Boris Johnson is now officially a ‘has-been’. His rejection by Conservatives MPs confirmed this in the October 2022 leadership ‘contest’. A legacy of bad government lives on. Johnson preferred incompetent people who didn’t threaten him. Only five cabinet members lasted three years in the same post. Cabinets were churned. Churning prevented overly strong, competent, ministers who knew what they were doing providing an alternative agenda. Only Priti Patel, Home Secretary, completed three years in a senior cabinet post. The Chancellorship changed hands three times and there were two Foreign Secretaries. This isn’t trivial. Policy was out-sourced to civil servants. David Frost is the worst example of this. He *negotiated* the Northern Ireland Protocol, which is a constitutional disaster.

Domestic politics under Johnson was incoherent and international politics was reduced to a mixture of tourism and photo-opportunities. This was especially true of Johnson’s repeated *visits* to Ukraine in 2022 as he was fighting for his political life. Johnson has delusions of being a latter-day Churchill.

Churchill’s wartime cabinet was, “A total of sixteen ministers [who] held war cabinet membership at various times in Churchill’s ministry. There were five at the outset of whom two, Churchill and Attlee, served throughout the ministry’s entire term.”¹ Sixteen cabinet members in five war years.

Addendum (1): Ministerial changes during Johnson’s premiership

Prime Minister: Boris Johnson
Chancellor: (1) Sajid Javid²; (2) Rishi Sunak²; (3) Nadhim Zahawi³
Home Secretary: Priti Patel²;
Foreign Secretary: (1) Dominic Raab²; (2) Liz Truss³
Brexit Secretary: Stephen Barclay³ (This cabinet post was deleted after he left)
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster: (1) Michael Gove²; (2) Greg Clark²
Defence Secretary: Ben Wallace
International Trade Secretary: (1) Liz Truss³; (2) Anne-Marie Trevelyan³
Health & Social Care Secretary: (1) Matt Hancock²; (2) Sajid Javid²; (3) Steve Barclay³
Environment Secretary: (1) Theresa Villiers²; (2) George Eustice²
Education Secretary: (1) Gavin Williamson²; (2) Nadhim Zahawi³
Culture Secretary: (1) Nicky Morgan²; (2) Oliver Dowden²; (3) Nadine Dorries²
Business Secretary: (1) Andrea Leadsom²; (2) Alok Sharma³; (3) Kwasi Kwarteng³
Housing and Communities Secretary: (1) Robert Jenrick²; (2) Michael Gove²; (3) Simon Clark²
Work & Pensions, Women & Equalities: (1) Amber Rudd²; (2) Theresa Coffey³
Justice Secretary: (1) Robert Buckland²; (2) Dominic Raab³
International Development Secretary: (1) Alok Sharma³; (2) Anne-Marie Trevelyan³
Transport Secretary: Grant Shapps³
Welsh Secretary: (1) Alun Cairns²; (2) Simon Hart²; (3) Robert Buckland³
Scottish Secretary: Alister Jack
Northern Ireland Secretary: (1) Julian Smith²; (2) Brandon Lewis³; (3) Shailesh Vara²
Leader of the Lords: Baroness Evans

There were 44 cabinet ministers in Johnson’s three years as PM, nine of whom shuffled between jobs. Michael Gove and Sajid Javid received payments for loss of office twice.

Notes

1 Churchill war ministry – Wikipedia

2 loss of office payment possible i.e Sajid Javid²

3 no loss of office payment possible i.e Nadhim Zahawi³

Addendum (2): These ministers received pay-offs x £18,860 = £433,780¹

Robert Buckland

Alun Cairns

Greg Clark

Simon Clark

Nadine Dorries

George Eustice

Michael Gove (twice)

Matt Hancock

Simon Hart

Sajid Javid (twice)

Robert Jenrick

Andrea Leadsom

Nicky Morgan

Dominic Raab

Amber Rudd

Julian Smith

Rishi Sunak

Anne-Marie Trevelyan

Shailesh Vara

Theresa Villiers

Gavin Williamson

Note

1 It was ridiculously hard to uncover the figures for junior ministers and their pay-offs. However, taking a heroic guess, the figure is about £1.2 million for that churn. Conservative MPs who didn’t become at least a junior minister, in the Johnson era, are a rarity.