
The Boris Johnson paradox
Here is the Boris Johnson paradox: the Tory party appears to have made up its institutional mind that Boris Johnson will be its next leader and our prime minister. And yet all the senior Tories I meet – ministers, MPs and especially his supporters – are bracing themselves to be disappointed and even betrayed by him. They don’t trust him. But they are aching for him. One household-name, Johnson-backing, Tory Brexiter, a little the worse for wear at The Spectator’s party last week, told me ‘of course Boris is going to eff us; it’s what he does.’ When he and his colleagues rationalise this contradiction, when they explain why only
