New British PM Boris Johnson’s ruthless purge of enemies before moving into No 10 Downing St
- British PM Boris Johnson overhauls cabinet with Brexit hardliners
- He takes over the leadership with a wafer-thin working majority in parliament
Dubbed the “night of the blond knives” after the new prime minister’s famously unruly hair, 18 of the 29 ministers who sat round the table of the now-departed leader Theresa May won’t be sitting in Johnson’s pro-Brexit war cabinet.
Some, like the former finance minister Philip Hammond resigned, others were pushed.
While many of the senior cabinet appointments were expected, no one had predicted quite so many sackings including that of pro-Brexit Liam Fox from his job as international trade secretary.
“The problem is the more you sack, the more enemies you’ve got behind you – that’s the danger of getting such a big clear out,” Liberal Democrat peer Richard Newby told Sky News.
“He has made a lot of promises, hasn’t he? Probably more than there are jobs so he’s got to get rid of anybody to whom he has not made a promise and that’s probably the biggest feature.”
Johnson, one of the architects of Brexit, will have just 98 days to reach a new departure agreement with the European Union over Brexit, or, as he has threatened, crash out without a deal.
May failed because she couldn’t get her deal passed through parliament – Johnson has an even slimmer majority of just two and is likely to lose another MP in a by-election next week.