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Related: About this forumMichael Gove announces surprise bid for Tory leadership - Brexit live
Michael Gove announces surprise bid for Tory leadership - Brexit liveLast I heard he was offering Boris his support in exchange for the right job.
Rats in a sack.
This is Gove's statement:
There are huge challenges ahead for this country but also huge opportunities. We can make this country stronger and fairer. We have a unique chance to heal divisions, give everyone a stake in the future and set an example as the most creative, innovative and progressive country in the world.
If we are to make the most of the opportunities ahead we need a bold break with the past.
I have repeatedly said that I do not want to be Prime Minister. That has always been my view. But events since last Thursday have weighed heavily with me.
I respect and admire all the candidates running for the leadership. In particular, I wanted to help build a team behind Boris Johnson so that a politician who argued for leaving the European Union could lead us to a better future.
But I have come, reluctantly, to the conclusion that Boris cannot provide the leadership or build the team for the task ahead.
I have, therefore, decided to put my name forward for the leadership. I want there to be an open and positive debate about the path the country will now take. Whatever the verdict of that debate I will respect it. In the next few days I will lay out my plan for the United Kingdom which I hope can provide unity and change.
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2016/jun/30/brexit-live-theresa-may-and-boris-johnson-set-to-announce-leadership-bids
muriel_volestrangler
(101,158 posts)He screwed his courage to the sticking plate. Or he's taken the Francis Urquhart route, if you prefer (Frank Underwood if you prefer 21st century drama to 20th century).
TubbersUK
(1,439 posts)A sort of double-bluff theory.
Interesting times.
muriel_volestrangler
(101,158 posts)Both think he's unsuitable as PM (Dacre is the editor-in-chief of the Mail newspapers, and thus very influential with Tory readers, for any Americans). That will encourage others to stand (currently Crabb, Fox, Gove, Leadsom and May).
TubbersUK
(1,439 posts)Also, some evidence from the political pundits that Gove has genuinely betrayed Boris:
Tom Newton Dunn ✔ @tnewtondunn
A text arrives from a senior Team Boris figure: "Gove is a c*** who set this up form start". This is going to be bloody.
9:38 AM - 30 Jun 2016
564 564 Retweets 257 257 likes
ETA:
Tim Bouverie ✔ @TimPBouverie
There is "a stampede away from Boris to Gove" - Tory MP.
10:54 AM - 30 Jun 2016
Nadine Dorries ✔ @NadineDorriesMP
Gove didn't get the big job Mrs Vine wanted for him - Boris doesn't do bribes
10:56 AM - 30 Jun 2016
10 10 Retweets 8 8 likes
RogueTrooper
(4,665 posts)didn't expect to find out so quickly.
LeftishBrit
(41,192 posts)Gove as Prime Minister??? Something out of a horror movie.
Betty Karlson
(7,231 posts)Gove doesn't inspire voter enthousiasm. He'd be the Tory equivalent of Gordon Brown: well connected and respected in significant parts of the party, but when all is said and done: a place-holder - and the UK voters have never retained a place-holder, with the possible exception of John Major.
Roseberry - b-bey in 1892
Douglas Home - voted out in '64
Calahan - voted out in '79
Major - only retained in '92 as - by general consensus - Kinnock managed to squander his advantage by excessive chest-thumping only days before the election.
Brown - voted out in 2010
Denzil_DC
(7,188 posts)Gove has more baggage than Heathrow.
He's obviously not alone in that, but although we may consider him a rightwing horror (which he undoubtedly is), he's also got tendencies to be what in the Thatcher days they used to call a "Wet". See his recent record in office:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Gove#Secretary_of_State_for_Justice
So they could end up with the worst of all worlds - a rival to Boris (also under suspicion for relative liberalism on some social issues, inasmuch as he's consistent on anything) who fronted the Leave campaign with no Plan A if they won, isn't sufficiently rabid on certain issues to satisfy the right (though that could obviously change for expediency), pretty incompetent in the roles he's held (not necessarily a bar), and utterly unappealing to disaffected voters who've defected to UKIP, let alone likely a high proportion of the electorate.
Last I saw, though it's very early days yet, May was streets ahead of the declared field.
TubbersUK
(1,439 posts)http://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2016/jun/30/brexit-live-theresa-may-and-boris-johnson-set-to-announce-leadership-bids
ETA: Sorry posted this in the wrong place in the excitement of the moment.
LeftishBrit
(41,192 posts)turning prisons into schools.
But he is a neocon, an authoritarian fanatic on education who would've made Chris Woodhead look moderate, an incompetent, and his 'people skills' mainly take the form of uniting almost everyone against him! Plus, he and his wife have far too many links with the RW media.
What a situation we're in, where Theresa May looks like she might be the lesser of the evils!!!
Denzil_DC
(7,188 posts)and snappy opening line, BTW!
But on the Tory scale, I do reckon they'd consider him a "Wet".
May does at least have some sort of air of seriousness and competence, but then (Godwin Klaxon) so did Hitler!*
* Cheap shot. I'll delete if that crosses somebody's line in the current indeterminate UK Group climate.
Ironing Man
(164 posts)Johnson has pulled out of the contest - Gove stuck the knife in, and Gove was the intellectual/policy force behind Boris's throne...
the money appears to be a complex mix - many of the Johnsons supporters were brought by Gove and will, theoretically, fall back to Gove, but others are now so agery with Gove that they will go for May instead.
Denzil_DC
(7,188 posts)"For the first time in his life!"
muriel_volestrangler
(101,158 posts)Wow, I didn't see this coming ... (set up for another joke ...)
Denzil_DC
(7,188 posts)LeftishBrit
(41,192 posts)Dworkin
(164 posts)Hi,
No surprise to me. Cameron didn't want it, Boris never wanted it and Gove wanted it all along. Gove played a Paul Ryan with the coy denials, but IMHO this mess was always going to go all the way down to his level. Theresa May? Well she didn't do much of a job on the borders and immigration, so incompetence would make her the best choice for me.
However, second guessing a Tory leadership battle is just about the least pleasant way I could be spending my day, except for watching Corbyn's agonies of course.
D.
T_i_B
(14,734 posts)Michael Gove is IMHO worse than Boris. One of the very worst sort of politician, namely the sort who have no understanding of the phrase "if it ain't broke don't fix it". And what's even worse is that I can see him winning it as the Tory grassroots, judging by what I see locally are in no mood for sanity or moderation.
Andrea Leadsom comes across as being absolutely terrible, similar story with Liam Fox and as I said yesterday, Crabbe comes across as an over ambitious oportunist.
T_i_B
(14,734 posts)Saying theres been a bit of a rush, catering workers are currently scouring the Houses of Parliament looking for MPs bodies from which they can retrieve their cutlery.
The carnage started yesterday when Michael Gove used a roughly-sharpened prison shiv to do over Boris Johnson, leading to a cascade of defenestrations and stabbings as the floodgates of years of pent up frustrations spilled out into open warfare. Michael Gove himself is understood to be currently desperately fending off a steak-knife-wielding Theresa May with a sandwich platter in the Pugin bar.
Meanwhile, heating engineers at the House have asked if Jeremy Corbyn would mind returning the boiler plate hes currently got stuffed down the back of his jacket as its playing gyp with the thermostat.