Musings on Tory leadership race. Am not working for any of them this time so hopefully semi objective. Short Thread 1/ Lots flying around on name recognition/who can win an election. Others have opined noise not signal. Special sauce if you are contender today is to look like a leader at uncertain economic moment - while nod to gravity of party on Brexit and tax. Talk about electorate later 2/

Political Twitter has been breathless and with notable exceptions insight-free in recent days. With all due humility therefore a short Thread on what the next few days are actually about re Johnson 1/ Lots of valid and convincing arguments that partygate political kryptonite. Tend to agree. However, imminent days are not about electability. Purely the raw exercise of staying in power and living to fight. Top flight politicians are optimists and believe something will turn up 2

Quick unsolicited advice on what next after Frost. Three ways to do replacement if you are Number 10 - path they choose will tell you a lot about nature of political operation left in building 1/ Option one. Go with true believer Brexiteer from backbenches. Assuming someone willing to take the job, this will get you c.12 hours breathing space with latest incarnation of ERG and please some excitable folk. 2/

Short Thread: general view among stepped out Tory apparatchiks for past year has been that Bojo operation hopeless but he'll probably get away with it because of teflon/Lab Scotland/Starmer bit uninspiring/COVID benefit of doubt/Tory papers look after ex member of chapel (1) Generally in politics if something is too good to be true it normally is and doesn't last. I remember Theresa May's Reaganite numbers while watching catastrophe unfold on the ground floor of CCHQ in May '17 (2)

It's normally a mistake in political comms to obsess about the slogan at the detriment of all else. If you want to use the slogan less, use it less and phase it out. Try not to brief that you are changing the slogan.

Show. Don't tell. Messaging is an oil tanker and can't simply be turned round overnight.

For a few months in 2012-13, "Winning The Global Race" was the political slogan of the Conservative Party. Until research made clear that people found it unsettling and definitely not a vote winner (2)

The first 48 hrs in D Street are overwhelming for all new administrations. The start-up mentality of campaigning has to adapt quickly to the awesome complexity of governing.

There are two political decisions above all that this new administration will have to take in short order Decision 1: what is your preferred Brexit outcome?

Is it leaving the European Union without a deal? This will be the inevitable consequence of axing the Irish border backstop entirely from the Withdrawal Agreement. As has been promised in this leadership campaign (2)

Johnson is evidently ticking the dealer in hope bit. But he is going to need one hell of a Downing Street operation around him not to get consumed in weeks. With the greatest respect, D St is not City Hall. The complexity and volume of decisions will be like nothing seen before. The United Kingdom's system of Government works on written fiat - boxes done overnight and officials given their marching orders from the boss. Unless you are consistent, thoughtful and timely in your instructions, the system will grind to a halt (2/8)

THREAD on why an election in the UK is not quite as fanciful as people think. This does not mean it is going to happen; but the risk of one is higher than commonly ascribed. My own preference is that Conservatives act sensibly and try and avoid it. Anyway, here we go (1/25) Since June 2017 we have had a hung parliament in this country that cannot be brought to consensus on how to proceed on Brexit. The numbers do not work (2/25)

NEW ESSAY QUESTION for future historians of Brexit. Was the hung Parliament of 2017 the real reason why the Irish border question proved insoluble? My answer - not necessarily but it certainly ensured there was no space to have realistic debates on the East-West dimension (1/25) I put this argument forward with a lot of caution because it is easy for words to be misinterpreted and motives questioned. Twitter is not a university tutorial room. So I will proceed carefully (2/25)

ESSAY QUESTION for future historians of Brexit. Was the creation of the Department for International Trade in July 2016 a strategic mis-step in the delivery of the referendum result? With hindsight only, I am increasingly of the view it was a mistake to do it so quickly (1/11) It legitimised a sense very early on that Brexit would not be Brexit unless the UK was able to strike trade deals without being part of a European trading bloc. This is the nub of many of the arguments being made today on the Customs Union and our future relationship with it 2/11

THREAD: The old cliché goes that a week is a long time in politics. This is part of the reason why history rarely gets a look in when assessing the challenges we face in the modern day (1/11) But I thoroughly recommend this (long) lecture by Professor Roy Foster from 2015. In which he talks about the dangers of letting loose “a new emotional force in politics that makes the old give and take seem irrelevant” (2/11)