was the day before.
Nobody of any worth or with any self respect will take on the jobs vacated, working for a man who quite obviously has serious character flaws if not genuine mental issues. He is as he always has been, totally out of control.
Cummings himself advised any potential applicants that the incoming prime minister is going to bring in his own team and the new job - for which you may have given up a good one - will have lasted just a few short weeks or even days at this rate.
I noted Gavin (Lord) Barwell on the Today programme saying that privately cabinet ministers are deeply concerned at how Downing Street is descending into chaos. Up to now they have all defended the PM publicly but Rishi Sunak has opened up a very small division by suggesting he himself wouldn't have used the words Johnson did about Kier Starmer, although his chief secretary Simon Clarke, who comes over as somewhat robotic, thought Johnson's smear was perfectly OK.
All of this would have been bad enough, but it isn't just the bunker which is collapsing, the entire economy is entering a very turbulent period. Yesterday, below the smokescreen of the chaotic events in No 10 we had:
- OFGEM announcing a 53% increase in the energy price cap from April
- The BoE announcing inflation will reach 7.25% very shortly
- Real wages will FALL by 2% this year
- GDP growth forecast for this year was lowered
- Interest rates went up again to 0.5%