When Theresa May finally, formally steps down in just under a fortnight, Boris Johnson is on course to be the main beneficiary of her resignation. But the hot question in Whitehall and Westminster this morning whether he will he now get the chance to benefit from Sir Kim Darroch’s resignation too.
The shockwaves within the civil service of the downfall of the UK’s ambassador to the US shouldn’t be underestimated. Leaks are a fact of life for many who work in government, but what’s different in this case is that an American president has exploited a confidential document to effectively hound Britain’s most senior diplomat out of his job. Within the foreign office and No.10, the ‘chilling effect’ on similarly frank advice from diplomats around the world is a grave cause for concern.
Allies of May say she is determined ‘not to let the leaker win’. And she knows one way they would ‘win’ is if Johnson installs someone in Washington who is not drawn from the foreign office cadre of highly experienced officials. Cabinet secretary Sir Mark Sedwill, seen by some Brexiteers as an Establishment opponent of no-deal, is high on the list of contenders. But I’m told May’s shortlist also includes highly rated female diplomats in key posts: current UN ambassador Dame Karen Pierce and Beijing ambassador Barbara Woodward.
The Times has its own list, with Antonia Romero, the permanent secretary at the Department for International Trade and former consul-general in New York, seen as a favourite. Liam Fox himself “would absolutely love to do it”, sources tell the paper. George Osborne (who recently endorsed Johnson in his London Evening Standard) is another political name floated at Westminster.
Don’t forget that the US ambassador appointment is decided by the PM, on the advice of the foreign secretary, and confirmed by the Queen. With Jeremy Hunt as keen as May to uphold the foreign office’s integrity, it’s hard to see any left-field candidate succeeding if she does indeed fast-track the process before she quits later this month. The main reason for the haste will be the need not to let such a vital post be kept vacant. Johnson’s team are likely to pushback at any accelerated appointment.
As for Johnson’s role in Darroch’s demise, I’ve written HERE an anatomy of the resignation. After hearing Johnson’s failure to support him, as well as waking to Trump’s Twitter tantrum, the ambassador ‘felt he had nowhere else to go’, one insider said. The Sun reports Darroch wanted ‘to control his own destiny’. Team Boris insist the national interest meant he took a cold-eyed decision to put Trump and Brexit first. For some MPs in his team, the UK’s departure from the EU was more important than Darroch’s departure from Washington.
In a fascinating interview with Politico’s Jack Blanchard, Johnson makes plain he agreed with Trump’s tweets about May’s Brexit deal failures. He even makes a joke about Darroch: “If Donald Trump can make friends with Kim Jong Un, then he can make friends with Kim Dar-roch.”
Yet it’s obviously easy to heap praise on a man once his fate has been sealed. The great irony here is that it was Darroch who helped secure an ‘in’ for Johnson with the Trump team when he became foreign secretary in 2016 - months after he had talked of the “stupefying ignorance that makes him frankly unfit to hold the office of President of the United States”.
Philip Hammond sounds like a man who is already de-mob happy. He’s become more vocal in recent weeks about the dangers of a no-deal Brexit, ruffling feathers in Cabinet in the process. I’m told that at a political cabinet recently, he ‘patronised’ Brexit secretary Steve Barclay as his colleague suggested collective responsibility should apply over no-deal. ’That’s a silly suggestion,” the Chancellor said, declaring that the Tory leadership contest would make such a position unsustainable.
Last night, on ITV’s Peston, Hammond sounded like he was endorsing Sir John Major’s legal threat to stop a no-deal prorogation of parliament. “We’d have to challenge it, we have to challenge it. The idea that elected Members of Parliament will be locked out of their place of work because they might do their job is truly shocking.”
Hammond also had a withering verdict on Johnson’s ITV debate claim that the cost of no-deal would be ‘vanishingly small’: “It’s wrong. It’s straightforwardly wrong.” But May won’t be pleased either at his signal that he won’t sign off billions to be spent on her ‘legacy’ projects. “Ask my wife, I’m notoriously difficult to persuade to open a cheque book in any circumstances.”
Even Hammond’s allies in cabinet sometimes worry about his stubbornness. His original refusal to authorise any spending for the net zero emissions target was reversed after colleagues had pointed out that the cost was nowhere near the mad £1 trillion some in the Treasury had calculated. In fact, it will help save the taxpayer money.
Meanwhile, we reported yesterday a senior Cabinet minister had told colleagues that a UK-US trade deal between Trump and Johnson “will never happen”, largely because American demands for agricultural standards will make it impossible. A sector-specific deal on financial services is much more likely, I’m told. Given that the Spectator suggestsJohnson wants the UK to join NAFTA, and given that the need to get a trade deal is a key ambition of his, we will find out soon if those Cabinet doubts are justified.
Most neutrals watching last night’s BBC Panorama special would have been moved by the testimony of Jewish party members and officials who recounted the abuse they have received offline and in person in meetings. Aside from the main allegations, it brought home the lived experience of those most affected.
Given the way the programme made direct allegations about Jeremy Corbyn and his most senior aides, it’s no surprise that his team have hit back hard with a string of lengthy and detailed rebuttals. It will be for the Equalities and Human Rights Commission to actually adjudicate on all of this, as I’m told Panorama’s evidence will form a key part of its investigation.
What is truly depressing but perhaps unsurprising was the reaction online to even the testimony of those Jewish members who said they felt unsafe. They were ridiculed, abused and declared enemies of Corbyn - all things that Corbyn would surely deprecate. As one participant in the programme put it last night, if this was anti-black racism, there would be zero tolerance of it.
As it happens, I got hold of the guidance for ‘socialist social media’ that was shared by key aides to the Labour leader this week. Read it in full HERE. It’s worth pointing out that the phrase ‘outriders’ was not my phrase, but the terminology of the person who drafted the guidance. I’m told it was not sent to leftwing journalists or commentators but instead to the real online army backing Corbyn - the network of Twitter and Facebook accounts that is used to promote his message. Few know much of how that network works, but it is crucial to his following.
Watch US women’s football World Cup winner Megan Rapinoe explain why she won’t be visiting Trump’s White House.
The DWP has today announced it will carry out a review of a controversial “policy fudge” that is denying thousands of terminally ill people from claiming fast-track benefits. This is an issue that HuffPost UK has been reporting on in detail and it’s a welcome announcement.
As if everyone wasn’t depressed enough this week, today’s long-awaited report into bullying and harassment in Westminster has just been released. Gemma White QC won’t name names but it is expected to make grim reading.
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