Late one night in 1867, Benjamin Disraeli, chancellor of the exchequer in Lord Derby’s Tory government, cunningly thwarted a Liberal wrecking amendment in the Commons to his second reform bill. Having written to Queen Victoria at 2am, he went to the Carlton Club, where he was cheered and toasted as “the man who rode the race, who took the time, who kept the time, and who did the trick”. The following year he became prime minister.
Much the same words might have been used in the small hours of 13 December 2019, when Boris Johnson pranced about Conservative central office in London, pumping his fists in the air as his adoring staff and colleagues embraced him. In the less than five months he had been Tory leader and prime minister, Johnson had purged his parliamentary party of some of its best and most honourable people, had precipitated a general election by dubious and possibly unlawful means, had then fought the election on a promise to “Get Brexit done” – and had won the Tories’ largest parliamentary majority for more than 30 years. Here was another leader who had ridden the race and done the trick.
