Sir, – Your London editor Denis Staunton is right: "Johnson's reshuffle has left senior Vote Leave figures in command of all the levers of power within a government that has been purged not only of dissenting voices but of sceptical ones" ("Johnson's purge leaves him free to spend his way to popularity", Analysis, February 13th).
However, the shock resignation of Sajid Javid means dark clouds are already gathering around Boris Johnson’s premiership.
For instance, a former chancellor under John Major, Norman Lamont, said of No 10’s treasury takeover: “This reeks to me slightly of vulnerability, suspicion, paranoia”.
Recent UK political history is littered with examples of overconfident prime ministers whose empires began imploding at the moment when they appeared to be strongest – think of Tony Blair and Iraq, and David Cameron and the EU referendum.
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Mr Johnson and his éminence grise, Dominic Cummings, may think they are taking total control of power.
Instead, they might just have laid the first dark seeds of a contagious narrative of distrust within the British government that will lead to their ultimate downfall. – Yours, etc,
JOE McCARTHY,
Arbour Hill,
Dublin 7.