November 14, 2004
BAD NEWS FOR BOJO
Spectator editor and Conservative MP Boris Johnson is in a spot of bother:
Tory MP Boris Johnson was sacked from his party's front bench last night over lurid claims about his love life.
His fate was sealed by the mother of his alleged mistress, Petronella Wyatt, who said her daughter had become pregnant by him and had an abortion last month.
Johnson, who is married with four children, had categorically dismissed the allegations only last week as an 'inverted pyramid of piffle'- and, crucially, he had assured Tory leader Michael Howard they were untrue.
Last night Howard said his colourful arts spokesman and party vice-chairman had been 'relieved of his responsibilities'. He is said to have been unable to forgive Johnson for having apparently misled both newspapers to whom he had earlier denied the allegations and Howard, who publicly backed him.
Johnson is already in the "unforgiven" pile for adding Andrew Gilligan to the Spectator's staff. Rumours of a Boris-Wyatt affair aren't new; e-mails were circulating up to a year ago.
Posted by Tim Blair at November 14, 2004 06:14 PMA little life and colour has been excised from British public life.
Farewell Boris, you will be sorely missed.
Talk about incestuous.
Petronella Wyatt wrote for the Speccie, too, and is herself the daughter of an old Tory minister. (She wrote a very funny column a while back about how her fathers gay friends used to get him to stand guard at the door of the House of Commons toilets.)
Posted by: TimT at November 14, 2004 at 07:46 PM>Farewell Boris, you will be sorely missed.
Missed perhaps, but not *sorely* missed. Too often he fails to see things in a broader context. He is not a strategist and will hopefully never run the Tory Party as has been suggested.
But to fire him because of his love life is ridiclous and typical British!
it is said that Chirac's chauffeur spend many hours a month, awaiting his master whilst he attends to "affairs of government".
But the British ever since Profumo... well!
Fired?
Why?
Did anyone ask Deborah Ross? Or Taki?
Posted by: ilibcc at November 14, 2004 at 09:56 PMI like "inverted pyramid of piffle" more than "goomba goom".
Posted by: bc at November 14, 2004 at 11:30 PM"...an 'inverted pyramid of piffle'..."
Only in England could a public official say something like this and people would still believe he had an affair with someone of the opposite sex.
Posted by: Jim Treacher at November 15, 2004 at 12:41 AMWyatt was I think orgionally a labor minister - before crossing over to the other side. So I suppose he was the origional neo conservative and Petronella is the result.
Does Richard Perle have a daughter?
Posted by: Giles at November 15, 2004 at 01:38 AM"There'll always be an England, eh...?"
Not if Blair and Brussels have anything to do with it ...
Anyway, even if England is immortal, so what? It's got to be an England worth living in, otherwise we may as well just become France-without-the-cooking.
Posted by: PJ at November 15, 2004 at 02:01 AMWhy are the Brits are in such a lather over this? I thought it was only us prudish unsophisticated Americans who cared about stuff like adultery and abortion.
And BTW Johnson was right (as was Mark Steyn) when he described the lachrymose wallowing that went on in L'pool after Bigley's murder. I wish he hadn't apologized.
Posted by: Annalucia at November 15, 2004 at 02:12 AM"I thought it was only us prudish unsophisticated Americans who cared about stuff like adultery and abortion."
thats jsut it cool britantia has just discovered that its prudish unsophisticated too.
"But to fire him because of his love life is ridiclous and typical British!"
All of the reports that I've seen stress that he wasn't fired because he had a bit on the side but because he lied to the boss about it.
In an Australian context, wasn't there a sitting Liberal member (and Parliamentary Secretary), during the recent election campaign, who the MSM set out to get because he'd had an affair and confessed it to his wife? The same media who, five years before, screamed bloody blue murder because Bill Clinton was being persecuted over, "incidents in his personal life".
Hard to see why Boris should be sacked over an affair, but not for being a clown and a source of ridicule for his party.Why his employers at the Spectator dont sack him is another puzzle.
Posted by: George Fish at November 15, 2004 at 07:21 AMGeorge,
They don't sack him because under his editorship the Spectator has had a major increase in circulation.
Posted by: Toryhere at November 15, 2004 at 08:21 AMPerhaps Boris was also upset Howard by being the only prominent Tory to sign the petition to impeach Blair. Most other signatories being the loony left Celtic fringe - not the best of company!
Posted by: don at November 15, 2004 at 08:37 AMThat explains everything. I wondered what Petsy meant when she wrote this in Singular Life a couple of weeks ago.
Had to be at a dinner party in Chelsea at 6pm. I was having my nails done at 4pm so that left me with half an hour for an abortion and to grab a bottle of Chateau Mouton Rothschild. The abortion, at least, went off without a hitch...
Posted by: Pig Head Sucker at November 15, 2004 at 09:57 AM>wasn't fired because he had a bit on the side but because he lied to the boss about it.
OK, but it is a private matter you can lie to anyone about, except to a court (unless you are a leftie President of the United States of America).