Boris Johnson’s dad says son can still be PM, despite ‘you’re a nasty piece of work’ interview

Boris Johnson’s dad says his son can still be Prime Minister, despite yesterday’s car-crash interview in which the London Mayor flapped at claims he was a “nasty piece of work”.

“It seems to me perfectly legitimate that he should, in due course, have a chance to put his hat in the ring,” Stanley Johnson said on LBC today.

Johnson senior rushed to shore up his son’s ambitions in the wake of the interview with the BBC’s Eddie Mair, in which the Mayor was quizzed on past misdemeanours including making up a story when a Times journalist, lying about an extra marital affair and agreeing to help get someone beaten up.

Boris’s dad dismissed the interview as a “disgusting piece of journalism”, but failed to dispute any of the events covered by Mair.

On the plus side for the Mayor, tonight he is the subject of a mostly positive documentary – Boris Johnson: The Irresistible Rise – broadcast at 9.00pm on BBC2.