What is Boris Johnson’s political philosophy?

The prime minister appears to be taking the lead from Michael Heseltine, writes Sean O'Grady

Perhaps a Johnson government would have done more to save the steel industry last year than May’s (PA)

Last September, Boris Johnson gave his cabinet an outline of his political philosophy. Unlike some of his colleagues’ dilations on their “vision for Britain”, Mr Johnson’s was succinct. He was, he vouchsafed to his top team, “basically a Brexity Hezza”. It is turning out to be an accurate description.

The “Brexity” adjective is easy to understand – and it is becoming increasingly apparent how Brexity the government is. Mr Johnson believes, quite simply, that the only point to Brexit is if Britain can design its own rules and laws to suit itself and gain a global competitive advantage, and that harmonising or aligning them with the EU is counterproductive. Thus, we are headed for a more difficult, harder Brexit than seemed possible in the referendum of 2016. It will entail quite a radical and painful restructuring of the economy when, or if, it transpires. Yet it will be tempered – in places – by the kind of state intervention the EU frowns on under its “state aid” rules.

The “Hezza” bit refers to Michael Heseltine. In the 1970s to the 1990s he was, like Mr Johnson today, the darling of the party grassroots. Since then, Lord Heseltine’s brand of conservatism has drifted so far away from the contemporary party that he was sacked as an adviser to the government by Theresa May, and later had the Tory whip withdrawn – all over differences about Brexit.