Boris Johnson: Three decades of scandals, blunders and rows
The Prime Minister survived when other politicians may have been brought down by controversy.
Boris Johnson has survived a series of scandals, blunders and controversies which could have sunk other political careers.
Here are some of them:
– Journalism
In 1988 Mr Johnson was sacked from his first job in journalism as a graduate trainee on The Times for fabricating a quote.
In 1995 a recording emerged of a telephone conversation in which he agreed to provide an old friend, Darius Guppy, with the address of a journalist who was investigating him so that he could have him beaten up to the extent of “a couple of black eyes and a cracked rib or something like that”.
In the event Mr Johnson said he did not pass on the information.
As a columnist on The Daily Telegraph he faced accusations of racism and homophobia for describing Africans as “piccaninnies” with “watermelon smiles” and referring to gay men as “tank-topped bum boys”.
In 2018, he caused further controversy with an article for the paper in which he described Muslim women who wore the niqab or the burka as looking like “letterboxes” and “bank robbers”.
– Personal life
The three times-married Mr Johnson has led a colourful personal life, with allegations of multiple affairs. He has never confirmed how many children he has fathered in and out of wedlock.
In 2004 he was sacked as a shadow minister by then-Tory leader Michael Howard for lying to journalists over reports he had an affair with the columnist Petronella Wyatt who said she had had two abortions.
