Boris Johnson was ‘a shambolic, shameless clot’
says former colleague
Alan Duncan’s new memoir savages UK politicians.
BY ARTHUR
NESLEN
April 3,
2021 3:04 pm
U.K. Prime
Minister Boris Johnson has been lambasted as a “selfish, ill-disciplined,
shambolic, shameless clot” in the memoir of Sir Alan Duncan, who served as
Johnson’s deputy when he was foreign secretary.
In the
colourful diary, which is being serialized in the Daily Mail, Duncan, a former
minister for Europe and the Americas, savages Johnson as “a clown, a
self-centered ego, an embarrassing buffoon, with an untidy mind and sub-zero
diplomatic judgement.”
“He is an
international stain on our reputation,” the diary adds.
During a
fiery row over a press report that diplomats were treating him as an
“international joke,” Johnson reportedly asked: ‘Why do you say they don’t they
take me seriously?’ Duncan says that he shook his head and replied: “Just look
in the ****ing mirror!”
Duncan was
the first openly gay Conservative MP and served in government under three prime
ministers. He resigned his ministerial position on July 22 2019, after Johnson
became prime minister.
Duncan
supported “Remain” during the Brexit referendum and described the final result
as a “tantrum” by the British working-class. Johnson was a leading campaigner
for the Brexit vote.
The current
prime minister is not the only politician targeted in the memoir.
His
predecessor Theresa May was “wooden and defensive, like a frightened rabbit,”
in the election campaign fought a year after the referendum, Duncan said. “We
have engaged in the politics of personality — without any personality,” he
wrote in his diary at the time, calling May “a cardboard cut-out.”
While
publicly supporting May’s government, Johnson privately despised her, Duncan
wrote. “I think he’s only right behind her, so as to push her off a cliff.”
In other
notable passages, the former minister describes Priti Patel, the current home
secretary as “a nothing person” and “a complete and utter nightmare.”
Michael
Gove, another key Brexit architect is characterized as “an unctuous freak who
generates his own publicity, a wacky weirdo who is both unappealing and
untrustworthy.”
The book’s
title “In The Thick Of It” is a reference to a satirical British political TV
series from 2005, which featuring foul-mouthed spin doctor Malcolm Tucker, who
became a cult figure.
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