Boris Johnson
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson Hon FRIBA (/ˈfɛfəl/;[7] born 19 June 1964) is a British politician, writer, and former journalist serving as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Minister for the Union[8] and Leader of the Conservative Party since 2019. He was Foreign Secretary from 2016 to 2018 and Mayor of London from 2008 to 2016. Johnson was Member of Parliament for Henley from 2001 to 2008 and has been MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip since 2015. Ideologically, Johnson identifies as a one-nation conservative.
Johnson was born in New York City to upper-middle class English parents and educated at Eton College. He read Classics at Balliol College, Oxford, where he was elected President of the Oxford Union in 1986. He began his career in journalism at The Times newspaper but was dismissed for falsifying a quotation. He later became the Brussels correspondent for The Daily Telegraph newspaper and his articles exerted a strong influence on growing Eurosceptic sentiment on the British right. He was promoted to an assistant editor from 1994 to 1999, and edited The Spectator magazine from 1999 to 2005. He was elected MP for Henley in 2001, and served as a Junior Shadow Minister under Conservative leaders Michael Howard and David Cameron. He largely adhered to the Conservatives' party line but adopted a socially liberal stance on issues such as LGBT rights in parliamentary votes. He resigned as an MP and in 2008 was elected Mayor of London, being re-elected in 2012. During his mayoralty he oversaw the 2012 Summer Olympics, introduced the New Routemaster buses, a cycle hire scheme and a cable car crossing the Thames, and banned alcohol consumption on much of London's public transport.
In 2015, Johnson was elected MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip, stepping down as mayor the following year. In 2016, he became a prominent figure in the successful Vote Leave campaign for Brexit. He then served as Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs under Theresa May's premiership – a post from which he resigned in criticism of May's approach to Brexit and the Chequers Agreement two years later. After May resigned in 2019, he was elected Conservative leader and appointed prime minister. His September 2019 prorogation of Parliament was ruled unlawful by the Supreme Court.[9] In the 2019 general election, Johnson led the Conservative Party to their biggest victory since 1987, and biggest percentage vote share of any party since 1979. The United Kingdom withdrew from the European Union under the terms of Johnson's Brexit withdrawal agreement. The 2019-2020 coronavirus pandemic emerged as a serious crisis within the first few months of Johnson gaining the 2019 majority. On 27 March 2020, it was announced that Johnson himself had tested positive for COVID-19, becoming the second head of government in the world to be infected with the virus.[10][11][12]
Johnson is a controversial figure in British politics and journalism. Supporters have praised him as an entertaining, humorous, and popular figure, with an appeal stretching beyond traditional Conservative voters and eurosceptics. Conversely, his critics have accused him of dishonesty, elitism, and cronyism, and of using offensive language. Johnson is the subject of several biographies and fictionalised portrayals.
Early life
Childhood: 1964–1977
Johnson was born on 19 June 1964 in the Upper East Side of Manhattan, New York City,[13][14] to 23 year-old Stanley Johnson, an Englishman, then studying economics at Columbia University,[15] and his 22-year-old wife of one year Charlotte Fawcett,[16] an artist from a family of liberal intellectuals and a daughter of Sir James Fawcett, a barrister. Boris's parents had married in 1963, before moving to the US,[17] where they lived opposite the Chelsea Hotel.[18] In September 1964 they returned to England so that Charlotte could study at the University of Oxford,[19]; during this time she lived with her son in Summertown, a suburb of Oxford, and in 1965 she gave birth to a daughter, Rachel.[20] In July 1965 the family moved to Crouch End in North London,[21] and in February 1966 they relocated to Washington, D.C., where Stanley had gained employment with the World Bank.[22] A third child, Leo, was born in September 1967.[23] Stanley then gained employment with a policy panel on population control, and in June moved the family to Norwalk, Connecticut
