Ding dang

Zahawi should have resigned during the week; his advisers should have realised the position was indefensible after their session with Sir Laurie Magnus, Minder of Ethics, No 10. 

Richard Sharp and Andrew Garfield should be drafting a BBC resignation letter today (and probably try to get it out by tea-time).   

Gabriel Pogrund and Harry Yorke have returned to the case of BBC Chairman Richard Sharp, Canadian businessman Sam Blyth and Boris 'Al' Johnson in today's Sunday Times. 

Whilst Pogrund and Yorke have had to correct one element of their first timeline of events - the Chequers Chop Suey Supper with Al, Sam and Dickie, took place after Richard Sharp had been installed at the BBC - but they've now put important holes in other elements of Mr Sharp's story. 

The Sunday Times's first version brought a response from Richard Sharp that he'd met Sam Blyth, an old friend, for dinner at the end of November 2020. That, of course, would have been against lockdown rules.  Now Mr Sharp says the dinner was in September 2020 (the month Simon Case was appointed Cabinet Secretary). The Times of 19th September carried a piece headlined "Overburdened, underpaid and ‘misery on his face’: Boris Johnson gets the blues". 

It went on "Those in contact with the prime minister, both friends and colleagues, say he is finding aspects of the job extraordinarily tough. They are concerned that Mr Johnson’s longstanding tendency for dark moods is being exacerbated by the pressure he is under. On the personal front, they say, Mr Johnson, 56, is worried and complaining about money. He is still supporting, to different degrees, four out of his six children, has been through an expensive divorce and had his income drop by more than half as a result of fulfilling his lifetime ambition."

Easy then, to believe that a Dickie/Sam dinner might have talked a little about their mutual friend, and perhaps their shared experiences of divorce costs.  But why cousin Sam didn't just call cousin Al/Boris is a puzzle, unless, of course, the non-financial advice from an investment banker working at the heart of No 10 was that it should be done 'properly'. 

The BBC vacancy was very much in the air that September. Briefings in August said Boris had lined up Nicky Morgan, Amber Rudd and Andrew Neil as possible candidates; at the end of September, newspapers claimed it was a done deal for Charles Moore, denied almost instantly by then Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden. In fact, the formal recruitment process that produced Mr Sharp was launched on 14th October, and applications closed on 11th November. 

Today's Sunday Times say there was one more phone call between Dickie and Sam, before Mr Sharp called in on Cabinet Secretary Simon Case on Friday December 4th.  On Monday 7th, Case asked his deputy to draft a formal note of advice to the Prime Minister. On Friday 11th December, Mr Sharp had his final interview for the vacancy of BBC Chairman. On December 22nd, the 'advice' note was handed to Mr Johnson “Given the imminent announcement of Richard Sharp as the new BBC chair, it is important that you no longer ask his advice about your personal financial matters.”

Sharp and Johnson's shaky defence now rests on arguing that the country's top Civil Servant and his number 2 got the wrong end of the stick in their call for an end to advice seeking. After all, Boris Johnson's spokesperson last week couldn't have been ding-dang clearer "“Richard Sharp has never given any financial advice to Boris Johnson, nor has Mr Johnson sought any financial advice from him.”