To the bitter end, he blamed everyone but himself for the implosion of his premiership. The authors are right to dismiss that as another of his fictions. Bad King Boris was dethroned because he was and always had been utterly unfit to wear the crown. He had no clue how to be an effective prime minister and no idea what he wanted to do with the role other than satisfy his lust for its status and perks. One of his cabinet ministers, who was also a friend, is quoted saying: “Boris absolutely loved being prime minister, its prestige and the trappings. He revelled in it… His philosophy on the way up had been to do, pledge, say anything to get over the line because I’m the best, I deserve it. Now I’m here in No 10 without any core beliefs, I can do and say whatever I need to remain here.” Johnson deliberately stuffed his cabinets with mediocrities who knew they were expected to be “nodding dogs” Cummings was one of the few participants in that Downing Street and Whitehall farce who did not speak to Seldon. The author does not feel that the omission is significant, since Cummings has written so very much about this period, “and his footprints are over everything anyway. People will make their own judgments,” he says of what he discovered, “but I don’t think that it’s remotely unfair to Cummings or for that matter to Johnson.” The most ridiculous part of the whole book is how everyone in government has to work around Johnson, a bit like a difficult Special Needs pupil who is disruptive in class. He rarely read papers before meetings, and everything had to be shortened to suit his attention span. Ironically the people around him did get better at working around his "issues" and things did improve for a while during his time in office. This was an explosive book! The tell all details of Boris Johnson's short reign as Prime Minister of what was once a first world country but which is now rapidly becoming a third world country, and all deepened by the rule of a short term egotistical man.

He lied about Brexit. In particular he was happy to sacrifice the Good Friday Agreement, international treaties and mislead the Queen without ever having an oven ready plan for Brexit or the skills or ability to make one. Purchasing a book may earn the NS a commission from Bookshop.org, who support independent bookshops The second moment was when Johnson ‘told his startled officials “Put down in 3,000 words what you think my foreign policy should be.”’ A myth peddled that he was the best leader given the toughest brief and any failures are to do with others (Trump often blames is failures on his predecessors). Evidence proves his personal floors were such even if he had become PM at the 1st time of asking, it would likely still have been a disaster. A desperate desire to hold court/power over his court. In some way BJ revelled in the chaos of having three different factions within his team, as shown by the story of Carrie and DC. It actually gave him protection and an ability to blame others. Similar to Hitler, who was well aware of the egos/dislike many German generals had for one another.What proves that Johnson was never a Brexiteer with no clear or ambitious plan for a post-Brexit Britain? Appointing capable senior ministers might have compensated for some of his weaknesses. Johnson deliberately stuffed his cabinets with mediocrities who knew they were expected to be “nodding dogs” and whom he disdained as “the stooges”. “We don’t want young, hungry lions”, an aide recalls him saying when Rishi Sunak proved to be a less pliable and more popular chancellor than Johnson had anticipated. I think it also overestimates Johnson's role in the Ukrain war, giving him far too much credit. Many of us saw it as a way for him to escape from the reality of the mess he had made domestically and allow him to emulate Churchill. I can understand why his forthright stance made him popular in Ukraine, but how do we balance his actions against his close association with oligarchs and Russian money?

https://fromtheheartofeurope.eu/johnson-at-10-the-inside-story-by-anthony-seldon-and-raymond-newell/ It’s difficult to understand, at times, how this self centred egomaniac ended up as Prime Minister. Until one realises that without exception, every prevarication and wavering was a means to ensure that his own needs came first. Never mind what may be good for the country or the people, as long as Boris got what he wanted.In this gripping work of contemporary history, one of Britain's leading political and social commentators maps Johnson's time in power across ten decisive moments and sheds light on the most divisive and inscrutable prime minister since Margaret Thatcher. Based on major interviews with key aides and allies, Anthony Seldon and Raymond Newell give the first account of Boris Johnson's explosive time in office. Boris Johnson and wife Carrie on their final day in Downing Street. Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images A spokesperson for Johnson told the Times, which has serialised the book, that the revelations were “the usual malevolent and sexist twaddle” from the former PM’s enemies. We can agree on that much, I suggest. But does he really think that the lessons of Johnson’s government have been learned? If you have been paying any attention to the British political landscape over the last seven years nothing in this detailed book will come as any surprise at all.