In 1969 the family returned to England and settled into West Nethercote Farm, near Winsford in Somerset, Stanley's remote family home on Exmoor in the West Country.[25] There Johnson gained his first experiences of fox hunting.[26] Stanley was regularly absent from Nethercote, leaving Johnson to be raised largely by his mother, assisted by au pairs.[27] As a child Johnson was quiet and studious[21] and suffered from deafness, resulting in several operations to insert grommets into his ears.[28] He and his siblings were encouraged to engage in highbrow activities from a young age,[29] with high achievement being greatly valued; Johnson's earliest recorded ambition was to be "world king".[30] Having few or no friends other than their siblings, the children became very close.[31]
In late 1969 the family relocated to Maida Vale in West London, while Stanley began post-doctoral research at the London School of Economics.[32] In 1970 Charlotte and the children briefly returned to Nethercote, where Johnson attended Winsford Village School, before returning to London to settle in Primrose Hill,[33] where they were educated at Primrose Hill Primary School.[34] In late 1971 a fourth child and third son, Joseph, was born to the family.[35]
After Stanley secured employment at the European Commission, he moved his family in April 1973 to Uccle, Brussels, where Johnson attended the European School, Brussels I and learned to speak French.[36][37] Charlotte suffered a nervous breakdown and was hospitalised with clinical depression, after which in 1975 Johnson and his siblings were sent back to England to attend Ashdown House, a preparatory boarding school in East Sussex.[38] There he developed a love of rugby and excelled at Ancient Greek and Latin,[39] but was appalled at the teachers' use of corporal punishment.[40] Meanwhile, in December 1978 his parents' relationship broke down and they divorced in 1980,[41] when Charlotte moved into a flat in Notting Hill, West London, where she was joined by her children for much of their time.[42]
Eton and Oxford: 1977–1987
Johnson gained a King's Scholarship to study at Eton College, the elite independent boarding school near Windsor in Berkshire.[44] Arriving in the autumn term of 1977,[45] he began using as his first-name Boris rather than Alex, and developed "the eccentric English persona" for which he became famous.[46] He abandoned his mother's Catholicism and became an Anglican, joining the Church of England.[47] School reports complained about his idleness, complacency, and lateness,[48] but he was popular and well known at Eton.[46] His friends were largely from the wealthy upper-middle and upper classes, his best friends then being Darius Guppy and Charles Spencer, both of whom later accompanied him to the University of Oxford and remained friends into adulthood.[49] Johnson excelled in English and Classics, winning prizes in both,[50] and became secretary of the school debating society,[51] and editor of the school newspaper, The Eton College Chronicle.[52] In late 1981, he was elected a member of Pop,[53] the small, self-selecting elite and glamorous group of prefects. It was later in Johnson's career a point of rivalry with David Cameron, who had failed to enter Pop. On leaving Eton, Johnson went on a gap year to Australia, where he taught English and Latin at Timbertop, an Outward Bound-inspired campus of Geelong Grammar, an elite independent boarding school
Johnson won a scholarship to read Literae Humaniores at Balliol College, Oxford, a four-year course in the study of the Classics, ancient literature and classical philosophy.[57] Matriculating at the university in late 1983,[58] he was one of a generation of Oxford undergraduates who were later to dominate British politics and media in the second decade of the 21st century; among them David Cameron, William Hague, Michael Gove, Jeremy Hunt and Nick Boles all went on to become senior Conservative Party politicians.[59] At university he played rugby for Balliol[60] and associated primarily with Old Etonians. To his later regret he joined the Old Etonian-dominated Bullingdon Club, an exclusive drinking society notorious for acts of vandalism on host premises.[61][62] Many years later a group photograph including himself and Cameron in Bullingdon Club formal dress was the cause of much negative press coverage. He entered into a relationship with Allegra Mostyn-Owen, a glamorous and popular fellow student from his own social background and they became engaged while at university.[63]
Johnson was popular and well known at Oxford.[64] Alongside Guppy he co-edited the university's satirical magazine Tributary.[65] In 1984, Johnson was elected secretary of the Oxford Union,[66] and campaigned for the career-enhancing and important position of Union President, but lost to Neil Sherlock.[67] In 1986 Johnson ran for president again, aided by undergraduate Frank Luntz; this time his campaign focused on reaching out beyond his established upper-class support base by emphasising his persona and playing down his Conservative connections.[68] Hoping to court their vote, Johnson associated with university groups affiliated with the centrist Social Democratic Party (SDP) and Liberal Party.[69] Luntz later alleged that Johnson portrayed himself as an SDP supporter during the campaign, of which Johnson later said he had no recollection.[69][70] Johnson won the election[71] but his term was not particularly distinguished or memorable[72] and questions were raised regarding his competence and seriousness.[73] Finally, Johnson was awarded only an upper second-class degree,[74][75] and was deeply unhappy that he did not receive a first.[76]
