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The 50-year war over political appointees in Downing Street

The clash between Boris Johnson and the head of the civil service is the latest outbreak in a long struggle at the heart of government, writes John Rentoul

Monday 06 July 2020 12:34 BST
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Boris Johnson shakes hands with Mark Sedwill as the new prime minister is clapped into No 10 after winning the election last year
Boris Johnson shakes hands with Mark Sedwill as the new prime minister is clapped into No 10 after winning the election last year

Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s chief adviser, explained why he hadn’t bothered his boss with trivia such as where he was during lockdown: “The prime minister’s time is just about the most valuable commodity there is in the government.”

It was an unexpected insight into the inner workings of No 10. “You have to be very careful about what you go to him with and what you don’t,” Cummings said in answer to questions from journalists in the Downing Street garden about his trip to Durham at a time when the government for which he worked was telling people to stay at home.

In doing so he revealed that he has wrestled with the same problems that have always beset the prime minister’s closest advisers. How best to manage a prime minister’s time; how to control the flow of information to the decision-maker; how to act on the decisions that flow out again.

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