‘I’m entitled not to listen to Sage’: an interview with Sajid Javid

In six years Sajid Javid has had six cabinet jobs. He has been culture secretary, business secretary, communities secretary, home secretary and chancellor — and, just over 100 days ago, he was made Secretary of State for Health. When we meet on stage for an interview at Tory party conference, I ask him about his credentials for the job. He has none. ‘But that’s not unusual for a health secretary,’ he chirps. And experience? He has visited a few hospitals. He then offers the story of his early run-in with the NHS.

As a child, he had his appendix removed in hospital. ‘Next thing I remember is being back at home in bed, being cuddled by teddy and feeling much better.’ Soon he was in pain again. ‘I go to the hospital, they do a scan and it turns out they left an instrument inside me.’ His mother, he says, was so traumatised that she still can’t remember the details.