Early career
The Times and The Daily Telegraph: 1987–1994
In September 1987 Johnson and Mostyn-Owen were married in West Felton, Shropshire, accompanied by a duet for violin and viola Allegra e Boris[78] specially commissioned for the wedding from Hans Werner Henze.[79] After a honeymoon in Egypt they settled in West Kensington, West London,[80] when Johnson secured work for a management consultancy company, L.E.K. Consulting, but resigned after a week.[81] Through family connections, in late 1987 he began work as a graduate trainee at The Times.[82] Scandal erupted when Johnson wrote an article on the archaeological discovery of King Edward II's palace for the newspaper, having invented a quote for the article which he falsely attributed to the historian Colin Lucas, his godfather. After the editor Charles Wilson learned of the matter Johnson was dismissed.[83]
Johnson secured employment on the leader-writing desk of The Daily Telegraph, having met its editor, Max Hastings, during his Oxford University Union presidency.[84] His articles appealed to the newspaper's conservative, middle-class, middle-aged "Middle England" readership,[85] and were known for their distinctive literary style, replete with old-fashioned words and phrases and for regularly referring to the readership as "my friends".[86] In early 1989 Johnson was appointed to the newspaper's Brussels bureau to report on the European Commission,[87] remaining in the post until 1994.[88] A strong critic of the integrationist Commission President Jacques Delors, he established himself as one of the city's few Eurosceptic journalists.[89] Many of his fellow journalists there were critical of his articles, opining that they often contained lies designed to discredit the Commission.[90] The Europhile Tory politician Chris Patten later stated that, at that time, Johnson was "one of the greatest exponents of fake journalism".[88]
Johnson biographer Andrew Gimson believed that these articles made Johnson "one of [Euroscepticism's] most famous exponents".[77] According to later biographer Sonia Purnell – who was Johnson's Brussels deputy[88] – he helped make Euroscepticism "an attractive and emotionally resonant cause for the Right", whereas previously it was associated with the British Left.[91] Johnson's articles established him as the favourite journalist of the Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher,[92] but her successor, the Europhile John Major, was annoyed by Johnson and spent much time attempting to refute what he said.[93] Johnson's articles exacerbated tensions between the Conservative Party's Eurosceptic and Europhile factions, tensions which were widely viewed as contributing to the party's defeat in the 1997 general election. As a result, Johnson earned the mistrust of many party members.[94] His writings were also a key influence on the emergence of the EU-opposing UK Independence Party (UKIP) in the early 1990s.[91] The proprietor of the Telegraph at the time, Conrad Black, said Johnson "was such an effective correspondent for us in Brussels that he greatly influenced British opinion on this country’s relations with Europe."[95]
In February 1990 Johnson's wife Allegra left him and after several attempts at reconciliation they divorced in April 1993.[96] He then entered a relationship with a childhood friend, Marina Wheeler, who had moved to Brussels in 1990,[97] and in May 1993 they were married at Horsham in Sussex,[98] soon after which Marina gave birth to a daughter.[99] Johnson and his new wife settled in Islington, North London,[100] an area known as the home of the left-liberal intelligentsia. Under the influence of this milieu and of his wife, Johnson moved in a more liberal direction on issues like climate change, LGBT rights and race relations.[101] Whilst in Islington the couple had three further children, all given the surname of Johnson-Wheeler,[102] who were sent to the local Canonbury Primary School and then to private secondary schools.[103] Devoting much time to his children, Johnson wrote a book of verse, Perils of the Pushy Parents – A Cautionary Tale, which was published to largely poor reviews.[104]
Political columnist: 1994–1999
