Cummings ‘is set to quit in six months’
Under-fire No 10 adviser ‘will go after drawing a line under Brexit’
Dominic cummings is considering quitting as Boris Johnson’s senior adviser later this year, well-placed sources said yesterday.
According to an insider who knows him well, he intends to step back from the political front line now that the UK is finally cutting ties with the EU.
The suggestion that he could be out in six months was reinforced by a separate claim that he will consider himself ‘largely redundant’ by christmas if he completes his shake-up of Whitehall mandarins by then.
The report appeared in the Spectator magazine, where mr cummings used to work, and where his wife mary Wakefield is a commissioning editor.
A senior source said: ‘Dominic has not decided what to do. He had to delay medical treatment unrelated to covid because of the virus. He will deal with that when the pandemic is over and then discuss things with mary. He will stay in his job if it seems worthwhile and [he] can improve things – otherwise he probably won’t.’
The question marks over his future follow the furore over mr cummings’s decision to drive his wife and young son 260 miles to his parents’ farm in Durham at the start of the lockdown. While they were there, the couple visited a nearby beauty spot.
The Prime minister has refused to back widespread calls – including from 40 Tory mPs – for mr cummings to resign, arguing it is time to ‘move on’ after a week-long controversy over his conduct.
The claim that mr cummings, 48, could be gone in six months will lead some to believe it is a facesaving measure to resolve a bitter clash between mr Johnson and rebel mPs.
A defiant mr cummings could say he has resisted the latest in a long line of attempts by his foes to sack him; mr Johnson could say he has shown he is loyal to his inner circle and strong enough to withstand pressure from public opinion and the media.
meanwhile, mr cummings’s Tory mP detractors could say that despite the six-month wait, they have achieved their objective of removing him from no10 and defused fury among the party faithful.
mr cummings’s allies insist his potential exit is not connected to the lockdown rumpus and that he ‘never intended’ to stay in Downing Street after achieving his two main aims: cutting the UK’s last ties with Brussels and reforming the civil Service. The former is due to take place on December 31 when Britain’s Brexit ‘transition period’ is scheduled to end.
officials say one of the reasons mr Johnson is digging his heels in over mr cummings is that he sees his hard-line anti-EU adviser as essential to maintaining the Government’s
resolve to stick to the new Year deadline.
Political campaigner mr cummings masterminded the Brexit victory in the 2016 EU referendum and played a vital role in helping mr Johnson win an election landslide in December.
The Spectator report said that by christmas, mr cummings expects to have completed his campaign to recruit a new tier of talented and high-powered individuals from the private sector or academia to take charge of Whitehall departments.
mr cummings declined to comment last night.