Boris Johnson won’t fall for Farage’s ‘electoral pact’, but he will be stuck with a mob of barely competent Brexiteers

The Brexit Party leader has made sure that when everything inevitably falls apart, he can say it’s all the new PM’s fault

If I were Boris Johnson and wanted to “energise” politics, mix things up a bit, smash a few eggs to fashion a free trading omelette, I’d bring Nigel Farage into the cabinet via a seat in the Lords, and appoint Ivanka Trump as British ambassador to Washington.

That bloke in a Union Jack suit and bowler hat wandering around Parliament Square? He could be Brexit Secretary. And I’d park the red Brexit referendum campaign bus with the thing about £350m a week for the NHS outside the Commons next to Churchill’s statue and declare it a national monument.

Well, not even Boris would do that. But he can do the next best thing and make his administration a truly Brexit one; one where no one can accuse him and his team of being cowards or closet Remainers or saps manipulated by the civil service and the establishment.

That way when the Brexit Project finally collapses under the weight of its own contradictions it will be plain that it was always going to be inevitable.

Farage is getting his excuses in early though – calling for an early election and a Tory/Brexit Party pact, which he knows Boris cannot give him. So when the Brexit failure comes round again he can say it’s all Boris’ fault.

He might then remind everyone about those two columns Boris wrote back in 2016 – one pro-Brexit and one anti-Brexit. That will be the original sin in the Brexit bible.

Apparently Johnson has created a Venn diagram to help him make his cabinet picks. In one circle are the Brexiteers. In the other are people able to run the country. Just him and Gove basically, the unhappy couple. The overlap is depressingly meagre.

That’s why we have the almost reckless talk of bringing Priti Patel in as Home Secretary, putting Jacob Rees-Mogg in charge of public spending (I know), David Davis and Iain Duncan Smith back as something or other, demoting Jeremy Hunt from the foreign office to defence (reportedly turned down), and promoting Penny Mordaunt. The only good news seems to be Mark Spencer, the obscure but well-regarded new chief whip. He doesn’t sell knickers, tinned Mojitos or prawn sandwiches by the way, but he is a (reformed) Remainer.

Much of the toing and froing over the next days will be window dressing. In reality, as in City Hall while he was Mayor of London, Boris prefers a close-knit “gang” around him, and Brexit will be run by the gang out of Downing Street, because Brexit is the only thing that matters. Edward Lister, his old mate, is to join as chief of staff, and former deputy mayors-turned-ministers James Cleverly and Kit Malthouse will be given decent jobs. As one Johnson ally says: “We’re getting the band back together.”

All the secretaries of state are basically stooges, to use another Boris word. His advisors and chiefs of staff and spinners will be even more important, back to the more presidential style of Tony Blair than Theresa May’s more ordered traditional style. You could call it “sofa government”, but with extra red wine stains.

Don’t forget though that something of the Boris strategy was tried by May. She only put Brexiteers including Boris himself in the key Brexit roles, adamantine figures such as Dominic Raab and Steve Baker. Then they quit, one by one. It will be interesting to see who in this bunch will jump out of the runaway train first.