Such has been the pace of modern politics since then, that Johnson at 10 didn’t make it out even for Boris’s immediate successor. Two prime ministers on from him, we now have the authoritative account of what he did with his time in power. That doesn’t make it any more comfortable for Johnson, who unlike Cameron hasn’t retreated for a period of silence in a shepherd’s hut. Instead, it serves as a cautionary reminder for those who are still dreaming of a Terminator-style Boris sequel. Events have flowed so bizarrely over the past four years that it's easy to become confused. This book is going to be a godsend to people writing about this era because the authors have recorded the views and thoughts of the participants before time and hindsight rewrite them. This mirthless farce had tragic real-world consequences. Utterly unsuited to handling a crisis as grave as the pandemic, his endless prevarications and about-turns cost lives. “He wildly oscillated in what he thought,” observes one official. “In one day he would have three meetings in which he would say three completely different things depending on who was present, and then deny that he had changed his position.” His personal brush with Covid encouraged some to think it might prompt a reform of his behaviour. They were disappointed. Even coming near to death couldn’t remedy character flaws that were so deeply ingrained. Reading this is a sad experience. This is not to make a political point but to reflect how far Boris Johnson's tenure in 10 Downing Street fell short of the demands of office, which is why he fell so spectacularly from power after only three years. This is hardly the first book about Johnson, with plenty of ink being spilled over the politician’s tumultuous childhood and his rise to power, and indeed his downfall. Johnson at 10 wisely summarises the other accounts of his early life, and focuses instead on the psychodrama of his time at the top.I suppose at least Cummings did believe in Brexit, although ultimately, really, did he?” he says. “From everything we heard [for the book] it just seemed Cummings was full of hatred. He probably hates himself; he certainly hates other people. He wants to destroy everything. Johnson in his own way never knew what he stood for, but he shared that contempt for the Tory party, contempt for the cabinet, contempt for the civil service, contempt for the EU, contempt for the army, contempt for business, contempt for intellectuals, contempt for universities.” At their best when against something (getting Brexit done, against Russia, against Covid) but never for anything. That extended to his team around him, most of all DC who did not have a clue what levelling up meant.

Boris Johnson was a man fit to lead and perform, but never to govern and articulate. A chronic people-pleaser, with an awful taste in colleagues and an even worse taste in advice, his premiership was defined by circumstance so much more than his own decision. Here was a prime minister with a potential for greatness, surrounded by supremely able people, who waffled and squandered his way to an early grave at the hands of people he could never let down. As much as he longed to be a Thatcher or a Churchill, he was so much the Brown or Callaghan he had dreaded from the start. During one of many episodes of derangement in Downing Street, Johnson is to be found raving: “I am meant to be in control. I am the führer. I’m the king who takes the decisions.” The would-be great dictator was never in control because he was incapable of performing even some of the most basic functions of a leader. I doubt Johnson will have read it, but his wife Carrie will and probably realise that somewhere ahead a very damning account of her role in his downfall is coming. But of course it's Johnson alone who destroyed this premiership. A life built on lies and infidelity in all his relationships was bound to end in tears. This is not a book that I enjoyed, not a book to be enjoyed from the viewpoint of my politics certainly because of all of the depressing confirmation that it provided of the failings that Johnson brought into No.10 and the damage it did to our nation.There is a telling coincidence in the fact that the first indelible report of Johnson’s behaviour was also the work of a school master. Martin Hammond’s infamous notes on Johnson at Eton, which recorded his “disgracefully cavalier attitude”, his “gross failure of responsibility” and his deep-seated belief that he “should be free of the network of obligation that binds everyone else” is the opening source of Seldon’s account. Johnson’s “end was in his beginning”, he argues. Speaking to me about his book last week, Seldon noted that Hammond – who had been the “formidable pipe-smoking” head at Tonbridge school when he started out as a teacher – was a longstanding inspiration, both as an educator and a writer. “Two things,” he says. “One is that his report was typically acute and detailed, like a psychiatrist’s analysis. And second: just how much the character is formed very early on.” Cummings and Johnson: a double act like no other. Photograph: Daniel Leal/AFP/Getty Images Boris Johnson has never made any secret of his admiration for Winston Churchill or discouraged comparisons between himself and his predecessor as prime minister. Yet a better parallel, argue Anthony Seldon and Raymond Newell in their account of Johnson’s time in office, is David Lloyd George. Johnson filled his cabinet with mediocrities and created a team in Number 10, including his partner/wife, whose main job was sniping at each other. (His mayorship of London had been supported by a strong team of advisers, most of whom refused to work with him again in Number 10.) His vision did not exist, beyond winning the 2019 election and “getting Brexit done”. But most of all, his personality is so flawed that he is unable to exercise leadership. He says one thing before a meeting, another in the meeting and something else entirely after it is over. He hates making decisions. He doesn’t really like or understand people in general. He has no idea how government works, and is therefore incapable of governing.