Home NEWS JANET STREET-PORTER: Sadly, Boris Johnson’s groping isn’t an issue for most voters

JANET STREET-PORTER: Sadly, Boris Johnson’s groping isn’t an issue for most voters

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JANET STREET-PORTER: Sadly, Boris Johnson’s groping isn’t an issue for most voters

A young female journalist is invited to lunch at a right wing political magazine. Much wine is consumed, the table is packed and the conversation fast and furious. Charlotte Edwardes is attractive and ambitious, and must have been pleased to be seated next to the editor, Boris Johnson.Almost 20 years later Charlotte lands a prestigious job – writing a lucrative column for the Sunday Times Style Magazine. During the intervening years she’s written from war zones and refugee camps and built a career as a serious writer. She’s embarked on a happy relationship with the respected political and financial commentator Robert Peston.So what would be Charlotte’s big story, the initial scoop that would define her agenda for readers? How would she trump her predecessor, the ‘Strictly’ host Claudia Winkleman, who used the same slot to eulogise about expensive shoes and handbags. Post #MeToo, how to show you’re on-message and relevant? Prime Minister Boris Johnson leaves 10 Downing Street in Westminster this morningInexplicably, Charlotte opted to remember an alleged incident from that drunken lunch back in the late 1990’s – the chilling moment when (under the table) a probing hand moved purposefully up her inner thigh and gave it a double squeeze. It belonged to the chap who is now our Prime Minister.And what came next? Charlotte says she did nothing, because the event was ‘work’. She kept quiet. She didn’t even fess up during the avalanche of allegations against MP’s in 2017, which saw the Deputy Prime Minister (Damian Green) lose his job, accused of squeezing a woman’s leg, and Defence Secretary Michael Fallon’s political career ended after being accused of trying to kiss journalist Jane Merrick during lunch back in 2003. Mr Green denied acting inappropriately.Since #MeToo, hundreds of well known women have come forward to share stories of unwelcome groping and unpleasant sexual advances endured silently as they went about their jobs. Men have been called out, and times have started to change. There has been the beginnings of a real shift in how the sexes interact in the workplace.In 2019, Charlotte’s ‘revelation’ has all the impact of a soggy tea towel. Is there anyone left in the UK who thinks that BoJo has spent his entire adult life as anything other than a rampant shagger? The Sunday Times already had a big story about another escapade involving Boris – how when London Mayor he formed a close friendship with a busty American blonde called Jennifer Arcuri who promoted herself as a tech entrepreneur and managed to worm her way onto a lot of official trips abroad. Mr Johnson leaves the stage with his girlfriend Carrie Symonds after giving his speech during the Conservative Party Conference at the Manchester Convention Centre yesterdayInvestigative journalists have discovered a whole lot of gaps (17 in total) in his official diary between 2012 and 2015, gaps that have been described as ‘private lunches’. Did they involve visits to Miss Arcuri’s flat in the East End, which featured a pole for erotic dancing in the living room? Miss Arcuri is alleged to have told friends in the US that she and Boris embarked on an affair, which was initiated in a hotel room in New York.Mr Johnson has been accused of squeezing the thigh of journalist Charlotte Edwardes (pictured in July 2016) at a private lunchThe trouble with sexual revelations about Boris is that we don’t really care unless they turn out to involve the misuse of public funds. He will never comment or deny, just prevaricate, bamboozle and waffle until interrogators give up.Boris is the political equivalent of the Joker, set to open in cinemas this coming weekend. Said by previous lovers to be ‘well-mannered and courteous’, he achieves results by being ‘persistent’. Physically, Boris is nothing to write home about, overweight, manic, vain and egotistical. Horrible haircut.In any relationship, the story is all about him, not you. He seems to have cheated on his wives almost continuously, conducting a four year affair with Petronella Wyatt (who had a miscarriage and an abortion during that time), but who still finds nothing negative to say about him, even though he subsequently moved on to another attractive young journalist, Anna Fazackerley. There was another affair with art consultant Helen MacIntyre resulting in the birth of a daughter Stephanie, which he has never commented on.Now, Boris has installed 31 year old eco-activist and campaigner Carrie Symonds in his official home in Downing Street, and even taken her to visit the Queen in Balmoral. He’s in the process of divorcing his long-suffering second wife, Marina. Mr Johnson is pictured with his second wife Marina Wheeler in Ruislip, West London, in 2014Ms Symonds has dumped the jeans and is dressing suitably demurely, even sporting blue heart-shaped earrings to the Tory party conference in an attempt to divert attention from lack of progress in delivering Brexit. None of which changes our bizarre tolerance of Bonking Boris and his amorous escapades which are miles away from the traditional Tory values which emphasise family life and marriage.Sexual politics don’t just operate one way. Around the time Charlotte Edwardes was getting her leg groped by Boris, I was editing the Independent on Sunday. The Labour government was full of middle aged powerful men who could be easily flattered and flirted with to encourage them to divulge secrets and Whitehall gossip.I lunched two different Cabinet ministers, accompanied by my female political writers, one sitting either side of our victim. One of the ministers was a well known groper, and we were willing to tolerate a bit of mild fondling in order to extract juicy nuggets about government business. I spent hours listening to one crashing bore drone on about his classic cars, while he leaned in try and get up close and personal. When Mayor, Mr Johnson formed a close friendship with tech entrepreneur Jennifer Arcuri At every party conference, female staff were groped and propositioned, offered private phone numbers and the chance to have ‘special’ lunches. Yuck!Back in 2000, Tony Blair was one of the few politicians not involved in any of that and female journalists knew only too well how to exploit male weaknesses to their advantage. Boris, like Trump, is a buffoon who appeals to his fans (many of whom are poorly educated men of a certain age) because he stands for everything they are not. He’s virile, he still has a sex life, whereas many of them lead depressingly celibate lives, ignore their wives’ pleas for a bit of nooky in favour of watching sport on the telly until the early hours.Boris might have lost some of his appeal to female voters, but plenty of men will be reading about Jennifer Arcuri and feeling slightly jealous. I am afraid that for some male voters he’s living the dream. The big question is, are there enough of them to keep him in power?

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