Sensational twist in the great psycho drama as Boris sacks Gove (again)
Just hours after The Mail+ reveals old rival had told PM to resign...
MICHAEL Gove was sacked by Boris Johnson last night – just hours after The Mail+ revealed he had told the Prime Minister to resign.
Mr Johnson phoned the Levelling Up Secretary yesterday evening to tell him he was being removed from his Cabinet job, accusing him of ‘treachery’.
The sacking came after the minister went alone to see Mr Johnson in his Downing Street study shortly before 10.30am yesterday and tried to persuade him to stand down.
Mr Gove warned the PM his position was ‘ no longer sustainable’, telling him: ‘The party will move to get rid of you’.
‘It is better to go on your own terms,’ he urged him. Despite his pleading, at the end of the amicable fiveminute conversation, Mr Johnson told Mr Gove: ‘Thank you, but I am going to fight on.’
The pair then walked down the corridor to the Cabinet Room, where the Levelling Up Secretary helped Mr Johnson to prepare for Prime Minister’s Questions.
But the minister was noticeably absent from the frontbench as the PM faced MPs.
At 2.27pm, the news that Mr Gove had told Mr Johnson to go was broken on The Mail+. But the Levelling Up Secretary’s allies insisted he was not quitting and was not planning to lead a wider delegation of ministers to Downing Street to call for the PM to stand down.
An hour later the Prime Minister was questioned about his cabinet colleague’s warning to him as he appeared before the Commons Liaison Committee.
Mr Johnson did not dispute that Mr Gove had told him he should resign. Asked if the story was true, he replied: ‘I am here to talk about what the Government is doing. I am not going to give a running commentary on political events.’
At around 9pm, Mr Johnson rang Mr Gove to sack him. Neither Mr Gove nor his advisers were the source of The Mail+ story, but the PM said he believed the minister was behind the leak.
A No 10 source last night accused him of being a ‘snake’, adding: ‘You cannot brief the Press that you’re calling on the PM to go and expect to stay in Cabinet.
‘It’s not the first time he’s been treacherous, appalling and disloyal. This is something he [Mr Johnson] should have done years ago. We need team players who share the PM’s vision for Britain.’
Danny Kruger, who had been a ministerial aide to Mr Gove at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) last night said he was quitting his post in response to the sacking. ‘Very sorry indeed to hear Michael Gove has been fired by the PM,’ he tweeted. ‘As I told No 10 earlier today it should be the PM leaving office. I am resigning as PPS [Parliamentary Private Secretary] at DLUHC.’
Three ministers at the department – Kemi Badenoch, Neil O’Brien and Stuart Andrew – had earlier announced they were quitting. Duncan Baker, another PPS, also resigned.
Tory former minister Tim Loughton said last night: ‘Michael Gove has taken the PM the traditional whisky and revolver. The PM has downed the whisky and turned the revolver on Gove.’
Mr Gove torpedoed Mr Johnson’s Tory leadership bid in 2016 following the Brexit referendum, when he dramatically withdrew support for his campaign at the last minute and then ran himself.
Ultimately it ended both men’s hopes and left the field clear for Theresa May to reach No 10.
In the 2019 Conservative leadership race, Mr Gove finished third place amid claims votes were switched from Mr Johnson to ensure Jeremy Hunt made the final two instead of him.
A Johnson ally claimed at the time: ‘He stabbed us in the back. We stabbed him in the front.’
But Mr Johnson made Mr Gove Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in his first Cabinet in July 2019 before moving him to become the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.
Mr Gove has been in and out of Cabinet positions. David Cameron removed Mr Gove from his post as education secretary in 2014 and demoted him to the role of chief whip. When Theresa May became prime minister in 2016, she sacked Mr Gove as justice secretary, before bringing him back as environment secretary a year later.
‘Not the first time he’s been disloyal’