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Boris Johnson

Credentials

Boris Johnson was educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford, where he was a Brackenbury Scholar in Classics. [1]

Background

Conservative politician and former Mayor of London Boris Johnson was appointed the UK’s Foreign Secretary in July 2016 following the Brexit campaign, where he endorsed the official Vote Leave campaign and acted as a member of the“core group” of its campaign committee. [2],[3]

Johnson’s career began in journalism working at The Timesof London, however he was eventually fired in 1988 for falsifying a quote. Later he became The Telegraph’s Brussels correspondent. From 1994 to 1999 he worked as assistant editor at the conservative-leaning magazine The Spectator, before becoming editor from 1999 to 2005. In 2001, he was elected as the Conservative MP for Henley. Johnson was Mayor of London from 2008 to 2016 and MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip since 2015. [4]

At school, Johnson was a member of Oxford University’s exclusive Bullingdon Club, which also had senior Tory politicians such as David Cameron and George Osborne as members. Johnson was also on the board of advisors for the now-defunct right wing think tank The Atlantic Bridge. [5], [6], [7]

Stance on Climate Change

June 2017

As foreign secretary, when asked his views on President Trump’s intention to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, Johnson told Sky News: [8]

“We continue to lobby the U.S. at all levels to continue to take climate change extremely seriously.”

December 20, 2015

Writing in the Telegraph, Johnson argued recent warm winter weather had nothing to do with climate change: [9]

“In the view of Piers and his colleagues at WeatherAction, it is all about sun spots, and he is on record as believing that we are now due for a new 'Maunder Minimum' – like the famous cold spell in the 17th century, when the Thames froze several times,” Johnson wrote.
“Whatever is happening to the weather at the moment, he said, it is nothing to do with the conventional doctrine of climate change.”

In the column, similarly to one he wrote for the Telegraph in 2013, Johnson refers to the “great physicist and meteorologist Piers Corbyn” – brother of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and a known climate science denier.

January 20, 2013

In a Telegraph column, Johnson claimed a cold snap in weather casts doubt on the science. [10]

“I am speaking only as a layman who observes that there is plenty of snow in our winters these days, and who wonders whether it might be time for government to start taking seriously the possibility — however remote — that [Piers] Corbyn is right,” Johnson wrote.
“Of course it still seems a bit nuts to talk of the encroachment of a mini ice age.
“But it doesn’t seem as nuts as it did five years ago. I look at the snowy waste outside, and I have an open mind.”

Key Quotes

December 2015

In a Telegraph column entitled “I can’t stand this December heat, but it has nothing to do with global warming: We may all be sweating in the winter air, but remember, we humans have always put ourselves at the centre of cosmic events” Johnson wrote: [9]

“It is fantastic news that the world has agreed to cut pollution and help people save money, but I am sure that those global leaders were driven by a primitive fear that the present ambient warm weather is somehow caused by humanity; and that fear – as far as I understand the science – is equally without foundation. There may be all kinds of reasons why I was sweating at ping-pong [in December] – but they don’t include global warming.”

January 2013

In a Telegraph opinion column entitled “It’s snowing, and it really feels like the start of a mini ice age. Something is up with our winter weather. Could it be the Sun is having a slow patch?” he wrote the following: [10]

“As a species, we human beings have become so blind with conceit and self-love that we genuinely believe that the fate of the planet is in our hands — when the reality is that everything, or almost everything, depends on the behaviour and caprice of the gigantic thermonuclear fireball around which we revolve.”
“I am all for theories about climate change, and would not for a moment dispute the wisdom or good intentions of the vast majority of scientists. But I am also an empiricist; and I observe that something appears to be up with our winter weather, and to call it “warming” is obviously to strain the language.”
“I wish I knew more about what is going on, and why. It is time to consult once again the learned astrophysicist, Piers Corbyn. Now Piers has a very good record of forecasting the weather. He has been bang on about these cold winters. Like JMW Turner and the Aztecs he thinks we should be paying more attention to the Sun. According to Piers, global temperature depends not on concentrations of CO2 but on the mood of our celestial orb.”
“Of course it still seems a bit nuts to talk of the encroachment of a mini ice age. But it doesn’t seem as nuts as it did five years ago. I look at the snowy waste outside, and I have an open mind.”

Key Deeds

September 2017

On September 27 inside the Foreign Office, Boris Johnson launched a new thinktank to push “the moral case for open commerce.” The Institute for Free Trade (IFT)“sees Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union as a unique opportunity to revitalise the world trading system,” according to its website (IFT now operates under the name “Initiative for Free Trade” following a dispute over its name). [11],[12], [13]

The IFT is based at 57 Tufton Street, sharing an office with the anti-renewables thinktank the Centre for Policy Studies, and next door to many of the organisations DeSmog UK previously revealed to be at the heart of a UK climate science denial network in 55 Tufton Street. [14], [15]

Former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott, who gave the 2017 annual lecture at the climate science denying Global Warming Policy Foundation, is on the IFT’s “international advisory panel.” The IFT's president is climate science denying Tory MEPDaniel Hannan. [12]

March 2015

Johnson launched a new “Prosperity for All” project at the Legatum Institute lead by Tim Montgomerie, founder of Conservative Home. As Johnson was reported telling the audience: “It is time to reclaim capitalism as a moral force.” [1]

December 19, 2010

Johnson wrote an article at The Telegraph promoting the work of climate change denier Piers Corbyn, “meteorologist and brother of my old chum, bearded leftie MP Jeremy.” According to Johnson, Piers “seems to get it right about 85 per cent of the time” with regards to forecasts. [16]

“I have not a clue whether his methods are sound or not. But when so many of his forecasts seem to come true, and when he seems to be so consistently ahead of the Met Office, I feel I want to know more. Piers Corbyn believes that the last three winters could be the harbinger of a mini ice age that could be upon us by 2035, and that it could start to be colder than at any time in the last 200 years. He goes on to speculate that a genuine ice age might then settle in, since an ice age is now cyclically overdue,” Johnson wrote.
“The question is whether anthropogenic global warming is the exclusive or dominant fact that determines our climate, or whether Corbyn is also right to insist on the role of the Sun. Is it possible that everything we do is dwarfed by the moods of the star that gives life to the world? The Sun is incomparably vaster and more powerful than any work of man.”

2007-2008

In the run up to Boris Johnson's May 2008 election as London Mayor, prominent Tory and billionaire hedge fund manager Sir Michael Hintze, a financial backer of the climate science denial group the Global Warming Policy Foundation, donated the following to the politician: £2,000 in December 2007, £2,000 in February 2008, and £1,000 in March 2008. [17], [18], [19]

Affiliations

Institute for Free Trade — Launched in September 2017. [20], [21]
Vote Leave — Campaign committee member (website no longer appears in operation). Listed as a member of the “core group” which “ coordinate between campaign committee meetings and meet on a daily basis.” [3]
The Atlantic Bridge (now defunct) — Former member, board of advisors. [7]
The Telegraph — Columnist. [22]