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Film lovers missing the cinema, who were glued to yesterday’s Oscars ceremony, need not fear. The blockbuster of 2021, currently being shot in real time, is “Dom v Bojo”. Whip out the

popcorn, sit back, relax and watch the open warfare between the Prime Minister and Dominic Cummings, his formerly most trusted confidant. It is evident that hell hath no fury like an adviser

scorned, but it was Downing Street that fired the first shot in this unedifying exchange. It briefed that Cummings had leaked confidential text messages between Boris Johnson and the

entrepreneur Sir James Dyson from March last year, concerning the tax implications of Dyson employees coming to the UK to work on the manufacture of ventilators.  The epistolary grenade that

Cummings lobbed back denied disclosure of the texts, and levelled a number of charges at the Prime Minister, including that he sought to abandon an inquiry into the leak that bounced him

into announcing a second lockdown in November last year. This was, he alleges, because the suspect, Henry Newman, is a close friend of Johnson’s partner, Carrie Symonds.  This psychodrama

has revealed two things. First, that No10 is leakier than President Richard Nixon’s White House. Second, that it is unwise to “finger” your erstwhile _consigliere_, who not only knows where

your skeletons are buried, but would be only too delighted to exhume them. Johnson’s miscalculation is failing to understand what motivates Cummings. He is not, and never has been, driven by

status or money, but by radical ideas and a desire to implement them.  This was first evident in 2004 when he led the “North East Says No” campaign, which successfully saw off the Labour

government’s plans for a regional assembly. It was also the case when he worked alongside Michael Gove to secure wide-ranging education reforms when the latter held the brief from 2010 to

2014.  The unceremonious turfing out of Cummings — along with Lee Cain, his fellow Brexiteer and the Prime Minister’s former Director of Communications — at the end of last year, marked a

breaking up of the Vote Leave cabal. It gave way to the ascendancy of the FoCs (friends of Carrie), including Newman as a senior adviser and Simone Finn as Deputy Chief of Staff. The

Government, whose management of the pandemic had been hapless at multiple junctures, is now benefiting from a vaccine bounce, having presided over an effective rollout, well ahead of its

European peers. The headache for the PM is not that he will now have to disclose details of the costs of refurbishment of the flat above the shop in which he resides, it is the broader

charge that he and his office fell “far below the standards of competence and integrity the country deserves”, as alleged by Cummings. It is a headache of his own making. While Johnson’s

unrepentant defence of his texts to Dyson appears reasonable, given the gravity of the situation in the early stages of the pandemic, the wider narrative about the way the Government

conducts its business may prove troublesome. Last year it was revealed that Robert Jenrick, the Cabinet minister ultimately responsible for planning decisions, approved a housing development

in East London that would have saved Richard Desmond, a Tory donor, almost £50 million in a local tax levies. Tower Hamlets Council took legal action and the decision was reversed.  Then

there is the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, and his 15 per cent shareholding in a firm approved as a supplier to the NHS which won £300,000 of contracts from NHS Wales this year. It is

questionable whether such an arrangement would be approved in the private sector on the grounds of a potential conflict of interest, though Hancock vehemently denies this.   Questions have

also been raised regarding the award of other Covid-related contracts to companies with political connections. The anti-corruption organisation, Transparency International, argues that up to

a fifth of contracts for protective equipment contained one or more red flags and that “systematic biases” existed in the procurement process, including the lack of competitive tender.  The

plethora of probes relating to the demise of Greensill Capital will also go on for months. Based on what we know so far, they are unlikely to uncover much apart from the ineffectiveness of

David Cameron’s lobbying. But the resignation of Sir Alex Allan, the Prime Minister’s adviser on the ministerial code, following an investigation he conducted into bullying allegations

against the Home Secretary, Priti Patel, which Johnson summarily dismissed, adds to the impression of a “vacuum of integrity” at the top. Each of these episodes in their own right can be

managed and contained, but taken collectively they create more than a whiff of cronyism and of a No10 operation that is dysfunctional. The sudden departure of Lord Udny-Lister, one of

Johnson’s key aides, will simply add to the Prime Minister’s woes. Dan Rosenfield, a former treasury civil servant, turned investment banker, who is Johnson’s Chief of Staff and Simon Case,

the Cabinet Secretary, are both adroit administrators but not political animals.  Boris Johnson’s strengths — ebullience, optimism, and ability to connect with voters — are the qualities

that helped him secure an 80-seat majority. But they are in themselves insufficient to govern. With the exit of Lord Udny-Lister, who has reportedly wanted to leave for some time, it is

difficult to see who in the PM’s inner circle will speak truth to power. And the real fireworks are yet to come. The maligned Mr Cummings will be looking forward to putting his side of the

story on how the pandemic has been handled to any future public inquiry. It is well known that he wanted the second lockdown to begin earlier, at a time when the PM was not in favour. This,

he will argue, resulted in thousands of avoidable deaths. What is certain for now is that Conservative party candidates standing for local government and Mayoral elections on 6 May will be

spitting blood, as this soap opera detracts from their efforts. At present, the Tories still enjoy a double digit lead over a Labour Party bereft of originality and ideas. But the Prime

Minister, who has a keen sense of history and his own place in it, should be all too aware that the current political situation is volatile and that governments lose elections more than

oppositions win them. A MESSAGE FROM THEARTICLE _We are the only publication that’s committed to covering every angle. We have an important contribution to make, one that’s needed now more

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