Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
SITTING DUCK MAY
Written off for refusing to deny Johnson is unsackable Palace was ‘outraged at misleading DUP deal claims’
THERESA May has been branded a “sitting duck” after dodging a question about whether Boris Johnson is unsackable.
It came as outraged Tories called on the increasingly weak Prime Minister to give the outspoken Foreign Secretary the boot.
Former minister Anna Soubry said Mr Johnson – whose interventions on Brexit have undermined the PM – must “grow up or go”.
And as top Tories were at each other’s throats on the opening day of the party conference in Manchester, Mrs May was mocked for claiming the Cabinet is completely “united”.
On what was a torrid birthday, she was also left reeling after it emerged Buckingham Palace was angry at her behaviour after the election.
It is claimed the PM misled the Palace by saying she had a deal with the DUP, despite it not being finalised for a further 17 days.
A new book – Fall Out: A Year of Political Mayhem – says Palace officials were also dismayed about Mrs May’s speech outside No10 when she breached protocol by saying she had “formed a Government” rather than the Queen had asked her to do so. It was also revealed the PM had t o h av e he r make-up redone before visiting the Queen because she had been crying after the election humiliation. On the BBC ’s
Andrew Marr Show yesterday, Mrs May failed to deny that Mr Johnson is too powerful to be sacked.
She also refused to admit she had bungled by calling the early election.
Mrs May, who turned 61 yesterday, was still reeling after the Foreign Secretary, who is arguing for a hard Brexit, laid down a raft of red lines for EU withdrawal.
But the PM told the TV show : “Boris is absolutely behind [my] Florence speech and the line that we have taken.” Lib Dem Brexit spokesman Tom Brake said:
“If Theresa May is now too weak to slap down... Boris Johnson, it shows she has gone from being a lame duck Prime Minister to a sitting duck Prime Minister... Boris Johnson is now driving the car.
“For the British people trapped in the back, this is a terrifying prospect.
“He might find it fun hurtling toward the cliff shouting ‘Cripes!’, but this threatens to crash the UK economy.” The PM’S closest ally, First Secretary of State Damian Green, tried to admonish Mr Johnson over Brexit by calling on ministers to make policy pitches in private. Ex-tory chairman Grant Shapps said Mrs May cannot take the party into another election. He added the PM is unable to sack Mr Johnson because “putting him on the outside would put her entire premiership in instant peril”. On the prospect of Mrs May staying as PM, Labour MP Jess Phillips said: “It’s bad for the country but for the Labour Party she is an absolute gift because she is terrible.”
OUT of touch and out of her comfort zone, Theresa May’s borrowed time is surely running out fast.
So too that of a Tory Party and Government which has never looked so divorced from the realities of life or so incapable of giving the leadership needed.
May’s inability to control Boris Johnson’s blond ambition is more than another episode in a tiresome Conservative soap opera. She is devoid of solutions for the major problems confronting us individually and collectively.
When the only jobs he is genuinely concerned about is her own, it leaves Britain rudderless at a key moment – with serious repercussions for future generations.
No wonder the other 27 members of the EU appear to be running rings around May and her clueless Ministers in Brexit negotiations.
Shaking a magic money tree merely emphasises her predicament when May can’t even be honest about changing her mind or admitting past mistakes.