The latest round of reshuffle appointments has seen Alistair Burt, Alok Sharma, Mark Field and Mark Lancaster promoted to Minister of State level. All of them Remainers…

The penny has dropped this afternoon that the PM’s new chief of staff Gavin Barwell has been slotting in Remainers where ever he can. The replacement of fervent Brexiteer David Jones as Minister of State at the Department for Exiting the European Union was remarkable. Guido understands that Jones – who led the Welsh arm of the Vote Leave campaign – was replaced by Baroness Anelay without reference to his boss David Davis. That raised eyebrows…

Insiders grumble that the charming Barwell, an arch-Remainer, blames the loss of his Croydon seat on Brexit, London being a Remain stronghold. He is taking the opportunity of being restored to the centre of power to put pro-Remain allies into positions of influence. Barwell is also being blamed for the clumsy “end to austerity” spin. Hardly anyone on the Tory backbenches thinks that the loss of a 24 point lead in a 7 week election was due to voters changing their views on fiscal prudence. Britain was not suddenly converted to the merits of harvesting magic money trees…