If politics were a game of chess, Theresa May has reached zugzwang, a situation where any move you make will weaken your position. The expression may be lost on most of the pawns in her cabinet but one has a zugzwang maestro on his side. Jamie Njoku-Goodwin, special adviser to Matt Hancock, the health secretary, never travels without a chess board and is always up for a game. He recently dispatched Jeremy Corbyn’s head of strategic communications and says that the only person to have beaten him in Westminster is the political columnist Dominic Lawson. He honed his craft during a spell in New York where he used to hustle in Union Square.

Source: The Times May 22, 2019 23:02 UTC