Theresa May has taken little time to assert her authority over British politics, implementing sweeping changes to the Conservative Party’s top team. Some genuine surprises have emerged, as we begin to see Mrs May’s approach to leadership. Her first cabinet shows her to be decisive, unafraid of major change, and determined to unify the Conservative Party at the very top of UK politics. Here are some of the big changes:
The chancellor
George Osborne, the architect of David Cameron’s reforms and a key strategist behind the Conservatives’ return to government is out of the Treasury. After years of implementing austerity and making the case for Remain, George Osborne is perhaps too closely linked to the past, and too divisive for a unifying Conservative leadership. Stepping into his department is the former foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, one of the safest pairs of hands in government, and a man who eschews the spotlight. There will be no emergency budget, not dramatic change of course. This is Theresa May putting one of the Conservative Party’s strongest political operators out to pasture with his old boss, but after the EU referendum George Osborne may appreciate a holiday.
Foreign secretary
Cripes! Boris Johnson, former GQ motoring correspondent and notorious champion of the Brexit campaign has been installed in the Foreign & Commonwealth Office. The only man in the cabinet who has had to apologise to the people of Papua New Guinea, aside from his gaffes Boris Johnson showed ambassadorial flair as London Mayor during the 2012 Olympics. However good his proficiency in French and German, this move isn’t about Boris Johnson the charming diplomat: Boris in the FCO means one thing, Theresa May’s confidence in healing the Conservative Party from the top down. The Foreign Office is one of the great prizes in UK politics, and it has been gifted to the standard bearer of the eurosceptic movement. This will mollify those who preferred Andrea Leadsom’s bid for Downing Street. More than that, it places Boris Johnson in a pivotal role in Britain’s post-Brexit future. Foreign Secretaries have a habit of "going native" in their departments, as the urbane sophisticates of the Foreign Office mould them to the department’s worldview. Boris has always held his opinions lightly, and this move may tame him, and in so doing tame his acolytes and soften the Brexiters up for an acceptable compromise on our relationship with the EU.
Gove out
Knifer Gove is on his uppers, having failed to kill the king. Few would have predicted that Michael Gove would come off so badly from Brexit victory. Just yesterday it seemed likely that Mrs May might consider it safer to keep Michael Gove inside the tent where she can keep both eyes on him, but he has been relegated to the back benches. Theresa May’s calculation is surely that having promoted Boris Johnson to such a senior post, there is no need to provide any further sop to the Brexiters. The prospect of Sarah Vine implementing Brexit has been avoided, and any idea of Michael Gove as the Frank Underwood of British politics has been abandoned.
Jobs for Brexiters
Gove’s departure doesn’t mean that Theresa May isn’t committed to unity across the cabinet. She’s created two new jobs for prominent Brexiters. This is the Conservative Party’s opportunity to heal on the issue that most divides it, and Theresa May is grabbing the chance with both hands. Gone from his job overseeing Brexit for about five minutes is Oliver Letwin, and in his stead are two key new jobs for securing Britain’s economic and diplomatic future. The Secretary of State for International Trade is prominent Brexiter and failed leadership candidate Liam Fox who quickly came out in support of Theresa May, and the shiny, brand new post of Secretary of State for Exiting the EU is being filled by David Davis who challenged David Cameron for the leadership and had a messy relationship with Cameron throughout his time in office.
The small clique who ran government in David Cameron’s time have gone. We haven’t seen the end of the Etonians thanks to Boris Johnson, but Justine Greening becomes the first Education Secretary in our history to be educated at a comprehensive school rather than privately. These are big changes, seismic in terms of the Conservative Party’s recent history. David Davis and Liam Fox were often outspoken opponents of Cameron, and Boris Johnson became his political assassin. The return to grace of these figures shows May’s determination to bring the Conservatives back together, and to finally move both her colleagues and the country on from arguing over the European Union.
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