Has the sheen come off BoJo? The question is echoing around some virtual corridors in
Westminster this weekend. The Mayor of London was caught off guard by the recent riots and his initial decision to remain en vacances made him look aloof and remote, a sense that grew during his
disastrous walkabout in Clapham. Then he joined Labour in calls for cuts in the police budget to be reversed, a decision that reeked on
opportunism, superficially at least. The FT’s Jim Pickard has an excellent
post on these matters and he reveals that Boris Johnson has been voicing these concerns in private for months and that he has a brace of Cabinet allies: Liam Fox and Michael Gove.
It’s tempting to add this news to the open file about the alleged leadership rivalry between Boris and George Osborne.
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