Boris Johnson’s Cabinet was ‘rocked’ last night by an ‘explosive’ political memoir revealing ‘vicious’ Tory infighting, or so we’re told (yawn).
According to MailOnline:
The Prime Minister is one of the targets for a series of astonishing personal attacks from Alan Duncan, his deputy when he was foreign secretary.
Methinks today’s reports exaggerate just a little bit. Given what’s still on his plate I can’t imagine Boris losing too much sleep over it.
It’s no surprise however that the book is being serialised by the Daily Mail. Ever since old Etonian (and Remainer) Geordie Greig replaced the great Paul Dacre as editor, the Mail has targeted the PM again and again.
Goodness knows Boris has his faults (though I’m still a big supporter) but the Mail’s ceaseless attacks on the PM have become so boring that I’ve given up a 50-year habit and no longer buy the paper every day as I used to.
I still think the Mail is great newspaper but that’s down to Dacre and his predecessor David English, not the present incumbent.
Anyway, here’s my Alan Duncan story, such as it is. I’ll try and tell it without resorting to crude personal abuse but I can’t promise I will succeed.
Twenty-five years ago I was working for a membership organisation and I came up with the idea of a series of events from boat parties to concerts to debates.
After organising several Question Time style events in the main lecture theatre at Kings College London we decided to move a few hundred yards down the road to Simpson’s-in-the-Strand where we subsequently hosted a series of Oxbridge Union type debates.
I had attended several Oldie lunches at Simpson’s and it worked well as a venue because there was a bar in the room so people could purchase drinks before, during and after the main event.
We attracted some reasonably high profile guests - Donald Trelford, former editor of the Observer, was one - and I remember being delighted when Alan Duncan, then a young but clearly ambitious Tory MP, also agreed to take part in a debate.
As soon as he arrived however the Oxford-educated son of an RAF wing commander, and a former president of the Oxford Union, took one look at the set up and made a sneering comment about the PA system we had hired (at some expense!).
I can’t remember exactly what he said but it was along the lines of, “The Oxford Union would never use a public address system.” It was the supercilious way he said it I’ll never forget and as the organiser of the event I did feel momentarily crushed.
As it happens I have since spoken twice at the Oxford Union and the reason they don’t need a PA system in the chamber is because the acoustics are fantastic.
It’s true that amplification has changed the nature of public speaking, possibly for the worse, but television started that process because when TV arrived it was no longer necessary to bellow like a foghorn in order to be heard.
With the arrival of decent PA systems in halls and theatres public speaking began to change too. Neil Kinnock was arguably the last of the ‘loud’ political orators and look what happened to him.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I just thought that in that moment Alan Duncan was incredibly rude, graceless and snobbish, and nothing he has done since has changed my opinion of the man.
Anyway, I’ve read the serialised snippets in today’s Mail and even allowing for the fact that they are heavily edited the author comes across as hugely unpleasant with hardly a good word to say about anyone.
Instead what we get is a litany of abuse, much of it aimed at colleagues. Most unpleasant of all perhaps are the unnecessary and very personal references to Tory MP Eric Pickles’ weight. Example:
Flight to Warsaw. Fat Lump Pickles is in biz class ... while I fly in economy. I suppose that whereas FLP might just fit into an economy seat, he would probably never get out of it again.
Nothing would persuade me to buy this book. After reading the Mail’s serialisation all I want to do is have a shower and scrub myself clean.
In The Thick Of It by Sir Alan Duncan is published on April 15