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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/dec/08/top-secret-shambles-brexit-stanley-johnson-gets-boot
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| Version 2 | Version 3 |
|---|---|
| A top secret shambles on the Brexit front, as Stanley Johnson gets the boot | A top secret shambles on the Brexit front, as Stanley Johnson gets the boot |
| (30 days later) | |
| David Davis shows why public confidence in Brexit is plummeting, while Johnson exits jungle trumpeting: ‘Is Boris still PM?’ | David Davis shows why public confidence in Brexit is plummeting, while Johnson exits jungle trumpeting: ‘Is Boris still PM?’ |
| Contact author | Contact author |
| Fri 8 Dec 2017 14.53 GMT | Fri 8 Dec 2017 14.53 GMT |
| Last modified on Wed 14 Feb 2018 15.29 GMT | |
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| Monday | Monday |
| MPs were finally allowed to read the government’s Brexit analyses. Though only under tight security. Full instructions were sent out in a letter from the junior Brexit minister Robin Walker. First, MPs had to log on to a government website to book a one-hour slot to read the 850 pages contained in two lever-arch files. On arrival at the top-secret location, MPs were asked to hand over their mobile phones and other electronic or recording devices, and were then led into the reading room where they were kept under surveillance at all times. To make sure there was no chicanery and that the security detail could not be distracted, just eight MPs were allowed in at any time. Those who did submit themselves to Walker’s demands soon found themselves wondering what they were missing in the files that the government had been so keen to keep private. Several MPs who did make the effort reported back that the assessments were “insultingly patronising” and appeared to have been cobbled together from newspaper cuttings at the last minute. They concluded that the real reason for privacy was to contain the feeling of embarrassment. | MPs were finally allowed to read the government’s Brexit analyses. Though only under tight security. Full instructions were sent out in a letter from the junior Brexit minister Robin Walker. First, MPs had to log on to a government website to book a one-hour slot to read the 850 pages contained in two lever-arch files. On arrival at the top-secret location, MPs were asked to hand over their mobile phones and other electronic or recording devices, and were then led into the reading room where they were kept under surveillance at all times. To make sure there was no chicanery and that the security detail could not be distracted, just eight MPs were allowed in at any time. Those who did submit themselves to Walker’s demands soon found themselves wondering what they were missing in the files that the government had been so keen to keep private. Several MPs who did make the effort reported back that the assessments were “insultingly patronising” and appeared to have been cobbled together from newspaper cuttings at the last minute. They concluded that the real reason for privacy was to contain the feeling of embarrassment. |
| Tuesday | Tuesday |
| I’ve been doing events to promote my book – tonight’s was at the Wanstead Tap – and the bit that always makes me the most nervous is the questions from the audience, as I’m terrified of having nothing intelligent to say. One of the many reasons I know why I would make a hopeless politician is that there are so many areas over which I have no strong opinions. Or knowledge. That, though, is a cardinal sin in politics, where everyone must appear to care passionately about absolutely everything even if they know nothing about it. The sound of politicians burbling inanities about something on which they are completely clueless is a regular soundtrack of the Today programme on Radio 4. So thumbs up to Michael Gove for a rare moment of honesty in admitting his ignorance. When asked about the effect of China banning the import of millions of tonnes of plastic waste, the environment secretary said: “I don’t know what impact it will have. It is ... something to which – I will be completely honest – I have not given it sufficient thought.” Time for some expert help. | I’ve been doing events to promote my book – tonight’s was at the Wanstead Tap – and the bit that always makes me the most nervous is the questions from the audience, as I’m terrified of having nothing intelligent to say. One of the many reasons I know why I would make a hopeless politician is that there are so many areas over which I have no strong opinions. Or knowledge. That, though, is a cardinal sin in politics, where everyone must appear to care passionately about absolutely everything even if they know nothing about it. The sound of politicians burbling inanities about something on which they are completely clueless is a regular soundtrack of the Today programme on Radio 4. So thumbs up to Michael Gove for a rare moment of honesty in admitting his ignorance. When asked about the effect of China banning the import of millions of tonnes of plastic waste, the environment secretary said: “I don’t know what impact it will have. It is ... something to which – I will be completely honest – I have not given it sufficient thought.” Time for some expert help. |
| Wednesday | Wednesday |
