
After a slow start as PM, Rishi Sunak has been on the attack of late, with an EU deal, asylum policy, and global summits. What changed? It may be the arrival of his new political secretary and old friend, James Forsyth. The pair went to Winchester College together, and Sunak was best man at Forsyth’s wedding.
Forsyth had been political editor of The Spectator, but left for Downing Street on Christmas Eve. Since then, his old boss, Spectator editor Fraser Nelson, has noted “the Forsyth effect in No 10”. Nelson said he tried to get Forsyth to stay, but “he thought this was a once-in-a-lifetime chance”.