Dominic Cummings

Dominic Mckenzie Cummings (born 25 November 1971) is a British political strategist who served as chief adviser to UK prime minister Boris Johnson from July 2019 until November 2020. From 1999 to 2002, Cummings was campaign director at Business for Sterling, the campaign against the UK joining the Euro. From 2015 to 2016, he was director of Vote Leave, a campaigning organisation active in the lead-up to the 2016 EU referendum, the result led to Britain's exit from the European Union.

Quotes

Interview in The Times (16 June 2014)

Interviewed by Alice Thomson and Rachel Sylvester "'Cameron bumbles from one shambles to another with no sense of purpose'", The Times (16 June 2014).

• [On arriving at the Department for Education in 2011] Documents were stolen from desks and leaked to papers, there were determined efforts to drive us out. It was beyond parody. Dysfunction was not the word, bedlam was the word.
• To begin with, it was a disaster every half hour, then every day, by the time I left it was once a fortnight. All the basic things didn't work — every financial model would be wrong, every bit of legal advice, every set of figures. The system had gone toxic. People had to go, a lot of changes had to be made. [...] It would work a lot better if you got rid of even more. There should be between 500 and 1,000 people, but we still have 4,000-5,000.
• The poor buggers are caught between structural dysfunction and politicians running around who don't really know what they're doing all day or what the purpose of their being in power is. Everyone thinks there's some moment, like in a James Bond movie, where you open the door and that's where the really good people are, but there is no door.
• [On then education secretary Michael Gove] They could see he was willing to take a lot of flak. He wants to do what he can for schools in five years. If that means being carted off in a bodybag at the end, so be it. They now work with him to screw other people in Whitehall. So if [Nick] Clegg comes along with another mad idea, our officials work with Michael to scupper it.

2020–present

• [On then deputy cabinet secretary Helen MacNamara] I will personally handcuff her and escort her from the building. I don't care how it is done but that woman must be out of our hair. We cannot keep dealing with this horrific meltdown of the British state while dodging stilettos from that c***”.
  • WhatsApp message ([22] August 2020), as cited in "Dominic Cummings attacks Boris Johnson over pandemic response — as it happened", The Times (31 October 2023).
  • At the UK's COVID Inquiry on 31 October 2023, where these comments were repeated, Cummings denied he contributed to a misogynistic culture in 10 Downing Street.

• [On Boris Johnson] Nobody could find a way around the problem of the prime minister, just like a shopping trolley, smashing from one side of the aisle to the other.
  • Speaking at a House of Commons hearing inquiring into the government's handling of the COVID pandemic, as cited in Heather Stewart and Peter Walker "Dominic Cummings says Boris Johnson 'unfit for job' of PM amid Covid crisis", The Guardian (26 May 2021)
  • It was a joint meeting of the Commons Health and Science committees.

• Well, I think there is a very profound question about the nature of our political system that means that we got at the last election a choice between Jeremy Corbyn and Boris Johnson. I think any system that ends up giving a choice between two people like that as the people to lead is obviously a system that has gone extremely, extremely badly wrong. There are so many thousands and thousands of wonderful people in this country who could provide better leadership than either of those two, and there is obviously something terribly wrong with the political parties if that is the best that they can do.
  • Oral evidence to the Health and Social Care and Science and Technology Committees of the House of Commons (26 May 2021).

• It is completely crazy that I should have been in such a senior position, in my personal opinion. I am not smart. I have not built great things in the world.
  • Oral evidence to the Health and Social Care and Science and Technology Committees of the House of Commons (26 May 2021).
  • Cummings referring to himself.

• [Referring to school half-term in February 2020] Your fundamental point is obviously correct, that there was indeed a massive crisis. It was indeed pretty insane that so many of the senior people were away on holiday at that time.
  It's also important to realise that it's not like the civil contingencies secretariat or the national security council, or any of the organisations in charge of this were beating the drum and saying, "We’ve got to get the PM back, this is a massive crisis" — in fact quite the opposite.
  • Comments at the UK's COVID Inquiry (31 October 2023), except as indicated, as cited in "Dominic Cummings attacks Boris Johnson over pandemic response — as it happened", The Times (31 October 2023).

• [Cummings lived in Russia from December 1994 until late 1996] Different places and different times in history are the epicentre of mad energy and in 1994 the epicentre of mad energy in the world was Moscow.
  • Interviewed by Jordan Tyldesley, as cited in "Cummings: 'Boris and I saved thousands from Covid – but we won’t talk again'", i (9 May 2024)

Quotes about Dominic Cummings

• Career psychopath
  • David Cameron. From a speech at a Policy Exchange garden party commonly assumed to be a description of Cummings, as cited in Rowena Mason "PM backs Michael Gove but suggests former aide was a 'career psychopath'", The Guardian (18 June 2014)
  • Cameron suggested there was a destination to "career psychopath" from being a special adviser. Michael Gove had reportedly distanced himself from his former aide after Cummings' comments (in the 14 June Times interview) about individuals in the government.

• Ian Hislop: He literally is an arsonist pretending to be a firefighter.
  Paul Merton: When you say he's an arsonist, is that word not slightly too long?
  • Have I Got News For You (28 May 2021).

External links

Authority control: WorldCat search