BY RYAN FLETCHER
Shamed by their own words
On UK workers
“The British are among the worst idlers in the world” Dominic Raab
On the Grenfell Tower tragedy
“I think if either of us were in a fire, whatever the fire brigade said, we would leave the burning building. It just seems the common sense thing to do”
Jacob Rees-Mogg
On black children “It is said that the Queen has come to love the
Commonwealth, partly because it supplies her with regular cheering crowds of flag-waving piccaninnies” Boris Johnson
On food banks
“In the UK, it is right to say that more people are visiting food banks, as we would expect.
Times are tough” Esther McVey
On workers’ rights “I envisage there being absolutely no regulation whatsoever – no minimum wage, no maternity or paternity rights, no unfair dismissal rights, no pension rights – for the smallest companies to get them off the ground, in order to give them a chance” Andrea Leadsom
Honest – ‘hard to vote for Tories’ – Justine Greening
Shamed – Andrew Bridgen
another person to hold “t**t a tramp Tuesday” in which people should “take your batts (sic) to the streets”.
What all the vile statements listed above have in common is that they are in keeping with Johnson’s own record of homophobic and racist statements. In the book Friends, Voters, Countrymen published in 2001, Johnson infamously compared gay marriage to bestiality.
He wrote, “If gay marriage was OK – and I was uncertain on the issue – then I saw
no reason in principle why a union should not be consecrated between three men, as well as two men, or indeed three men and a dog.”
In a 2002 column for the Telegraph on Congo, while MP for Henley, Johnson gleefully described black children as “piccaninnies” and said that “tribal warriors” had “watermelon smiles”.
The capture of the Conservatives – never a party especially known for egalitarianism – by its hard-right fringe has led to an
11 uniteWORKS Winter 2019
exodus of former high-ranking members. Earlier this month, former cabinet minister Justine Greening told the BBC that she “would find it very hard to vote for the Conservatives” and that it would “be hard to trust [Johnson]”, echoing comments from a range of Tories about the current state of their party.
In politics like attracts like, so it should be no surprise if those that follow Johnson wish to wield their sense of innate ‘superiority’ over their ‘inferiors’ rather than use that power to serve the people.
Find out more VOTE 2019
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