Adrian Goldberg speaks to Conservative insiders about how the Prime Minister is viewed by his own MPs and his chances of leading the party into the next General Election Adrian Goldberg 1

July 2020 ‘LAZY, SLAPDASH, BADLY ORGANISED’THE BACKBENCH GRUMBLINGS ON BORIS JOHNSON’S FUTURE HAVE BEGUN ADRIAN GOLDBERG SPEAKS TO CONSERVATIVE INSIDERS ABOUT HOW THE PRIME MINISTER IS

VIEWED BY HIS OWN MPS AND HIS CHANCES OF LEADING THE PARTY INTO THE NEXT GENERAL ELECTION SHARE THIS ARTICLE Not content with presiding over the worst Coronavirus death toll in Europe, Boris

Johnson has set another unenviable record – by enjoying the shortest honeymoon period of any Prime Minister in living memory. The Conservatives are normally loyal to any leader they think

Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell described Johnson’s plan to merge his old department with the Foreign Office as “a serious error of judgement”. It normally takes a bit longer than this

for the backbench backbiting to begin. Margaret Thatcher faced internal dissent to her strict monetarist policies from the start of her premiership in 1979, but it wasn’t until she sacked

three ‘wet’ Cabinet ministers two years later that the serious catcalling began, led by Sir Ian Gilmour, one of the trio who had lost their jobs. Her successor John Major was in power for

five years before criticism of his leadership reached such a crescendo in 1995 that he was forced into a ‘back me or sack me’ leadership contest with John Redwood. Johnson, on the other

hand, is already facing as much flak from his own side as from the Labour Leader Keir Starmer and the ferocity of the attacks is remarkable for a politician still wearing his Prime

Ministerial ‘L’ plates. BEYOND EXCEPTIONALTHE ETONIAN ENGLISH IMPERIALISM AT THE HEART OF A DEADLY COVID-19 CRISIS May remarked this week that, in her nine years as a member of the National

Security Council, “I listened to the expert independent advice from national security advisors”. She scornfully described Frost as “a political appointee with no proven expertise in national

security”. The dagger she was wielding had already been sharpened by Mitchell, the Sutton Coldfield MP, who said on my podcast last month that the Government’s merger of the Department for

International Development with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office was “a quite extraordinary self-inflicted wound and a terrible mistake”. ------------------------- Seeking an explanation

for the ferocity of the attacks so early in his premiership, I spoke to a senior Brexiter who has worked closely with Johnson who explained that the circumstances of his accession to Downing

Street had emboldened backbenchers. “The whole circumstances of his election are upside down,” they said. “Normally you would be a leader in opposition for several years, but Boris came in

all of a sudden after Theresa May on the pretext of delivering Brexit. There are some backbenchers who can’t believe he’s Prime Minister.  “They see him someone who was an MP, went off to

become Mayor of London, came back as an MP again and before you know it was Prime Minister. They don’t regard him as one of them.” According to this analysis, the key to Johnson’s long-term

survival among his own MPs rests on his ability to deliver a post-Coronavirus economic bounce, particularly in the ‘Red Wall’ of former Labour seats in the Midlands and the north won by the

Conservatives in 2019. One senior Conservative told _Byline Times_ that Johnson’s position isn’t under immediate threat, but that his long-term prospects were less certain. “His leadership

isn’t going to come under pressure just yet – not while we’re in the midst of a crisis, but he’s already seen as lazy, slapdash and badly organised,” they said. “The smart question isn’t

whether he’ll be challenged now, but whether he’ll still be there to lead us into the next election.” -------------------------