| A new YouGov poll has found that public confidence in the government’s handling of Brexit has tumbled to a new low, with just one-fifth of the country believing it is doing a good job. To which the obvious next question is: “Why still so high?” Just what does the government have to do to lose the confidence of this rose-tinted 20%? One would have thought that failing to square off a deal with the DUP and not having bothered to make any impact assessments of leaving either the EU or the customs union might have caused one or two to have second thoughts about the government’s competence. David Davis’s performance before the Brexit select committee was best understood as a piece of surreal performance art. Called to explain why he had previously said the impact assessments existed in “excruciating detail” when he was now claiming they had never existed, Davis resorted to type. Playing stupid. Just because he had used the word impact, it didn’t follow that the impact assessments actually had any impact. A board member of a FTSE 100 company would be fired for less. | A new YouGov poll has found that public confidence in the government’s handling of Brexit has tumbled to a new low, with just one-fifth of the country believing it is doing a good job. To which the obvious next question is: “Why still so high?” Just what does the government have to do to lose the confidence of this rose-tinted 20%? One would have thought that failing to square off a deal with the DUP and not having bothered to make any impact assessments of leaving either the EU or the customs union might have caused one or two to have second thoughts about the government’s competence. David Davis’s performance before the Brexit select committee was best understood as a piece of surreal performance art. Called to explain why he had previously said the impact assessments existed in “excruciating detail” when he was now claiming they had never existed, Davis resorted to type. Playing stupid. Just because he had used the word impact, it didn’t follow that the impact assessments actually had any impact. A board member of a FTSE 100 company would be fired for less. |
| Thursday | Thursday |
| Stanley Johnson was many people’s favourite to win but this week was voted off I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! One of his first remarks on leaving the jungle was: “Is Boris still PM?” As so often with all the Johnsons, it was hard to know whether this was a genuine mistake or part of ongoing manoeuvres. Certainly Boris has done little in recent months to suggest he regards loyalty to Theresa May as a binding obligation. One person who would be equally as horrified at the prospect of Boris becoming prime minister as he is at the reality of Theresa is George Osborne. At a press gallery lunch, the former chancellor and now editor of the Evening Standard made several gags at Boris’s expense. The best was about the time he and Boris went to Texas to meet George W Bush. The presidential hopeful, as he was then, asked why Boris was wearing a Che Guevara watch. Boris immediately replied that the watch actually belonged to his sister. Bush then replied that it was just as well, because in Texas you could be executed for owning a Che watch. Osborne appeared to regard that as a missed opportunity. | Stanley Johnson was many people’s favourite to win but this week was voted off I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! One of his first remarks on leaving the jungle was: “Is Boris still PM?” As so often with all the Johnsons, it was hard to know whether this was a genuine mistake or part of ongoing manoeuvres. Certainly Boris has done little in recent months to suggest he regards loyalty to Theresa May as a binding obligation. One person who would be equally as horrified at the prospect of Boris becoming prime minister as he is at the reality of Theresa is George Osborne. At a press gallery lunch, the former chancellor and now editor of the Evening Standard made several gags at Boris’s expense. The best was about the time he and Boris went to Texas to meet George W Bush. The presidential hopeful, as he was then, asked why Boris was wearing a Che Guevara watch. Boris immediately replied that the watch actually belonged to his sister. Bush then replied that it was just as well, because in Texas you could be executed for owning a Che watch. Osborne appeared to regard that as a missed opportunity. |
| Friday | Friday |
| Joy of joys. The second series of The Crown starts airing today and I have every confidence it will be just as good as the first. My wife and I binge-watched the first series in a week and have plans to do much the same. I can’t help wondering, though, how the Queen must be feeling at having her life picked over and being reminded of Prince Philip’s affairs. Though perhaps she thinks her life can’t get any more surreal than it already is. Only this week she was down in Portsmouth to commission a new £3bn aircraft carrier into the fleet. As she named the new ship after herself, she must have wondered whether the fact that it was already regarded as out of date, and that it would only be carrying about a third of the aircraft it had been built for as their cost had become exorbitant, was somehow a metaphor for her own life. | Joy of joys. The second series of The Crown starts airing today and I have every confidence it will be just as good as the first. My wife and I binge-watched the first series in a week and have plans to do much the same. I can’t help wondering, though, how the Queen must be feeling at having her life picked over and being reminded of Prince Philip’s affairs. Though perhaps she thinks her life can’t get any more surreal than it already is. Only this week she was down in Portsmouth to commission a new £3bn aircraft carrier into the fleet. As she named the new ship after herself, she must have wondered whether the fact that it was already regarded as out of date, and that it would only be carrying about a third of the aircraft it had been built for as their cost had become exorbitant, was somehow a metaphor for her own life. |
| Digested week, digested: Brexit still means Brexit. | Digested week, digested: Brexit still means Brexit. |
| Politics | Politics |
| Digested week | Digested week |
| I'm a Celebrity ... | I'm a Celebrity ... |
| European Union | European Union |
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