Boris Johnson

there are so many people who never have a sense of communal exhilaration
according to a recent survey a sense of social isolation is the number one problem of our lives
we need to start actively re-knitting the coalition of British society
Dear oh dear, it’s just as well I never said anything rude about the Lib Dems, [...]

[The Chorus of Labour M.P.s]
With cat-like tread
    The revenue we steal ;
Influence ped-
    d-ling is our new deal.
Of the truth
    We never speak a word ;
And Sterling’s fall
    can be distinctly heard.

[The Chorus of Lobbyists]
Taxi ! Tara !
Taxi ! Tara !

[Labour M.P.s]
So stealthily the tax-men creep
    While all across the country sleep.

Come, friends
    who used to be
Leaders of the [...]

A ‘scientist’ — engaged in his employment
            his employment
    And maturing his felonious little plans —
            little plans
’Though he likes to interfere with your enjoyment,
            your enjoyment
    Wants a pension just like any honest man’s.
            honest man’s

Our data we with difficulty smother,
            -culty smother
    When F.O.I.* reports are to be done ;
            to be done
Ah, take one consideration with another :
            with another
    A fraudster’s [...]

Watch Question Time this Thursday 4th March on BBC 1 at 10.35pm
Question Time, the BBC’s premier political debate programme comes from Canary Wharf this week.  David Dimbleby will be joined in London by Boris Johnson, Liberal Democrat peer Shirley Williams, broadcaster Carol Vorderman, the novelist Will Self and the Transport Secretary Lord Adonis.
Question Time will [...]

 
I love newspaper headlines, the way that they shout at you competitively from the stand on a Sunday morning – imploring your attention like a bunch of gape-mouthed nestlings. I have always admired the art with which the headline writer will take the story before him and bleach it of conditionals, sharpening and condensing and [...]

Downing Street has admitted “time is tight” to get laws for a referendum on scrapping Britain’s first past the post voting system through Parliament.  Gordon Brown wants to replace it with “alternative vote,” where candidates are ranked in order of preference.  The Prime Minister says this is a better way of choosing MPs but the [...]

It is not often that fate hands you what appears to be a total moral and political victory. But this one looked like a slam dunk. As some of the world’s most self-important people descended last week on the World Economic Forum in Davos, I was delighted to find myself on the same plane as [...]

Lessons of the Past
Boris Johnson has spoken of the contribution a knowledge of the classics can make to understanding our own times. In the modern political world — as in the ancient — the same theme is played out again and again … with the same characters : political leaders that let power go to [...]

Boris Johnson has often spoken of his love of Greek history and of Pericles in particular. When asked who his historical pin-up was and why, he replied: “Pericles. Look at his Funeral Speech: democracy; freedom — champion stuff.” — Read the full interview.

A few years ago he went to the British Museum and bought [...]

Dungeekin provides a musical rendition on the Queen’s Speech this afternoon
Many of the original words are resonant today.
In a break from Tradition, this year saw Her Majesty the Queen deliver the speech at the State Opening of Parliament not in words, but instead in song:
As each year for the Government a speech one must propound,
One’s [...]