It is perhaps the greatest testament to Gavin Williamson’s mastery of the baser political arts that three separate prime ministers have seemingly found him indispensable despite his striking record of ministerial mishaps and, at times, sheer ineptitude.
Further evidence of Williamson’s political antennae comes from his parallel habit of backing winners: he was an early supporter of Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak, proving invaluable in marshalling support among Tory MPs.
The same fundamental paradox has, however, emerged under all three: Williamson is seemingly much better at acquiring ministerial roles than carrying them out, with the exception of being chief whip.
May was so impressed by the South Staffordshire MP as chief whip that she promoted him to become defence secretary, a role in which he visibly struggled. May then sacked him after she concluded he had leaked sensitive telecoms information from a meeting of the national security council.
Williamson bitterly complained he had been wronged, while May’s aides were equally adamant the evidence of the leak was watertight. As it turned out, less than three months later Johnson returned him to the cabinet as education secretary.
While it is possible that Michael Gove was an education secretary more disliked by teaching unions for his breakneck programme of schools reform, Williamson is almost universally seen as the least-competent modern occupant of the role, and he was dismissed by Johnson last year. Even then, Johnson handed Williamson a knighthood six months later.
The list of Williamson’s moments of ministerial ignominy is long, even before the recent days of controversy over allegations of bullying and expletive-laden messages to fellow MPs.
As defence secretary, many worried that Williamson’s much-reported comment that Russia “should go away and should shut up” perhaps indicated a politician lacking the necessary gravitas for the job.
While Williamson’s tenure in education was made hugely difficult by the impact of Covid, he nonetheless showed minimal aptitude for making things better, most notably with the debacle over A-level grading in 2020, when he initially stood by the controversial system of computer algorithm and teacher assessments, before an inevitable U-turn.
Williamson even made his own contribution to the Johnson-led controversy over extending free school meals for poorer children, telling a newspaper he had held a Zoom meeting with Marcus Rashford, the Manchester United footballer and anti-poverty campaigner, when he in fact met a different black sportsman, Maro Itoje, a rugby player.
For all this, Williamson’s more terminal political downfall appears likely to come as a corollary of his greatest talent: as a politician even his foes accept is brilliant at gauging support levels, knowing secrets about everyone and everything, and using the various levers at a whip’s disposal to exert pressure.
Williamson has visibly enjoyed this reputation, gaining his first beyond-Westminster renown as a chief whip who kept a pet tarantula called Cronus in a glass box on his desk.
“I don’t very much believe in the stick,” Williamson joked at a May-era Conservative party conference. “But it’s amazing what can be achieved with a sharpened carrot.”
What has emerged in recent days is the sense that Williamson’s evident enjoyment of the inevitable menace of a whip’s role can, critics allege, spill over into bullying, abuse or just plain pettiness.
One of the most damaging recent claims is the fact that Williamson not only sent furious messages to Wendy Morton, who filled the chief whip’s role under Liz Truss, but did so because he could not believe he had not been invited to the Queen’s funeral.
Born in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, Williamson had a comprehensive school education before getting a degree in social science at the University of Bradford and working in business.
One role involved working for a North Yorkshire-based fireplace manufacturer, a job he left after a relationship with a female junior colleague jeopardised his marriage – yet another embarrassing detail to emerge during his ministerial career.
He became an MP in 2010, aged just 33, soon becoming a parliamentary private secretary – an unpaid aide – to several ministers, then for David Cameron, yet another prime minister for whom he made himself invaluable.
Williamson’s big break came when Cameron resigned after the Brexit referendum, and he attached himself to May, promising he could deliver the MP numbers for her to win.
This is the other knack he has been able to take advantage of: like Johnson and Sunak subsequently, May is not a natural networker or schemer, and badly needed someone else to fill that role. Williamson has filled this very particular, politically lucrative niche three times now. Four, however, might be a stretch.
