Let us talk about the man who wanted to castrate Michael Gove
Ben Wallace has cut a repeatedly frustrated and forlorn figure in recent days as it appears thanks to Pen Farthing’s PR campaign which appeared to prioritise animals over humans, as we can see in the tweet above. I suspect as a former member of the Scots Guards Ben Wallace was channelling the motto of that august regiment, nemo me impune lacessit.
I’ve always liked Ben Wallace for not sugarcoating things, most (in)famously in 2016 when Michael Gove torpedoed Boris Johnson’s leadership bid Wallace publicly wanted to castrate Michael Gove, as a Boris Johnson supporter Wallace did not take Gove’s behaviour very well.
Wallace has appeared to be on top of his brief, particularly on the Afghanistan evacuation, which is in stark contrast to the likes of Dominic Raab, and the wider competence free zone that is the current cabinet where ministers like Gavin Williamson and Priti Patel have turned incompetence into performance art.
I have this hunch now, based on the cri de cœur that was this twitter thread from Ben Wallace, that once the UK has done as much as permissible with the deadline he might quit as Defence Secretary, resigning mid way through the evacuation may have caused even more issues and allowed fewer people to be evacuated from Afghanistan.
On Smarkets you can get 15/1 that Wallace is next out of the cabinet, which is similar to the price Ladbrokes were offering before they pulled their market and I think that is worth a nibble.
There is also the possibility that Boris Johnson’s inamorata may ask for Wallace to be dismissed from the cabinet. There were several stories earlier on this week that ‘Carrie Johnson was key to rescue of 200 cats and dogs from Kabul’ so there could be problems from Wallace on that front given his public comments. Sacked or resigning would pay out on this bet.
TSE