Many Tories had begun to wonder where Michael Gove had got to. The Chief Whip’s move from the Department for Education was heralded with a briefing that he would be doing far more broadcasting, representing the government front and centre on the airwaves. However, there was only silence. Though he has been dealing with defections and whipping up the air strike vote, the darling of Tory conferences past was mysteriously missing from the official platform schedule in Birmingham. Until this afternoon.
Taking to the stage to introduce the Prime Minister, Gove received the warmest applause yet from the crowd. The left loathe Michael Gove, something that only bolsters his credentials in Tory-land. It was as if the crowd collectively knew that the Prime Minister had treated his old—occasionally controversial—friend badly by pulling him away from reform’s front line and putting him in a back room role until the election. Polite claps that would be more suited to a golf tournament had been given to the previous speaker, Phillip Hammond, but when Gove came out the crowd erupted into sustained cheers.
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