The Brexit reshuffle: every great office of state is now held by a Leaver

One of the Tories’ tactical successes has been to push Brexit down the news agenda. But even if it
no longer dominates front pages and news bulletins as it once did, the task of sorting out Britain’s future relationship with the European Union remains the government’s biggest challenge. Brexit also provides
the best explanation for some of No. 10’s other actions.

Last week’s cabinet reshuffle, for instance, can only be properly understood in the context of Brexit. The purpose was to create an all-powerful centre. The three greatest parts of government — No. 10, the Treasury and the Cabinet Office — have now been joined together. There is a combined No. 10 / No. 11 economic unit and, just as significantly, Theodore Agnew is a Minister of State in both the Cabinet Office and the Treasury, which links those two motors of government together. Agnew is also a trusted ally of Dominic Cummings. Cummings, with Michael Gove, appointed Agnew to the board of the Department
of Education when Gove was Education Secretary.

The government is acutely aware that it has less than ten months to get ready for the end of the transition period. The hope is that this new structure will prevent anyone from attempting to delay or obstruct preparations for the end of December.

The Brexit celebrations on 31 January disguised the fact that, in practical terms, nothing changed the next day. Boris Johnson could throw a bash in No. 10, confident that goods were going to flow across the border the next morning. But when the transition period ends, the nature of this country’s borders will change in terms of both trade and immigration. On 31 December, no one in government will be throwing parties. Instead, they will be waiting anxiously to see what happens when the first lorries roll off the ferries at Calais and Dover.