What’s behind the Boris Johnson show?

Coming in from the pouring rain, I make my way to the office on the eighth floor of City Hall. With its curving windows, many books and bust of Pericles tucked away in a corner, it reminds me both of a classroom and the cockpit of a spacecraft. Its occupant is waiting for me, looking a little crumpled but less dishevelled than I had expected. He greets me very pleasantly but this is what I’m thinking. Here is the most famous person I have ever interviewed. In his own way, he is almost as iconic as the Queen or Churchill, the nodding dog in those insurance commercials. He is Boris, one of a tiny handful of politicians/celebrities instantly known by their first name. This is the man who dangled from a tripwire with two Union Jacks in his hands, who waved that gigantic flag in front of about a billion people in Beijing. He’s a bestselling author, a TV star. What can I possibly ask him that he hasn’t been asked before? Indeed, why on earth am I doing this? What’s the point?

Well, all right. Here’s how it will work. I will write a cheerful, fairly light-hearted piece. This is, after all, the Christmas edition of The Spectator. But along the way, I will set a few traps intended quite simply to trip him up. Somehow I will winkle out the self–interest, the naked ambition, the dishonesty that must surely lurk beneath that jovial exterior. He is, after all, a politician and right now the reputation of politicians has never been at a lower ebb. We just don’t respect them any more — do we?

I put this last question to Boris and his answer is disconcerting. ‘No. But that’s a good thing. It’s a sign of a healthy democracy. People often say, “Where are the next Winston Churchills? They were giants in those days!” And I’m afraid the answer is a rather optimistic one.