Boris johnson

As the man who quite literally wrote the book on Churchill, Boris Johnson will be all too keen to encourage talk of a comeback. There’s much excited talk in the corridors of power about whether the former premier really can mount a comeback, just four months after leaving in disgrace. Lists of MPs are being circulated, with Johnson needing 100 MPs by Monday to get on the ballot. Can the king of the comebacks do it once more? One place where Johnson certainly has his fans is on Fleet Street, where he’s provided more than his fair share of copy over the years. Much of the (still powerful) right wing

The question on everyone’s lips tonight is whether Boris Johnson can get 100 MP nominations by Monday. This is the bar that the 1922 committee have set. Johnson’s supporters have been coming out tonight at pace: he is up to 20-odd supporters already. But the question of whether he can get to 100 is difficult given the circumstances that led to his departure and the coming privileges committee investigation. Johnson’s advocates, though, think that if he can get that 100 and make it to the member’s round, then he will become the favourite. Rishi Sunak – whom I have been friends with for a long time – and Penny Mordaunt both ran

In the past few minutes, Conor Burns has been told to leave the government after a complaint of ‘serious misconduct’ was made against him. Downing Street has released a statement saying:  Following a complaint of serious misconduct, the Prime Minister has asked Conor Burns MP to leave the government with immediate effect. The Prime Minister took direct action on being informed of this allegation and is clear that all ministers should maintain the high standards of behaviour – as the public rightly expects. No. 10’s press release is keen to stress that the Prime Minister took immediate action Burns was moved sideways by Liz Truss in the recent reshuffle, from

The ejection of Boris Johnson from Downing Street today proves that the UK has not gone the way of Donald Trump’s United States, Viktor Orbán’s Hungary or Narendra Modi’s India. For all our faults, the strongman model of leader ends in farce rather than fascism here. Liberal critics ought to be big enough to concede that Conservative MPs – more than any opposition party, movement or institution – saved us from populist authoritarianism. No doubt they did so for impure and self-interested reasons, but this is politics and it is deeds – not motives – that matter most. Johnson’s failure to impose his will on his parliamentary party was his

Levelling up is probably not even in the top tier of Liz Truss’s intray for this week, given the pressure to do something big on energy bills, and then to address the multiple other crises including the NHS, the Northern Ireland Protocol and Ukraine. But what she does with her predecessor’s flagship policy is a matter of great anxiety for MPs and activists in Red Wall seats. I spent some time over the weekend with Conservative councillors, MPs and Tory members in Greater Manchester. Unsurprisingly, most of them had supported Truss as be party leader. But most of them were also anxious about the future of levelling up, or whatever

Boris Johnson’s last set piece speech today was typical him. There were references to Ladybird books, attempts to blame the last Labour government, not much detail but lots of optimism about how things are about to get better. Johnson has so dominated British politics these past few years that it is hard to imagine it without him. (Of course, he won’t disappear – which will cause its own problems for his successor – but he’ll no longer be PM). As I say in the magazine this week, his absence will reshape the political landscape because his presence defined it. Keir Starmer has relished attacking Johnson, but he must now pivot. In normal circumstances

Liz Truss has always been more popular with Tory party members than with Tory politicians. The moment of greatest peril for her in the Conservative leadership race was when MPs were whittling down the final two candidates. After being knocked out in the second round, Suella Braverman urged her Brexiteer backers to get behind the Foreign Secretary. Many refused to do so and instead supported Kemi Badenoch, which meant that Truss’s vote count only went up by seven MPs. The momentum could have moved to Badenoch, then behind by just 13. ‘It was the most stressful point of the contest,’ recalls a supporter of the Foreign Secretary. Eventually Truss made

Boris Johnson has written more than his fair share of controversial stuff over the years. Whether it’s jibes at Islam, the Commonwealth or Barack Obama, general statements about blue collar men, working women and single mothers or, er, advice on handling female Spectator employees – ‘just pat her on the bottom and send her on her way’ – there’s always been something to annoy the left. He, for his part, is largely unapologetic, claiming in the 2019 election debates that: ‘If you go through all my articles with a fine-tooth comb and pick out individual phrases, there’s no doubt that you can take out things that can be made to

Boris Johnson is very much the elephant in the room of this leadership race, looming large over both Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss. And much like an intimidating pachyderm, neither candidate seems completely confident how to handle him without being squashed. Sunak’s approach is the simpler one: talk about the defenestrated premier as little as possible and for God’s sake don’t mention how the ex-Chancellor helped bring him down. Truss meanwhile has opted to praise the former PM while, er, claiming to be the change candidate who’d take a completely different approach in office. This of course begs the question: what do the Tory members actually think? Are they pining

With just four weeks left in No. 10, rumours are swirling about Boris Johnson’s future plans. Will he quit the Commons or face down his critics on the Privileges Committee? Make a mint on the speaking circuit or champion Kyiv’s cause? With debts, costs and childcare bills, one thing’s for sure: Boris’s next job will probably pay far better than the extra £79,000 he gets to be PM on top of his MPs’ salary. So it’s no surprise then that there is plenty of talk in Fleet Street right now about the Old Etonian resuming his columnist duties. Johnson received £250,000 a year when he was London Mayor to write

After a long period in office, it’s natural for any political party to lose their zeal for governing. As problems mount up, loyalties fray as the stench of sleaze begins to reek. In hushed whispers, MPs begin to talk of a ‘spell in the wilderness’ as opposition looks increasingly attractive compared to the burdens of statesmanship. Some Tories in Westminster appear to be flirting with such sentiments now, judging from the lackluster enthusiasm which the current contest seems to inspire. After a dozen years in office, the thinking goes, could now be the time for a ‘reset’? A brief respite on the other side of the Commons, time for a