This tape will always threaten Boris Johnson

It’s not hard to work out the ‘lines to take’ that are being handed out from Boris Johnson’s team to his surrogates in politics and the media after the police were called to the flat he’s been living in.

‘It’s a private matter. It’s an invasion of privacy. The neighbour who taped the incident, called the cops and tipped The Guardian (yes, The Guardian) clearly has an agenda. This is the same sort of smear they’ve tried against poor old Mark Field. All couples have rows. It was just a domestic. Besides, women commit at least as much domestic violence as men.’

I won’t bother to record here my contempt for people who downplay the importance of domestic violence because it suits their politics or agenda, beyond saying this: the ‘it’s just a domestic’ argument helps get women killed. Are you really comfortable supporting that in order to further the interests of your candidate or your career?