Does it matter if the prime minister and the chancellor don’t get on?

Amid rumours Boris Johnson threatened to demote Rishi Sunak, Sean O’Grady considers the relationships between some of the previous incumbents of No 10 and No 11

Are Johnson and Sunak still seeing eye to eye? (Getty)

A ccording to a source close to the chancellor of the exchequer, if Boris Johnson “demotes him, he’s only signing his death warrant. There’s nobody else as good as Rishi”. It sounds hubristic because, after all, no politician is indispensable, no chancellor is 100 per cent immune from sacking, and while Rishi Sunak does the job well (within the peculiar bounds of this Brexity, populist government) his popularity ratings among the party activists lag behind their current darling, Liz Truss, who seems a much more willing warrior in the culture war and is who Johnson fancies for the Treasury. So Sunak may be pushing his luck and irritating the prime minister, who likes to get his own way, even with the forces of logic. Johnson has already, effectively, sacked one chancellor for having the temerity to stand up to him (Sajid Javid); but that was during the warm honeymoon of his 2019 general election triumph, and while he may not be strong enough now, you couldn’t rule out gambler Johnson pushing his luck too.

Prime ministers occasionally like to remind their chancellors and indeed the press and public of the words on the highly polished brass letterbox at 10 Downing Street: “First Lord of the Treasury”. An ancient and archaic title, nonetheless it conveys the very contemporary political truth that, in a quasi-presidential political sustenance such as the UK, it is the prime minister as party leader who wins elections, and sets the direction and tone of their government. Premiers often owe their success to the brilliant tax-cutting budgets and wise stewardship of the nation’s finances by the man in No 11 (no woman yet, though it may not be long), but politics is a thankless task.