What the squabbling in No 10 tells us about Boris Johnson’s style of governing

David Frost, the prime minister’s Brexit negotiator, has been promoted to the cabinet to stop him resigning, while Oliver Lewis, known as Sonic, Frost’s former deputy, has quit, and there are well-sourced, colourful accounts this weekend of 10 Downing Street descending into infighting between warring factions.

This latest turmoil started nine days ago, with the appointment of Simone Finn and Henry Newman to posts in No 10. They are close to Michael Gove, which put the noses of some Boris Johnson loyalists out of joint. Lord Frost threatened to leave but was made a cabinet minister instead on Wednesday and given part of Gove’s job: dealing with the EU. That evening, Johnson is said to have accused Lewis of briefing the Financial Times against Newman; they met on Thursday, when Johnson tried to persuade Lewis not to resign; but on Friday he quit anyway.

The atmosphere in No 10 is described as terrible, with strong personalities and loyalties pulling people apart. Carrie Symonds, the prime minister’s fiancee, is a well-connected and forceful Conservative Party operator, who is friends with Finn and Newman despite their role in urging Gove to betray Johnson in the 2016 leadership election. Lewis is one of the Vote Leave team assembled by Dominic Cummings, who left in November after falling out with Symonds.

Daniel Rosenfield was brought in from a civil service background to restore order as Johnson’s chief of staff, but according to Paul Goodman, the editor of Conservative Home, “as a recent arrival from outside the Tory family, he finds himself a civilian amidst a landscape of RPG-wielding clans, with their tribal customs, feuds, intermarriages and culture”.

It is hard to judge how important all this is. Alastair Campbell used to complain about Downing Street “getting a bit Peyton effing Place” when tensions swirled in which Cherie, Tony Blair’s wife, was involved (Peyton Place being a US soap opera in the 1960s that became a byword for histrionics).

Goodman’s view is that “the main issues at stake are not so much personal, let alone administrative, as political”. He says there are disagreements of substance over EU policy, Northern Ireland and Scotland, and that Johnson hasn’t always made up his mind and stuck to it.

It reflects badly on the prime minister’s style that he allows such disorder around him, but it is possible that this is precisely how he likes it. Goodman comments: “Johnson’s approach to politics – indeed, to life – is a bit like Wittgenstein’s to philosophy: ‘You have to descend into primeval chaos and feel at home there.’ It works for him.”

Well, it has so far, but you have to wonder whether it works for the country.

Yours,

John Rentoul

Chief political commentator