Not for the first time, a throwaway line in a Spectator article by James Forsyth has been picked up by Fleet St and set the hares running. It’s about Steve
Hilton, Cameron’s best friend and chief strategist, and whether he’ll quit. Hilton is a man in a hurry — rightly, in my view, as the Tories are not incapable of blowing the next election. So
he wants things transformed, and — for all his faults — acutely feels the sense of urgency and tries to communicate it through government. The Whitehall machine (and, more specifically,
the permanent secretary of No.10) does not share this urgency and waters down change. It poses a grave risk. Cameron’s mission to change Britain could be over, before it begins.
Two weeks ago, in his definitive piece about all this, James said that Hilton (who is the proud father of a second child) is getting increasingly frustrated:
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