Back in London, Hastings turned down Johnson's request to become a war reporter,[105] instead promoting him to the position of assistant editor and chief political columnist.[106] Johnson's column received praise for being ideologically eclectic and distinctively written, and earned him a Commentator of the Year Award at the What the Papers Say awards.[107] His writing style was condemned by some critics as bigotry; in various columns he used the words "piccannies" and "watermelon smiles" when referring to Africans, championed European colonialism in Uganda[108][109][110] and referred to gay men as "tank-topped bumboys"
Contemplating a political career, in 1993 Johnson outlined his desire to stand as a Conservative candidate to be a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) in the 1994 European Parliament elections. Andrew Mitchell convinced Major not to veto Johnson's candidacy, but Johnson could not find a constituency.[112] He subsequently turned his attention to obtaining a seat in the UK House of Commons. After being rejected as Conservative candidate for Holborn and St. Pancras, he was selected as the party's candidate for Clwyd South in North Wales, then a Labour Party safe seat. Spending six weeks campaigning, he attained 9,091 votes (23%) in the 1997 general election, losing to the Labour candidate.[113]
Scandal erupted in June 1995 when a recording of a 1990 telephone conversation between Johnson and his friend Darius Guppy was made public.[114] In the conversation, Guppy said that his criminal activities involving insurance fraud were being investigated by News of the World journalist Stuart Collier, and he asked Johnson to provide him with Collier's private address, seeking to have the latter beaten to the extent of "a couple of black eyes and a cracked rib or something like that". Johnson agreed to supply the information although he expressed concern that he would be associated with the attack.[114] When the phone conversation was published in 1995, Johnson stated that ultimately he had not obliged Guppy's request. Hastings reprimanded Johnson but did not dismiss him.[114]
Johnson was given a regular column in The Spectator, sister publication to The Daily Telegraph, which attracted mixed reviews and was often thought rushed.[115] In 1999 he was also given a column reviewing new cars in the magazine GQ.[116] His behaviour regularly disgruntled his editors; those at GQ were frustrated by the large number of parking fines that Johnson acquired while testing cars,[111] whilst at The Telegraph and The Spectator he was consistently late in delivering his copy, forcing many staff to stay late to accommodate him; some related that if they went ahead and published without his work included, he would get angry and shout at them with expletives.[117]
Johnson's appearance on an April 1998 episode of the BBC's satirical current affairs show Have I Got News for You brought him national fame for his bumbling upper-class persona, viewed as highly entertaining by the show's large audience. He was invited back on to later episodes, including as a guest presenter.[118] After these, he came to be recognised on the street by the public, and was invited to appear on other television shows, such as Top Gear, Parkinson, Breakfast with Frost, and the more highbrow political show Question Time.[119]
The Spectator and MP for Henley: 1999–2008
In July 1999, Conrad Black – proprietor of The Daily Telegraph and The Spectator – offered Johnson the editorship of the latter on the condition he abandons his parliamentary aspirations; Johnson agreed.[120] While retaining The Spectator's traditional right-wing bent, Johnson welcomed contributions from leftist writers and cartoonists.[121] Under Johnson's editorship, the magazine's circulation grew by 10% to 62,000 and it began to turn a profit.[122] His editorship also drew criticism; some opined that under him The Spectator avoided serious issues,[123] while colleagues became annoyed that he was regularly absent from the office, meetings, and events.[124] He gained a reputation as a poor political pundit as a result of incorrect political predictions made in the magazine,[123] and was strongly criticised – including by his father-in-law Charles Wheeler – for allowing Spectator columnist Taki Theodoracopulos to publish racist and antisemitic language in the magazine.[125][126]
Journalist Charlotte Edwardes alleged in 2019 that Johnson had squeezed her thigh at a private lunch in the offices of the Spectator in 1999 and that another woman had told her that he had done the same to her. A Downing Street spokesman denied the allegation.[127]
In 2004, Johnson controversially published an editorial in The Spectator suggesting that Liverpudlians were "hooked on grief" over the Hillsborough disaster and partly blaming the tragedy on "drunken fans".[128] In an appendix added to a later edition of his 2005 book about the Roman empire, The Dream of Rome, Johnson was criticised for arguing Islam has caused the Muslim world to be "literally centuries behind" the west.[129]
