Boris Johnson’s decision to play cricket day after Brexit victory cost him chance to be PM, reveals book on the secrets of Tory bust-up
Michael Gove’s fury at seeing his colleague relaxing with Princess Diana’s brother Earl Spencer sparked a huge betrayal
BUNGLING Boris Johnson’s decision to snub the PM campaign trail to play cricket was one of three “criminal errors” that hit his leadership bid for six.
Brexit campaign boss Michael Gove’s fury at seeing his colleague relaxing with Princess Diana’s brother Earl Spencer sparked one of British politics’ biggest betrayals.
He also blundered by holding a boozy barbecue at his £1.5million farmhouse the next day, and by failing to gain Tory leadership rival Andrea Leadsom’s support.
The claims are made in a sensational new book by acclaimed author and Tory insider Andrew Gimson.
Mr Gove, then Justice Secretary, stood shoulder to shoulder with Mr Johnson in the battle to lead Britain out of Europe.
But he would leave BoJo’s lifelong ambition to be Tory leader in tatters after an extraordinary 11th-hour knifing as he made his own pitch for the top job.
Gimson’s book Boris: The Adventures Of Boris Johnson is exclusively serialised in The Sun on Sunday today.
In it, he pours scorn on Gove’s vanity-driven attempt to stab his pal in the back — and confirms that it was propelled by his newspaper columnist wife Sarah Vine, 49.
He also tells how Gove, also 49, was called a “Machiavellian psychopath” by Johnson’s exasperated team.
Gimson describes one of the most turbulent leadership contests of all time in the wake of former PM David Cameron’s resignation in June.
It showed an almost criminal lack of seriousness
He says: “Within six days, Boris was destroyed by the people with whom he’d just spent six months in close alliance.
“Some of Gove’s friends blame the blunder he was to make on his wife.
“They say her father is a wealthy, self-made man, who does not recognise other people’s good qualities unless they too have made money.
“They believe she wanted to lift her husband in her father’s eyes, and making Michael Prime Minister would not be a bad way of doing that.”
Gimson’s book, with accounts from key insiders, shines new light on the rampaging egos, catastrophic errors and most treacherous week in Tory Party history.
It says the relationship between the Leave figureheads crumbled hours after they publicly embraced and celebrated the 52 per cent Brexit vote on June 23.
And Gimson says Gove was enraged by Johnson’s lack of focus in the days after Remain campaigner Mr Cameron quit.
The day after the Brexit victory, Johnson went to the Althorp estate in Northants to compete in Earl Spencer’s annual cricket match against the Johnson family.
Gimson writes: “To some, this seemed a quintessentially English way to relax after the rigours of the campaign.
“But to others, including some Gove supporters, it showed an almost criminal lack of seriousness.”
The following day, Johnson, 52, held his barbecue in Thame, Oxfordshire.
Gimson says of the Sunday bash: “Team Gove were invited to this festivity, and were appalled by what they saw as the lack of professionalism in the Boris camp.
“As one Gove supporter put it, ‘Boris was surrounded by jolly good sorts, but they weren’t sharpening their machine.”
Gimson also writes about Johnson’s failure to gain leadership dark horse Ms Leadsom’s support.
He is said to have forgotten to give her a letter promising her a Cabinet role.
Gove’s camp have cited this blunder as one of the key reasons he decided to run for the leadership alone.
Gimson says: “Gove was almost certainly not aware that Lord Tebbit, a stern up- holder of Thatcherite verities, had rung Leadsom on Tuesday and urged her to run.
“She may have had an incentive to present Boris with a series of demands he would feel unable to meet, whereupon she could go ahead on her own account.
“She considered there would be two top jobs in the future Johnson government — either Chancellor or Deputy PM in charge of Brexit negotiations.
“On Wednesday evening she wished to receive a letter and a private tweet guaranteeing her one or other of those posts.
“My guess is that Boris did not want to be bounced into accepting such an extravagant demand, so prevaricated.
“Nor was it sensible to treat him as a kind of postmaster, responsible for the safe delivery of letters.”
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Gimson reveals that Gove held a long-running resentment towards Johnson ever since they were at Oxford, where he used to describe himself as his more flamboyant friend’s “stooge”.
While on the surface the Johnson-Gove ticket seemed unstoppable, Gimson adds: “Behind the scenes things were going from bad to worse.”
Tension was rising and Gove was unimpressed by the former London Mayor’s speeches, often hammered out in the early hours.
Gimson writes: “The Gove camp claimed Boris was ‘curiously unenergised’ and disastrously unprofessional about becoming PM.”
On July 4, Leadsom stunned the Gove camp by launching her leadership bid.
He called his team to a 1am meeting at his house where, with wife Sarah at his side, he decided to do the same.
Gimson writes: “No one spoke against this idea, for he was surrounded by his little court.
“None of these people would shrink from telling Gove how brilliant he is. Vine was having too much fun, at this meeting of dead-tired amateurs in the early hours of the morning, to say what a spouse should have said:
‘Don’t be such a damn fool, darling . . .’
What really warped his judgement was his vanity: The irresistible belief that he would be better than Boris at being Prime Minister
“But what really warped his judgement was his vanity: The irresistible belief that he would be better than Boris at being Prime Minister.”
The next day Gove called Johnson’s political strategist Lynton Crosby to say he was running. “Running what?” was the Australian’s reply, says the book.
Crosby later looked “ashen white” as he said: “He has done the dirty on us.”
Johnson accepted he had insufficient support to continue his leadership bid and stepped aside.
Gimson writes: “Gove was accused by Boris supporters of being a ‘Machiavellian psychopath’ always plotting to stab their man, and chose the most damaging moment to wield the dagger.
“It soon became clear that Gove’s position was hopeless. He held his launch and gave the speech he had wanted Boris to give, but did not win a single convert.
“The effect of his treachery had been to destroy himself.”
Johnson too had faced the political graveyard as many Tories said he had led Britain to Brexit then abandoned it in its hour of need.
But Gimson says he was able to lead a Lazarus-like return from the dead as he had been quietly in touch with pro-EU rival Theresa May long before his bid faltered.
When Leadsom gave an interview criticising childless women like May, Johnson acted as a “channel of communication” between the two.
Leadsom withdrew from the race on July 11, leaving May unchallenged.
Three days later Johnson was appointed Foreign Secretary, an appointment that caused Gove to go “white as a sheet,” Gimson claims.
The author concludes that the stunning turnaround confirmed Johnson as “a master of the theatre of politics”.
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