A day after a U.K. parliamentary privileges committee concluded that former Prime Minister Boris Johnson was “deliberately disingenuous” about parties in his residence during COVID-19 lockdown, he has landed a plum writing gig. However in the timing of his accepting the gig, he committed a “clear breach” of the rules.
Johnson will write a weekly column for U.K. tabloid the Daily Mail. His previous journalism experience includes being the Brussels correspondent, and later political columnist, for The Daily Telegraph, followed by the editorship of The Spectator. After he became a politician, he wrote a column for The Telegraph, which ceased in 2019.
The Mail teased Johnson’s appointment on Friday and confirmed it later the same day.
“We are delighted to announce Boris Johnson as our new columnist. Famed as one of the wittiest and most original writers in the business, Boris’s column will appear in the Daily Mail every Saturday and you’ll be able to get a preview on MailOnline and The Mail+ on Fridays,” the publication tweeted on Friday.
In the accompanying video, Johnson says: “I am thrilled to have been asked to contribute a column to the Daily Mail. It is going to be completely unexpurgated stuff. I will write whatever I want. I may even have to cover politics, but I’ll obviously try to do that as little as possible unless I absolutely have to.”
Even in this seemingly innocuous career development, Johnson omitted to follow the rules. Prior to taking up a new position, former ministers are required to apply to the the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (ACOBA) for up to two years after leaving the government. Johnson did so only 30 minutes before the Mail announced the appointment.
“The ministerial code states that ministers must ensure that no new appointments are announced, or taken up, before the committee has been able to provide its advice,” an ACOBA spokesperson said. “An application received 30 minutes before an appointment is announced is a clear breach. We have written to Mr. Johnson for an explanation and will publish correspondence in due course, in line with our policy of transparency.”
This is not the first time Johnson has fallen foul of ACOBA. In 2018, Johnson signed a column contract with The Telegraph after resigning as foreign secretary. ACOBA had written to him then, saying: “The committee considers it to be unacceptable that you signed a contract with The Telegraph and your appointment was announced before you had sought and obtained advice from the committee, as was incumbent on you leaving office under the government’s business appointment rules.”
For his first Mail column, published online on Friday, Johnson chose to focus on how a slimming drug did not work for him.
