Katy Balls Katy Balls

The Tory cadets who want a shot at the top

[Getty Images]

When Conservative prime ministers face a problem of logistics – from ambulance-driver shortages to border-force failures – there is a solution they like to fall back on: send in the military.

When Boris Johnson was London mayor, he welcomed David Cameron’s decision to invite the army to help with the Olympics after the security firm G4S failed to provide enough staff. Now Johnson is in No. 10, he regularly calls in the troops to deal with any state deficiencies. During the pandemic, army personnel worked closely with the NHS, first in helping to build a Nightingale hospital in ten days and then during the vaccine rollout. Just this week, the government welcomed ‘a far-reaching review’ of health and social care leadership co-produced by Sir Gordon Messenger, who led the Royal Marines’ invasion of Iraq.

Might the army also fix the dysfunction in Johnson’s Downing Street? At the start of the year, when the partygate story broke, Tobias Ellwood – a former soldier and the chair of the defence select committee – said that an officer should be drafted in to bring ‘a bit of discipline’. None was forthcoming. Instead, Johnson replied with a military allusion, telling colleagues it would take a ‘Panzer division’ to get him out of No. 10.

Since then, things have got worse for the Prime Minister. Ellwood is one of the 148 MPs who this week voted to force him out of office. The rebels failed this time, but the fact that 41 per cent of the parliamentary party voted against Johnson means there’s talk of there being a second attempt before the year is out, and a leadership contest to follow. Such a contest would be unpredictable. After Rishi Sunak’s fall from grace, there is no obvious frontrunner. But many Tory MPs and party members are beginning to think that candidates with military credentials could have the edge.

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