Has Boris Johnson ‘restored’ cabinet government? Don’t believe it

Prime ministers sometimes yield to collective ministerial decision-making when they are in a tight spot, writes John Rentoul

Sajid Javid, health secretary, leaves the cabinet meeting on Wednesday (Anadolu Agency/Getty)

The prime minister’s need to manage a party divided over coronavirus restrictions has led some commentators to claim that collective cabinet government has been “restored”. In particular, a cabinet meeting held on Zoom before Christmas lasted for three hours, as nearly all of the 28 or so ministers in attendance had their say on whether further restrictions were needed. Despite presentations from Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance, the government’s scientific advisers, they decided they were not.

James Forsyth of The Spectator contrasted this with the video of the (start of the) first cabinet meeting after the election, in which Boris Johnson led the assembly in a call-and-response chant like a primary school class. “How many hospitals are we going to build?” “40!” Forsyth commented: “A return to cabinet government may well offer him his best chance of survival.”

We have had returns to cabinet government before. They are always proclaimed by new prime ministers if their predecessor was seen as high-handed. John Major made much of his new collegiate style in 1990. Gordon Brown did away with the “presidential” police outriders for the prime minister’s car. Theresa May removed the sofa from the prime minister’s study and even divided her cabinet into rival subgroups to work on Brexit solutions.