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After an eight-year detour into municipal government, Boris Johnson has now returned to national politics. The former mayor of London will mark this moment by going on the stump for the Leave campaign. He has some catching up to do: while never far from the public eye, he was absent from the Commons for seven years. Even when back in Parliament after the general election, Boris felt he could not take the cabinet job that was offered to him.
But his time at City Hall hasn’t dented his ambitions; quite the opposite. He is the bookies’ favourite to be the next Prime Minister. Indeed, he returns to the national scene in a far stronger position. In the summer of 2007 when he announced his intention to run for mayor, his political career had stalled. He was Tory spokesman for higher education but not a full shadow cabinet member. Although he had backed David Cameron for the leadership, it was clear Cameron was never going to give him a big job. What’s more, his Commons performances had been disappointing. A style of speaking that worked so brilliantly outside the chamber didn’t work inside. Mr Cameron would privately remark that his fellow Old Etonian was ‘stuck in a buffoonish rut’, unable to make the transition from entertainer to politician.
Eight years of running London, after two Tory victories in a Labour city, has changed all that. Boris is now a serious contender for the leadership in a way he simply wasn’t in 2007, and wouldn’t have been had he stayed in the Commons. He could be the first Prime Minister since the Duke of Wellington to enter No.
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