Michael Gove to be editor of The Spectator following takeover

Former Cabinet minister will take over from Fraser Nelson on Oct 8 – three months after standing down as MP

Michael Gove has been appointed as editor of The Spectator magazine after its takeover by GB News co-owner Sir Paul Marshall, The Telegraph can reveal.
The controversial former Cabinet minister will begin his new job on Oct 8, just over three months after he stood down as an MP. It means he will be at the helm of the magazine known as the “Tory Bible” as the Conservative Party leadership election reaches its climax.
He will take over from Fraser Nelson, who has achieved record print circulation figures during his 15 years in the job as well as making a success of its digital subscription strategy.
Mr Gove’s appointment will not only give him a major platform for shaping opinion around who should be the next Tory leader, but it also suggests a shift in emphasis at the influential magazine, which was fiercely opposed to the Covid lockdowns that Mr Gove championed while in government.
Mr Gove is a divisive figure in Conservative circles, having scuppered Boris Johnson’s 2016 leadership bid by standing against him after promising he would back him. It earned him a reputation as a backstabber which has stayed with him ever since.
Mr Johnson, himself a former editor of The Spectator, had run the successful Vote Leave campaign with him before they became rivals.
Mr Gove will take over as editor of the magazine three weeks before the end of the Tory leadership contest. He has in the past been a vocal supporter of Kemi Badenoch, though their relationship is said to have cooled in recent months. She told a hustings event last month that she was not “controlled” by the former housing secretary.
Mr Gove is thought to have sought the approval of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments, which must green light any job taken by an ex-minister within two years of leaving government.
Mr Nelson, who is also a Telegraph columnist, is expected to leave the world’s oldest weekly magazine, which had become so successful under his stewardship that Sir Paul outbid Rupert Murdoch to pay £100 million for it earlier this month, around twice what it had been expected to sell for.
Mr Gove’s divisiveness in the Conservative Party was not confined to his long-running rivalry with Mr Johnson. David Cameron, now Lord Cameron, described him in his autobiography as “mendacious” after falling out with him over Brexit and said of him: “One quality shone through, disloyalty.”
Liz Truss described him as “that snake” after he helped undermine her brief premiership by saying he would not vote for her Budget when it was put before Parliament.
Sir Paul, who made his fortune as the co-founder of the hedge fund group Marshall Wace LLP, is a former member of the Liberal Democrats who switched his allegiance to the Conservative Party because he supported Brexit.
He is co-owner of GB News and owner of the news website UnHerd, and is part of a consortium that has previously expressed an interest in buying Telegraph Media Group, the sale of which is ongoing.
Earlier this month the veteran journalist Andrew Neil resigned as chairman of The Spectator with a parting shot at Sir Paul.
He told its staff: “My greatest regret is that I have not been able to find you a new home guaranteed to nurture the unique chemistry of The Spectator, which makes it so special and successful,” said Mr Neil.
“You can have all the resources in the world but if you don’t understand what really makes The Spectator tick then they will be as naught.”
He also urged Sir Paul not to interfere in editorial matters, saying: “I regarded it as my prime responsibility for 20 years to ensure [editorial independence], protecting the editor not just from outside pressures, commercial or political, but even from proprietors,” said Mr Neil.
“I cannot tell if the new owners will have the same reverence for editorial independence since they have not shared their thinking.”
Mr Gove and Sir Paul share a belief in the need for a more responsible form of capitalism, and in March, Mr Gove defended Sir Paul in the House of Commons during a debate about extremism.
Sir Paul had “liked” a tweet that said “civil war is coming” because of the increasing proportion of Muslims making up the population of Britain, which was criticised by Labour. Mr Gove said: “I deprecate the personal attack on Sir Paul”, describing him as “a distinguished philanthropist.”
Mr Gove’s new job marks a return to the career he left when he became an MP in 2005. He was assistant editor of The Times, having started his career in journalism working on The Telegraph’s Peterborough column.
Mr Gove is not the first former Cabinet minister to become an editor: George Osborne, the former chancellor, was appointed editor of The Evening Standard in 2017 by its owner Lord Lebedev, but he was unable to halt its decline during his three years in the job. Earlier this month the newspaper ceased daily publication and moved to a weekly print publication model to cut costs.
Sir Paul bought The Spectator through his Old Queen Street Media company, which owns UnHerd. Its chief executive is Freddie Sayers, who is now publisher of The Spectator.
After the takeover, he promised that UnHerd and The Spectator would “remain fully separate titles, with independent editorial and governance structures”. 
Mr Gove and Mr Sayers have been contacted by The Telegraph for comment.