“What are you doing here, Caino?” said Boris Johnson, as he brushed past his director of communications. “I thought you were off on hols.”
“I was,” Lee Cain replied, trying to conceal his resentment. “But then you went and shut down non-essential travel to Spain, so that was my fortnight in Magaluf buggered.”
“Sorry about that. Maybe you could try France or Italy instead ...”
“How do I know you aren’t going to cancel all travel there too?”
“Good point. Why don’t you just go to Gatwick and see which flights are still open and book a seat to anywhere? It’s not far off what Oliver Dowden was suggesting on the radio this morning and it seems to be as good a plan as any. And if it turns out you get stuck there, I promise to try and repatriate you.”
“If it’s all the same, I think I’ll stay put.”
“Well, I’m glad I have bumped into you because I’ve had a great idea,” Boris continued. Since the daily coronavirus briefings went down such a storm, why don’t we start a daily televised Downing Street press conference in the autumn? It will be a great way to get our message across to the public.”
“What is our message?” Caino snapped. He was having a bad enough day as it was, without another of the prime minister’s new ideas.
“Whatever it happens to be at the time. I’m not saying we should be consistent. Also be a great opportunity to rubbish whatever Labour happens to be doing at the time.”
“You do realise that the coronavirus pressers weren’t a total success. Even without the damage limitation on the Dom Cummings Durham safari, we frequently had to silence the scientists and give information that was only partly accurate. And your approval ratings have dropped significantly over the past four months.”
“But not by as much as if I hadn’t done the press briefings.”
“Are you sure now is the right time? Things are going to get even messier with high unemployment, further lockdowns and a bodged Brexit deal. Mightn’t it be better to keep your head down?”
“Oh, I didn’t intend to front them myself. I’m far too busy trying to lose weight at the moment. Besides, neither me nor anyone in the cabinet is trusted by the public. So what I imagined is that we could make it like the White House pressers and just get someone in on a £100K contract and get him to do it instead.”
“Don’t you think we should maybe also consider hiring a woman?”
“Are you sure? Everyone else who works here is a bloke. But if you say so. Best man for the job and all that.”
“So how are we going to go about the recruitment process?”
“We’ll just bung an advert on the Conservative party website with all the usual blah about ‘must be able to work to immovable deadlines, strong under pressure and good interpersonal skills’.”
“Christ,” said Caino. “We don’t want someone with interpersonal skills. The whole point of Number 10 is that it’s a place where everyone gets to shout at each other. We can’t start going soft and have people talking about their feelings.”
“I know. But we’ve got to look as if we’re being diverse and accessible. So just knock something up and let’s see what kind of takers we get.”
“I think the £100K salary is going to prove to be a dealbreaker for some. I mean there’s no chance of getting Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby in on that kind of money. They would have been a perfect double-act as they don’t ask difficult questions and the public trust them. Still, let’s see who we get.”
Within minutes of the advert going live, the applications started pinging their way into Caino’s inbox. The first was from David Starkey. He had unexpectedly found himself with time on his hands having lost a couple of jobs after an ill-advised interview with Darren Grimes.
“I have had a long career in television,” he wrote, “am sympathetic to the Brexit agenda and would be an ideal communicator of the government’s immigration policy”. He was filed under maybe.
Moments later an email arrived from Carol Vorderman saying she was excellent with numbers. She was a definite no. They didn’t want someone who could pick holes in the government’s budget.
George Osborne was also put on the reject pile. Not because he couldn’t do the job, but because Caino was aware that the former chancellor was constitutionally incapable of not applying for a high-profile post regardless of whether he wanted it or not. Besides, he might find it hard to fit in with his six other jobs.
There were also two applications from serving Tory MPs. One from Helen Whately, who felt her career had shown there was nothing she wouldn’t say in defence of the party line and that she could easily combine the post with her job as the care minister who didn’t care about anything but herself.
The other came from Chris Grayling. He was rather more blunt about his prospects. He was now struggling to get by on his MP’s salary of £80K and felt that he had a proven track record in crisis mismanagement.
The most left-field email came from Keith Vaz. Things hadn’t particularly worked out for him in the industrial washing machine sector and he was keen to re-enter politics. And even though he had also once been a Labour MP he didn’t see why that should stop him being a Conservative spokesperson. Another maybe.
Now to sit back and wait for the people he really wanted to apply The hacks and radio shock-jocks who had made a living out of giving Boris an easy ride.
