What the commentators said
At last, Boris has recovered his “mojo”, said Fraser Nelson in The Spectator. As the Tories’ “most gifted communicator” and the man who helped deliver the Brexit result, his voice on this issue has been sorely missed. His reticence, along with that of many other erstwhile Leave campaigners, “has allowed Brexit to be defined by its enemies” as a doomed, misguided project. Vince Cable says Boris is “on manoeuvres”. Not so. He’s just making the case for Brexit with his customary brio – “and I can understand why the Liberal Democrats don’t like it”. Critics have accused Johnson of being a backseat driver, said Rachel Sylvester in The Times, but if May weren’t steering all over the place, he wouldn’t have tried to grab the wheel.
Johnson is clearly unhappy with the way the EU talks are going, said Matthew d’ancona in The Guardian, but he has also been “stung by a series of suspiciously clustered and well-briefed newspaper columns savaging his record at the Foreign Office, as though No. 10 were preparing the ground to sack or demote him”. His intervention may have headed off that possibility – to sack him would look as if he were being “punished for boldness” – but it’s unlikely to advance his leadership ambitions. The fact is, he’s no longer the darling of the Tory rank and file: “that mantle seems to have passed – unbelievably – to Jacob Rees-mogg”. If anything, said Stephen Bush in the New Statesman, Johnson’s ill-timed Telegraph article has only strengthened the doubts that MPS have about his suitability for the top role.
The most important thing that Johnson’s article highlighted, said William Hague in The Daily Telegraph, is that even now, 15 months after the referendum, ministers are still negotiating publicly with each other over what type of Brexit we should have. Let’s hope that after May’s Florence speech, the Cabinet can unite around an agreed plan. If not, there will be no point in the Tories discussing who should lead the government, because the prime minister will be Jeremy Corbyn.
There were angry scenes at the opening of the inquiry into the Grenfell Tower fire last week when its chairman announced he wouldn’t appoint any survivors or local community members to its panel of assessors. Martin Moore-bick said he had decided not to include local residents because it could raise doubts about the “impartiality” of the inquiry, which, he announced, will be divided into two phases: the first will investigate how the fire started and spread; the second will look at the design and refurbishment of the building. Moore-bick said he would not shrink from making recommendations that could lead to prosecutions. Separately, Scotland Yard revealed that its own investigation into the disaster might lead to individual as well as corporate manslaughter charges.
More than three months after the fire, just three of the 196 households made homeless by the disaster have moved into permanent new homes. The Grenfell Fire Response Team says 22 offers of permanent housing have been accepted, but most of those families have not yet moved in. Emma Dent Coad, Labour MP for Kensington, criticised the rehousing programme for falling “disgracefully behind schedule”.