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Chief of Staff

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Chief of Staff

By: Gavin Barwell
Narrated by: Gavin Barwell
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About this listen

Once a more sedate affair, since 2016, British politics has witnessed a barrage of crises, resignations and general elections. As Brexit became logjammed, Theresa May's premiership was the most turbulent of all. In her darkest hour, following the disastrous 2017 election, she turned to Gavin Barwell to restore her battered authority. He would become her chief of staff for the next two years - a period punctuated by strained negotiations, domestic tragedy and intense political drama.

In this gripping insider memoir, Barwell reveals what really went on in the corridors of power - and sheds a vital light on May, the most inscrutable of modern prime ministers. He was by her side when she negotiated her Brexit deal, met Donald Trump, heard about the poisoning of the Skripals in Salisbury, responded to the Grenfell Tower fire, met Jeremy Corbyn and Keir Starmer to broker a cross-party Brexit agreement - and ultimately made the decision to stand down as prime minister. Revealing how government operates during times of crisis, this will become the definitive record of a momentous episode in Britain's recent political history.

©2021 Gavin Barwell (P)2021 W. F. Howes Ltd Europe Great Britain Political Science Politics & Government World England Thought-Provoking Government

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All stars
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The book is highly interesting and offers great insights into the May government. Not sure I fully agree with all the assessments of the political situation.

Great insights jnto May government

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The book would be perfect for its subject but for the incredibly irritating tick of announcing and closing each quote. I have heard thousands of books with quotes and never heard or needed this before.

Excellent book well read

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Absorbing account of how to not solve the impossible.
Superbly written factual account. You are left breathless at the sheer stupidity of the whole Brexit fiasco.

Really well written

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a really engrossing account of the Brexit dogfight. makes sense of what happened since then

fascinating

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I had hoped this book would give me an interesting insight into the workings of number 10; it did. However, Barwell’s irritating habits ruined it for me: the least of this was his insistence of expressing the date as, for example, ‘twelfth March,’ rather than ‘the twelfth of March’ was irksome after twenty or so times. The biggest irritation was his constant use of ‘quote’ blah blah blah, ‘end quote’; there are ways of writing that can avoid this annoyance, particularly when it comes half a dozen times in the same paragraph!
Apart from all of this, the book does give a good insight into the workings of number 10 during the May Government; although that has probably changed considerably now the lunatics have taken over the asylum!

A fine tale badly told.

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My favourite read of 2021. Honest and enlightening look at Brexit and May premiership and all the trials and tribulations faced.

Wonderful

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Please sort out technical problems. No mechanism for reporting problems or getting help to resolve

Simply won’t play beyond ch 22

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interesting book that shined a light on brexit and the May government that
our media a bad job of showing.
it was long and got abit hard going near the end but I am glad I finished it.
The recording was very good and all the better that the reader was the author who had lived through what he spoke of.
This is one of those books that I would not read in book form but buy in audiobook form.

interesting though a tad bit to long.

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Certainly an interesting listen. Gavin is clear in his pitch and open about his experience.

Interesting insight

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The self congratulatory nature of this memoir is quite remarkable at times given the quite frankly disastrous nature of the May premiership. I can accept that she may have had good intentions, but that really is not enough. There are many breathtaking moments. In a discussion of the backstop to the backstop period (don’t ask) he mentions at one point that there was general misunderstanding that the May proposal was about "a" customs union rather than "the" custom union, but it was too difficult to make that point clear. That seems to me to go to the heart of the problem. It was the government’s problem to MAKE that clear but they failed in that central duty and then became hamstrung by their opponents. Sulphurous fumes appear whenever Boris or Trump make an appearance but the latter often seems to be quite acute about things, and it is interesting to hear about his desire to avoid nuclear war by all costs. Barwell gives one radio interview at the end of his term and speaks movingly and admiringly about Theresa May. Afterwards he asks if she heard it . “Typical Theresa, she hadn’t” he says. But that is also part of the problem. There is something missing about her, human empathy really, despite all her high falutin ideas. Oh well, she placed him in the House of Lords. I found this an entertaining listen about a complex period of recent history, but it doesn’t show much insight on the whole. Quite a boozy culture in No 10 too, I note. We would be hearing more about that soon unbeknown to the author!

Theresa Fan Boy

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