If Boris is so weak he lets Carrie steer policy, blame him — not her

WHEN Tory grandee Lord Frost told the PM to sack all the ‘green fanatics and prowoke crowd’ in No 10 who influence his decisions, it made me wince. I thought he was taking a swipe at Carrie Johnson.

Perhaps I was wrong, but I hate the way the old male brigade often blame the partners of powerful men for their ills, portraying them as Lady Macbeths. I had my fair share of it while working for William Hague when he was leader of the Opposition.

A Times front page carried a lifesized picture of my red lips (no face) with the screaming headline, as I recall: ‘Is this the most useless woman in politics today?’

I wasn’t devising Tory policy, I was a mere spin doctor. Yet, like Carrie, I was an easy target. The author of The Times’s 2,000-word hatchet job on me, one Michael Gove, who was then a journalist, has since apologised.

Of course, I cannot deny there’s a thread running through many of the Prime Minister’s current woes that seems to lead back to Carrie.

First there was Wallpaper-gate, then the hiring and tearful resignation of her friend Allegra Stratton as Boris’s spokeswoman — and she produced that controversial birthday cake for him.

Her enmity with Dominic Cummings reportedly led to his removal — which in turn resulted in his vindictive leaks that now seriously endanger Johnson’s premiership. There’s also the suggestion Carrie is behind Boris’s apparent obsession with green causes and Net Zero which is causing energy bills to soar.

But is it right to blame Carrie for Boris’s plight? Not really in my book. Those who know her say she is clever, kind and lots of fun.

In any good marriage, wives influence their husbands and make them better men. Sarah Brown and Samantha Cameron certainly did.

But does that mean Carrie is influencing policy? Well, if she were to the extent her critics suggest, it should surely be Boris who gets the flak, not her. If he does his wife’s bidding and can’t make his own decisions, he’s not fit for any position in government, let alone PM.

If Carrie’s sin is that she makes her husband watch an Attenborough documentary on melting icecaps and the perils facing polar bears, so be it.

It will hardly influence his approach to the impending disaster in the Ukraine.