'Anniversary blues' as Theresa May marks a year as PM
The PM's plan to reboot her faltering premiership is overshadowed by her own MPs and mixed messages over Brexit.
Wednesday 12 July 2017 01:16, UK
It was not a happy first anniversary for the Prime Minister.
It was never going to be, after the bungled election that saw her lose her Commons majority and left her fighting for her political life.
But the anniversary blues need not have been so painful. After all, the Tories' woes of the past 48 hours were largely self-inflicted.
On the morning of the anniversary - 12 months to the day since she was crowned Tory leader unopposed - the headlines could hardly have been worse.
They were , Anne Marie Morris, who to many was so low-profile she wasn't even a household name in her own home.
Indeed, outside her Newton Abbot constituency her only previous claim to fame was asking David Cameron a question at PMQs in 2012, waving her left arm around in a sling.
She's a household name now, though. "Tory MP's N-word shame," screamed one headline. "Tory suspended for N-word Brexit rant," said another.
This on a day the PM wanted the headlines to be about her on boosting the rights of workers in the so-called "gig" economy, such as Deliveroo riders and Uber taxi drivers.
But the Prime Minister's anniversary was about to get worse.
At the very moment she was delivering her finely crafted speech in central London, back in the Commons it was Foreign Office questions.
Uh-oh! What could possibly go wrong? Well, with the least obscure MP in the House of Commons - Boris Johnson - answering questions on the sensitive subject of Brexit, just about anything.
And it did. It was barely a week since the gaffe-prone Foreign Secretary deepened a split in the Cabinet by self-indulgently calling for the cap on public sector pay to be lifted.
This time Boris allowed himself to be goaded by the fiercely Eurosceptic Tory MP Philip Hollobone, who urged him to in its demands for more UK cash for the EU.
The sums being demanded were "extortionate", said Mr Johnson, and "go whistle" was "an entirely appropriate expression".
Then came another Boris Brexit blooper. "There is no plan for no deal because we are going to get a great deal," he told Labour's Shadow Foreign Secretary, Emily Thornberry.
No plan for no deal? Really? That's not what David Davis, the Brexit Secretary and the man in charge of the UK Brexit negotiations, has said repeatedly.
For instance, Mr Davis said last month: "We have worked up that alternative in some detail. We are still working on it. Not because we want to, but in government you have to, if you are responsible, work up every contingency."
And asked later if Mr Johnson was right to suggest there were no plans for leaving the EU without a deal, Downing Street slapped him down firmly and backed Mr Davis's "responsible government" line.
"Planning is under way across Government for all eventualities, which is what you would expect a responsible government to do," said a spokeswoman.
Mr Davis himself, enduring a marathon interrogation from the House of Lords EU Committee, wearily swatted away a question about Mr Johnson's comments as if it was annoying insect bothering him.
In a performance that was as measured as Boris's earlier was clumsy, he laughed before telling peers: "Bluntly, I wouldn't worry. I mean you will have to get the Foreign Secretary here to explain his views if you really wanted to. I'm not going to comment on other ministers."
However, he then did precisely that, praising his new best friend in the Cabinet, the pro-Remain Chancellor Philip Hammond, who is so distrusted by Eurosceptic Tory MPs.
There was not "a cigarette paper" in difference between the public statements of himself and Chancellor Philip Hammond on issues like migration or the transition to Brexit.
So, as she sat down with husband Philip in the Downing Street flat at the end her first anniversary as Tory leader, how will the PM have reflected on the day? Well:
:: First, she found herself embroiled in a racism row and being accused of leading a "nasty party" - her own memorable phrase from 2002 - once again.
:: Second, the Government's top diplomat insulted Brussels chiefs with undiplomatic language and has no doubt made Brexit negotiations more difficult.
:: And third, the man tipped to replace her as PM soon is boasting about his close alliance with the Chancellor she was too weak to sack after the election.
It's fair to compare Theresa May's first year in Downing Street with that of another un-elected PM, Gordon Brown, who also enjoyed a honeymoon period but then lurched from one crisis to another.
The difference, of course, is that Gordon Brown suffered from not holding an election in 2007. Theresa May's problems can mostly be attributed to her disastrous decision to hold an election.
Her supporters want her to stay on until after Brexit is concluded in 2019. But if she has more bad luck like she had on this first anniversary, it's doubtful whether she'll make it to a second anniversary in No. 10.