Boris Johnson suffers 15min TV nasty
Camera friendly politician Boris Johnson has suffered an uncharacteristically hesitant display on live television after coming out the worse for wear from a head to head tussle with the BBC's Eddie Mair.
Johnson had expected to discuss a range of bread and butter issues relating to housing and immigration but Mair opted to go off script with a series of questions pertaining to a documentary investigating the flamboyant politician’s history.
The bouffant mayor was grilled by the Andrew Marr stand-in for 15 min during which time he was forced to concede a series of historical faux pas; including an admission he’d ‘sandpapered’ quotes (made them up) as a Times journalist, failed to deny that he had lied to Michael Howard, his then party leader, over an extra-marital affair and passed on a phone number to a friend in the knowledge that they intended to beat up the owner.
As the PR disaster concluded Mair observed: ‘You’re a nasty piece of work aren’t you?’