Deceit, Lies, and Disgrace: A List of Boris Johnson’s Most Despicable Acts

LBC’s James O’Brien conducted a disturbing phone-in session recently which stopped me in my tracks.

For around one hour caller after caller was asked to explain what they believe is the worst thing our Prime Minister has done. The caller was free to pick any event they felt was most egregious. The only rule being one caller, one event. 

With the Met police investigating so called “partygate” whilst the public are left with nothing but hope that enough Tory backbenchers grow a backbone and oust the man, it’s sometimes easy to forget the vast swathes of abhorrent and repulsive things the prime minister has done. Thankfully, yet regrettably when you comprehend this all has happened, James O’Brien’s phone-in has allowed me to recall some of these events. I have collated what I think are some of the worst from O’Brien’s list and added some myself too to share with you my despair at the state of the country. You’re welcome.

Let’s break into this as lightly as we can. Starting with one that affects students deeply, the withdrawal from the Erasmus programme. This pointless policy misstep is one of a never ending, constantly evolving list of repercussions caused by leaving the EU.

Erasmus and Erasmus + made it easier than ever to study abroad, with universities even encouraged to give grants to students to do so. Having benefited from studying in Brussels himself, Boris saw it right to rip the opportunity away from thousands of students who dream of studying abroad.

Not only that, but this withdrawal also had an utterly soul-destroying consequence for some students who had come to the UK. It forced universities to terminate some students’ courses before they’d finished. Boris’s ‘Brexit Britain’ is outwardly hostile to immigration and the prospects of foreign integration. It is no wonder, then, that he has little regard for our educational ambitions beyond these shores. 

Moving away from backwards policy blunders and towards Boris’s despicable lack of moral code. There are countless examples of Johnson failing to live up to the bare minimum we expect from a public figure. Be it his betrayal of his constituents to show any real opposition to the expansion of Heathrow like he promised, or his conspiring plot with Darius Guppy to get a journalist beaten up. The one I find unimaginably horrible however, is his vile comments regarding the murder of Jo Cox.

Cox was murdered in 2016 by a far-right extremist who believed her Remainer stance and pro-immigration beliefs made her a “traitor” to the United Kingdom. When Cox’s name was invoked as a consequence of Johnson’s choice of words to describe Remainer MPs, many of whom were receiving death threats as a result, Johnson described how he thought the best way to honour Cox was to “get Brexit done”. This cheap attempt to sloganeer over the murder of an MP I believe is one of the most despicable acts that man has committed.

To try and score political points instead of taking responsibility for his words and actions, which were resulting in many of Cox’s colleagues receiving threats against their lives, shows the depth of immorality and lack of remorse our prime minister has. Let’s not forget, this is the same man who allegedly preferred letting the “bodies pile high” rather than take a temporary hit on the economy just last year. 

His appetite for lying becomes clearer day by day. He is the person who let Dominic Cummings lie to the people about his infamous trip to Barnard Castle. He wilfully misled many members of the public into thinking we would get £350 million a week for the NHS if we left the EU. He lied to the face of an extremely distressed father whose son was in hospital, claiming there were no press there. We know this is a lie, as this was all recorded by the press present at the hospital.

He allowed Jacob Rees-Mogg to lie to the Queen over the prorogation of Parliament. He happily spat in the face and completely undermined the very institution he coerced the public into thinking needed to be taken back from the EU. Most recently he lied about Sir Keir Starmer being responsible for the Crown Prosecution Service failing to prosecute Jimmy Savile. And finally, what people are probably most familiar with now, he lied about the Downing Street parties. 

Johnson doesn’t care about you, your loved ones, or the public as a whole. He gladly shunned away the prospect of feeding children during the pandemic. This policy was only overturned when Marcus Rashford MBE stepped in to highlight the gross misconduct of the prime minister’s thought process. He seemingly never took Covid seriously, resulting in the deaths of over 150,000 of the people he governs.

He refused to come back from his holiday when the London riots were underway under his mayoral tenure. He’s jeopardised the peace of Northern Ireland which is now arguably at its most tense since 1998.

Politics doesn’t matter to Boris, your lives, your livelihoods, your hopes and dreams. They are all just a game to this overprivileged, disingenuous, dishonest shell of a prime minister. I’m no fan of the Conservative Party but even I am sad to see this once respected political party, one of the oldest in the world, fall from grace and become a populist stage for Boris to stand on, mostly recently due to birthday party celebrations.

James O’Brien’s phone-in covered many of the points I have covered today, and more. I urge you to listen to his full list. It is easy, and sometimes preferable, to not think about the current state this country is in. However, unfortunately we cannot pretend anymore.

Our prime minister is dangerous and, for once since his premiership began, it seems as if there is finally a possibility that he might be shown the door. Personally, I don’t think this will happen in the coming days or even the coming weeks, but once the May local elections are over and the Tories (hopefully) suffer a major defeat, we may see the end of Boris. I, for one, can’t wait to find out.