FROM the authors of May At 10: The Verdict, viz, Sir Anthony Seldon and Raymond Newell, comes the acclaimed Sunday Times bestseller on one of the most charismatic – and controversial – British leaders to ever occupy 10 Downing Street, titled, Johnson At 10: The Inside Story.
About the premiership of the unmistakably blond-haired New York City-born politician, Boris Johnson (one of only two British prime ministers to have been an American citizen), the 624-page book focuses on the periods of post-Brexit, his tenure at No. 10 (July 24, 2019 – September 6, 2022) pending the Covid-19 debacle, the outbreak of war in the Ukraine and the Partygate scandal (where it emerged that social gatherings of government and Conservative Party staff occurred against COVID-19 regulations).
Based on more than 200 interviews with aides and insiders, Seldon’s and Newell’s account offers behind-the-scenes perspective on a premiership deemed divisive pending the most turbulent epoch of British history.
In the introduction the writers draw fascinating parallels between Johnson and a predecessor from hundred years afore his tenure, viz, David Lloyd George – even mentioning George nearly succumbing to the Spanish Flu in September 1918 and Johnson from Covid in April 2020.
Furthermore, the two statesmen are observed to have had favoured the US system of governance in which the president feels obliged to the mandate of the citizenry rather than to his political party or country’s Parliament. (Johnson’s tenure occurred parallel to that of President Donald Trump – a character he deemed ‘unfit’ to hold the office of President of the United States – and their helming of their respective nations at inadvertently the same period appeared as sheer coincidence, even down to the duo spotting blond hairstyles!)
An alumnus of Eton College and Balliol College, Oxford who rose from being a member of Prime Minister David Cameron’s shadow cabinet to becoming Leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022, Johnson – whose economist father constantly moved the family to-and-fro the US, the UK and Belgium owing to his work postings – was no ordinary premier when he ascended to power and his term in high office happened to be defined by the resolving of the daunting events of Brexit, the Covid pandemic and the Ukranian conflict.
Ably versatile and clearly aspirant, by the time he became the prominent player at Whitehall, Johnson had designed his way into the public impression by writing a book on another of his predecessors, Winston Churchill; became the editor of The Spectator weekly magazine where despite his repeated absenteeism and delegating of duties unto others (freelance writers claimed he’d bluster thus, upon their suggesting a topic: “yes, yes, tremendous idea – when can I have it, I need it now.”), he oversaw to the publication’s rise in circulation and profitability, in addition to twice being elected as Mayor of London, 2008–2016, including, to critical acclaim, helming the metropolis pending its successful hosting of the 2012 Olympic Games!
Laying Johnson’s character traits bare to scrutiny, the authors describe him as, although imbued with a larger-than-life persona, lacking no interest or understanding of how organizations work or the jobs people need to perform within them and a lack of moral seriousness.
Although happily married, Johnson is said to have had a wandering eye and when he dismissed an allegation of an affair as ‘an inverted pyramid of piffle’ – he was exposed as a blatant liar! Incredulously too old for an elected public figure, an aide adjudged him as ‘high on vision and enthusiasm, but terrible on money: he had no idea if something was going to cost 1 million, 10 million or 1 billion pounds Sterling.’ He was the first Prime Minister to have been found by the police to have broken the law.
With regard to Brexit – the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union – Seldon and Newell reckon that Johnson’s imprint on history will be judged upon Britain’s exit from the EU and the deal reached on the future relationship, two foremost events he shaped.
“We will look back in fifty years’ time,” argue the duo writers, “at the Johnson premiership and remember it for one overwhelming fact: Brexit. It was one of those rare decisions which reverberates through history, its importance enduring to the history of the United Kingdom.”
Hardly had Johnson manoeuvred through the Brexit hurdle than did he run headlong into what in the tome is described as the worst health crisis since the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918–19, in the form of Covid-19 – which the authors claim exposed the Prime Minister as completely unsuited to the challenges which arrived with its outbreak, with Downing Street initially not becoming involved in initiatives (such as the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies) put in place to counter the threat.
As the menace spread its tentacles, a sense of lack of leadership prevailed with No. 10 and the Cabinet Office deemed to be found wanting with regard to a coordinated approach to combating it.
Eventually, during a March 23, 2020 broadcast, the libertarian premier instructed the British people to stay at home, with him displaying a laissez faire attitude to the pandemic – an adviser remarked that he proved difficult to persuade to wear a mask – whilst expecting compliance from his subjects!
And so did he duly contract the virus with government officials hearing him coughing in his study and they murmuring among themselves: ‘He’s got Covid, hasn’t he?’
At the beginning of the eighth chapter of the narrative, there’s an image limning Johnson walking alongside Ukranian president, Volodymir Zelenskyy on a street of the capital, Kyiv on April 9, 2022.
Britain’s Foreign Secretary pending Theresa May’s premiership, as her immediate successor at No. 10, Johnson has been praised by many for pledging military aid and supporting anti-Russian sanctions in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of the country.
It all came crashing down for Johnson when, nine days after he had, on June 2022, responded to a query about his premiership’s longevity that, ‘at the moment I’m thinking actively about the third term and what could happen then’ he delivered his resignation speech in front of No. 10 Downing Street on July 7, 2022 in the aftermath of the highest number of ministerial resignations from his Cabinet, in UK history.
Having been invited by Queen Elizabeth II to form a government in 2019 – he had been prime minister for 3 years and 44 days.
Johnson At 10: The Inside Story, is a paperback published by Atlantic Books and distributed across South Africa by Jonathan Ball Publishers.
Available at leading bookstores countrywide, it retails for R345.
