Conor Burns, the formerly-Tory MP who was sacked from the government and suspended from the Conservative whip after an alleged altercation with another man’s thigh, was in line for elevation to the House of Lords by Boris Johnson, it seems.
The reason?
Well, we don’t know for sure – but the smart money says it’s because he was the one who burst in on Boris Johnson and Carrie Symonds (as she was then) while he was allegedly (again) having an extra-marital canoodle with her in a government office, some years ago.
Burns didn’t spill the beans on this one, although details emerged later.
It’s a deeply dodgy reason for sending anyone to the Upper Chamber of Parliament – especially somebody who may have a record of sexual inappropriateness.
Yes indeed: sordid.
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Carrie Johnson: it seems she demanded that The Times keep its big mouth shut but if she had done that, there might not have been a story in the first place.
Remember Carriegate? The claim that a Times story about Boris Johnson trying to get his then-lover (now wife) Carrie Symonds (as was) a high-paying Foreign Office job, back when he was Foreign Secretary, was removed from the paper and deleted from the World Wide Web because of interference from Downing Street?
Now, Private Eye has claimed that the woman now known as Mrs Johnson had demanded the story’s removal out of a fear that the more salacious details of her relationship with Johnson would be trotted out.
(This is probably baseless; The Times may be a Murdoch rag but it isn’t The Sun or the News of the World.)
But now we know anyway, because Private Eye has told us that another member of Parliament walked in on Johnson and (now) Johnson just as she was attending to his important little places in an intimate way:
The Friday night attack of the ab-dabs was caused by a baseless fear that the Times might be more specific about the compromising situation [those of a timid disposition should look away now] by adding that the MP walked in while Carrie was giving Boris oral sex on the sofa.”
This raises serious questions:
Yes, blackmail – because the MP who burst in on such an act could demand elevation in return for his silence. Some have suggested that Gavin (now Lord) Williamson may have been that person, because he has subsequently done very well for himself despite being utterly incompetent;
Presumably, former chief whip Gavin Williamson got his ridiculous knighthood for keeping schtum about the extra-marital blow job that is now public knowledge anyway. What an utterly appalling shambles our country has become.
There are also concerns about misconduct in public office.
Firstly, it may be misconduct if the sex act “renders the public office holder vulnerable to misjudgement” – such as trying to get the provider of said act a job worth more than £100,000 a year? Note that Johnson has ‘form’ in this respect as he funnelled more than £100K to Jennifer Arcuri, who alleges a similar relationship with him.
Alternatively, if the act occurred when the public office holder was “on duty” – that dereliction of duty/unprofessionalism attends the conduct and it could be seen to undermine trust in the office holder.
It’s alleged that Johnson was interrupted in his office by a colleague wishing to discuss work with him, and could have easily been interrupted by any number of other foreign office officials or government staff.
They may have used it as kompromat – compromising information collected for use in blackmailing, discrediting, or manipulating someone, typically for political purposes – as has been (humorously?) suggested of Gavin Williamson. Junior or female staff may have seen it as sexual harassment.
So, in withdrawing the article, it seems The Times did us all a favour and revealed that the man who is now our prime minister may have casually – and possibly habitually – put himself in the kind of compromising situations that may endanger the security of the United Kingdom.
As Yorkshire Bylinessuggests, this is a matter for investigation – possibly by the Metropolitan Police, possibly by the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner. Personally, I would add that the security services might also wish to become involved.
Whoever takes in the task (if anyone does in Johnson’s corrupt UK dystopia), This Writer can only agree with the final sentiment of the Bylines piece:
Let’s hope for their sake there’s no photographic evidence.
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Why is Boris Johnson’s government so determined to be dishonest all the time?
Yesterday (June 20), Downing Street was adamantly refusing to comment on whether the government had intervened to force The Times to drop its damning story about Boris Johnson wanting to hire then-Carrie Symonds into the Foreign Office for £100,000.
Now the prime minister’s office has given up its pretence and
confirmed it contacted the newspaper on Friday night and asked it to retract the story.
But:
Contrary to online speculation, there is no superinjunction or specific legal issue preventing reporting of the story.
Handy, that – it means those of us who have been repeating the story left, right and centre won’t face reprisals for doing so.
But that leaves us asking: what was the point?
This Site and others have already mentioned the so-called “Streisand Effect”, whereby efforts to remove a story from the Internet only increase public interest in it.
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The claim is that Boris Johnson tried to hire his current wife as his chief of staff – with a £100,000-a-year salary – while he was foreign secretary and married to somebody else.
It said the idea had fallen apart when his closest advisers learned of it.
It was published as a news story in The Times, early on Saturday – but was suddenly withdrawn amid rumours of a high-level government intervention.
A MailOnline rewrite has also been removed without explanation, and news aggregation sites have deleted their copies of this article.
But if Boris Johnson – or any of his aides – had hoped to suppress the story, they may now be reeling from the discovery that their heavy-handedness has had the opposite effect.
It is apparently known as The Streisand Effect: efforts to delete a story from the internet make the public much more interested in it.
So while
a No 10 source also said the story was untrue – and suggested it was sexist.
“This is a grubby, discredited story turned down by most reputable media outlets because it isn’t true. The facts speak for themselves.”
and the report’s original author, Simon Walters
told the Guardian: “I stand by the story. I went to all the relevant people over two days. Nobody offered me an on-the-record denial and Downing St didn’t deny it off the record either,”
the public are having a barrel of fun at the expense of the prime minister – and his wife:
It is four years since I worked for The Times. Sometimes I hear stuff … but I don't know why this story on Carrie Johnson was cut after being published in early editions. Yet cut it was. How are readers supposed to trust a paper that does this without explaining why? pic.twitter.com/8W65XHkw5m
— Katherine O'Donnell (@kathy__odonnell) June 19, 2022
Boris and Carrie Johnson Forced the Media to Memory Hole an Article About Their Latest Scandal. Now, It's Trending, And It May Bring His Government Down. https://t.co/7zosLOKlv3
Just look up #Carriegate on Twitter and you’ll see a lot of people having a lot of fun.
And of course the story raises questions that deserve answers.
If Johnson really did try to install the woman who was his then-lover into a high-paying job at his government department (which seems a common practice, looking at someone whose name sounds like Hat Mancock) while he was married to someone else, what does that say about his morals?
That’s why This Writer likes the tweet that suggests Johnson should just go the whole hog and appoint her as his new ethics advisor.
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Loadsamoney: the controversy over Boris Johnson’s flat has concentrated attention on the fact that Tories always find cash for their own benefit, while depriving members of the general public of the funding that a proper government should provide to them.
The Electoral Commission has announced that it is investigating the funding of redecoration work on Boris Johnson’s Downing Street flat, saying it has “reasonable grounds to suspect that an offence or offences may have occurred”.
And our friends on the social media have gone into satire overdrive.
Today they have targeted the prime ministerial consort, Carrie Symonds, under the hashtag #CarrieAntoinette – on the grounds that she was the driving force behind the astonishingly-expensive changes.
Many have pointed out the hypocrisy of being funded with huge amounts of cash to pay for the redecoration of a Tory prime minister’s flat, while the Tory government still refuses to fund safety improvements to blocks of flats afflicted with inflammable cladding that makes them as likely to go up in flames as Grenfell Tower (due to decisions by Tories, most likely):
Boris Johnson and #CarrieAntoinette should pay back every penny into a highly flammable cladding removal fund.
— Northern Independence Party 🟨🟥 (@FreeNorthNow) April 29, 2021
The image is of a John Lewis van outside the gates of Downing Street.
The way events are moving, in a few days we’ll be seeing a removal van there.
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