Shona Craven: Take SuperDom’s heroic tale with a pinch of salt

On one hand, it’s tempting to accept his narrative given so much of it chimes with what we already knew about Boris Johnson (that he is unfit to lead the UK) or suspected (that he responded with his usual bluster to dire warnings about the dangers of Covid). And some of his claims, if true, will surely be backed up by others who were present in meetings, or by digital communications.

On the other hand, we must consider what we know – or suspect – about this scheming strategist, described by John Major as a “political anarchist” and by David Cameron as a “career psychopath”. A 2019 profile in the New York Times declared that Cummings would be “happy to watch the country blow up if he gets what he wants”. So while he has apologised for the role he played in the disaster that unfolded over the past year and a half, listen carefully to the picture he paints of his own actions.

By getting in first with his version of events, many months before the public inquiry into the handling of the pandemic is due to get going, he is controlling the narrative and setting the news agenda. By apologising for personal failings, he may appear to be contrite. But make no mistake: the key message from his testimony isn’t “I’m sorry”. What he seeks to remind us at every opportunity is “I’m brilliant”.

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Much has been made of the fact that Rishi Sunak, the presumed successor to Johnson, escaped criticism during the seven-hour evidence session, despite presiding over the Eat Out to Help Out scheme that saw folk pile back into cafes and restaurants at the end of last summer. Many commentators have echoed the suspicion of committee member Sarah Owen that Cummings might be angling for a new job when the keys to Number 10 change hands. But this was never going to happen – we didn’t need Cummings’s wife to confirm that it was a terrible idea.

If we end up with Prime Minister Sunak, he will be keen to draw a clear line between his leadership and that of his predecessor, and with Cummings now saying it was threats made to his family that forced his notorious trip to Country Durham, he has justification for seeking a quieter (but professionally successful and well-paid) life.

Others have tried to dismiss him as a disgruntled former employee out for revenge, but that doesn’t quite add up. Naturally, he claims it was his decision to part ways with Johnson at the end of last year, after telling the Prime Minister: “You are more frightened of me having the power to stop the chaos than you are of the chaos.” Here he casts himself as some kind of flawed but heroic Batman figure squaring up to The Joker, who supposedly said he was right, and that “chaos means that everyone has to look to me to see who’s in charge”.

I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t say Johnson has had the appearance of someone who’s been revelling in his leadership role for the past 12 months.

SuperDom’s special power is, he tells us, getting great teams together and managing them. To prevent thousands more needless UK Covid deaths he simply needed to assemble his Avengers – sorry, his data scientists and policy experts – but the villainous Prime Minister was just enjoying the fall of Gotham City too much, so wouldn’t let him crack on with saving the day.

It’s not clear whether the team contained any of the “weirdos and misfits” Johnson’s right-hand man hired for Number 10 roles, but it did include a data scientist named Ben Warner, who he compares to Jeff Goldblum’s tech expert character in the blockbuster movie Independence Day; and Cambridge maths professor Professor Tim Gowers, who he describes as “one of the smartest people on the planet”.

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Note that when he compliments others, he is usually complimenting himself. It was clever of him to rely on Warner to translate the science-talk of Sage for him, and an inspired move to seek the opinions of Gowers. If only the famously meek, gentle and polite Cummings had found the nerve to speak up about the need for lockdown sooner.

The reason this humble genius didn’t push the PM was, he says, because he was worried that he might be wrong, and then be blamed if all it achieved was pushing the spike of infection into the winter. Of course, it’s not possible that anyone else had similar concerns. No, those sheep were all consumed by groupthink. They hadn’t spent enough time reading Cummings’s blog, which he took time to update during the pandemic as a service to the global scientific community, and definitely not so he could say “I told you so” later on.

Cummings might think he is vastly superior – both intellectually and morally – to his old boss, but they have one thing in common, and that’s an ability to dodge questions that might paint them in a bad light. No doubt much of what he says is true, but Classic Dom as thwarted hero of the hour? Call me a cynic, but A hae ma doots.