Becoming an MP
Following Michael Heseltine's retirement, Johnson decided to stand as Conservative candidate for Henley, a Conservative safe seat in Oxfordshire.[131] The local Conservative branch selected him although it was split over Johnson's candidacy – some thought him amusing and charming; others disliked his flippant attitude and lack of knowledge about the local area.[132] Boosted by his television fame, Johnson stood as the Conservative candidate for the constituency in the 2001 general election, winning with a majority of 8,500 votes.[133] Alongside his Islington home, Johnson bought a farmhouse outside Thame in his new constituency.[134] He regularly attended Henley social events and occasionally wrote for the Henley Standard.[135] His constituency surgeries proved popular, and he joined local campaigns to stop the closure of Townlands Hospital and the local air ambulance.[136]
In Parliament, Johnson was appointed to a standing committee assessing the Proceeds of Crime Bill, but missed many of its meetings.[137] Despite his credentials as a public speaker, his speeches in the House of Commons were widely deemed lacklustre; Johnson later called them "crap".[138] In his first four years as MP he attended just over half of the Commons votes; in his second term this declined to 45%.[139] He usually supported the Conservative party line but rebelled against it five times in this period, reflecting a more socially liberal attitude than many colleagues; he voted to repeal Section 28 and supported the Gender Recognition Act 2004.[140] After initially stating he would not, he voted in support of the government's plans to join the US in the 2003 invasion of Iraq,[134] and in April 2003 visited occupied Baghdad.[141] In August 2004, he backed unsuccessful impeachment procedures against Prime Minister Tony Blair for "high crimes and misdemeanours" regarding the war,[142] and in December 2006 described the invasion as "a colossal mistake and misadventure".[143]
Although labelling Johnson "ineffably duplicitous" for breaking his promise not to become an MP, Black decided not to dismiss him because he "helped promote the magazine and raise its circulation".[144] Johnson remained editor of The Spectator, also writing columns for The Daily Telegraph and GQ, and making television appearances.[145] His 2001 book, Friends, Voters, Countrymen: Jottings on the Stump, recounted that year's election campaign,[146] while 2003's Lend Me Your Ears collected together previously published columns and articles.[147] In 2004, his first novel was published: Seventy-Two Virgins: A Comedy of Errors revolved around the life of a Conservative MP and contained various autobiographical elements.[148] Responding to critics who argued that he was juggling too many jobs, he cited Winston Churchill and Benjamin Disraeli as exemplars who combined their political and literary careers.[149] To manage the stress he took up jogging and cycling,[150] and became so well known for the latter that Gimson suggested that he was "perhaps the most famous cyclist in Britain".[151]
Following William Hague's resignation as Conservative leader, Johnson backed Kenneth Clarke, regarding Clarke as the only candidate capable of winning a general election. Iain Duncan Smith was elected.[152] Johnson had a strained relationship with Duncan Smith, and The Spectator became critical of the latter's party leadership.[153] Duncan Smith was removed from his position in November 2003 and replaced by Michael Howard; Howard deemed Johnson to be the most popular Conservative politician with the electorate and appointed him vice-chairman of the party, responsible for overseeing its electoral campaign.[154] In his Shadow Cabinet reshuffle of May 2004, Howard appointed Johnson to the position of shadow arts minister.[155] In October, Howard ordered Johnson to publicly apologise in Liverpool for publishing a Spectator article – anonymously written by Simon Heffer – which said that the crowds at the Hillsborough disaster had contributed towards the incident and that Liverpudlians had a predilection for reliance on the welfare state.[156][157]
In November 2004, tabloids revealed that since 2000 Johnson had been having an affair with Spectator columnist Petronella Wyatt, resulting in two terminated pregnancies. Johnson initially called the claims "piffle".[158] After the allegations were proven, Howard asked Johnson to resign as vice-chairman and shadow arts minister for publicly lying; when Johnson refused, Howard dismissed him from those positions.[159][160] The scandal was satirised by The Spectator's theatre critics Toby Young and Lloyd Evans in a play, Who's the Daddy?, performed at Islington's King's Head Theatre in July 2005.[161]
Second term
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