Gently does it. The last time Greg Clark exchanged words with Dominic Cummings was in the summer of 2019, when Boris Johnson’s former chief adviser had phoned to abuse him for not backing the prime minister’s Brexit deal. Fair to say that call did not end well. But both men have moved on since then – Cummings to … no one is quite sure what – and for their reunion gig at the science and technology committee, Clark, its chair, was determined to defuse any possible tensions. So for this particular session, no one would mention coronavirus and Cummings’ role in the government’s handling of the pandemic. That treat would be saved for a later date. For the next 90 minutes all questions would be confined to the new Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria), Dom’s baby that was promised an initial handout of £800m in the last budget. For his part, Dom was on his best behaviour. At his last appearance before a select committee, during the EU referendum campaign, he had made a point of insulting everyone in the room in turn, but now he was careful to be the model of politeness. Hell, he’d even bothered to iron his shirt. How much more respect could a guy show? Cummings began by explaining the concept of Aria with the help of a Venn diagram he had brought with him. That small pink area? That’s where scientific research was currently concentrated. That vast blue area? That’s where he thought the scientists should be focused. Not so much thinking outside the box as thinking outside the circle. And if the diagram wasn’t sufficiently clear, MPs would be able to find a version in the 100,000-word blog he had altered on his return from Barnard Castle in the spring of last year. What Dom wanted was an agency that would focus on blue skies research, that would find solutions to the questions no one else was asking. A pared-down agency that would dispense with the bad bureaucrats and replace them with the good bureaucrats of a scientific director and four trustees – you would be able to tell they were good because they would have jerseys with G for good on the back of them. An agency whose success would be measured by the number of failures it produced. If every project succeeded then the agency would be funding the wrong ones. An agency that would be prepared to take a chance on some weirdo taking an hour round-trip drive in the car to check up on the state of his eyesight and to hell with the risk of undermining the government’s entire message on complying with the Covid regulations. Because that was precisely the type of misfit who would be able to come up with the idea of Aria. Above all, what he wanted was an agency without the cronyism of old muckers peer-reviewing each other’s work and friction-free. This all sounded quite plausible until you considered the ironies and contradictions. During the pandemic, the government’s first attempts at reducing bureaucracy had merely resulted in contracts being awarded to Tory party donors. And as the architect of Vote Leave, few had done more to increase the paperwork of non-tariff barriers to trade with the Brexit deal than Cummings. Despite the whole session being dedicated to Dom’s favourite subject – why Dom was extremely clever and right about everything – even Cummings began to tire of people taking him seriously. There was only so much humble-bragging he could manage – “Oh, I’m definitely not the right person to run Aria” – so then he turned to setting the record straight. AKA conducting a drive-by shooting. First in line was Matt Hancock. The Department of Health and Social Care had been an “absolute, total mess”, a “smoking ruin” in the aftermath of its failure to provide enough PPE. That was why he and Patrick Vallance – the prime minister wasn’t important enough to be consulted – had insisted that the vaccine programme be taken out of Hancock’s hands. Back in his office, Door Matt sobbed uncontrollably. He had spent weeks the previous summer making excuses for Dom’s Durham safari and now he was being repaid by being turned over. Moments later, Matt’s day took a further turn for the worse when he was told to lead the Downing Street press conference. Even though there was no news to pass on. “I have some very exciting information,” he later said with all the sincerity of a shopping channel presenter on the graveyard shift. So exciting that he forgot to mention a letter which stated there would be a shortage of vaccine for the next month or so. “Oh that!” he said, affecting surprise when asked about it by the media. “That was just a standard letter.” As in a standard bad news letter Door Matt also did his best to swerve questions on Dom’s remarks about the Department of Health. It’s a team effort, he said. “We have a positive mission, can-do spirit.” Except some parts of the team had been noticeably weaker than others. He looked miserable. All Tigger spent. Still, at least Hancock could console himself that he wasn’t the only one in the line of fire. Asked about being offered the job of chief adviser, Dom was quick to point out that it was actually him who had hired Boris. He had asked Johnson if he was serious about getting Brexit done, serious about doubling the research budget, serious about Aria and serious about getting the dead wood out of Whitehall, and it was only when he had received an affirmative answer to each question that he had agreed to take Boris on as his prime minister. The rest of the session was just clickbait. No, he hadn’t bothered to listen to the budget. He had far better things to do with his time. And yes, having already dropped in a few teasers, he would happily come along at a later date to give fuller evidence on the government’s handling of the Covid crisis. He had rather forgotten how much he enjoyed being the centre of attention and, after all, the more he thought about it the more he was convinced that everything that had happened in 2020 proved he had been right to do whatever it was he had done. He didn’t care who he took down. Dom owed nothing to anyone. Il ne regrette rien. Dom Classique.