Former director of communications, Guto Harri, has revealed the details of a "confrontation" between Boris Johnson and King Charles III. In a new podcast called Unprecedented, Guto Harri said that the former Prime Minister Boris Johnson "squared up" and "confronted" King Charles, who was a prince at the time, whilst on a trip in Kigali, Rwanda.
The former journalist became Boris Johnson's director of communications in February of last year, but announced in September that he was leaving the post after seven months following the appointment of Liz Truss as Prime Minister. In the podcast, Guto Harri also claimed that Mr Johnson warned the future king to "be careful" or that he'd "end up having to sell the Duchy of Cornwall to pay reparations for those who built it".
He added that "relations never fully recovered" between the pair. In an interview with Nick Ferrari on LBC on Tuesday morning, the Cardiff-born broadcaster went into detail about how Prince Charles at the time had criticised the Tory government's Rwanda deportation plan.
Read more: Guto Harri says Boris Johnson was 'an exceptional Prime Minister' as he leaves Number 10 post
In the interview, he said: "I think what I’m trying to do is give people a glimpse of what it was really like because there was one story last year that dominated everything. And I’m trying to put Partygate in perspective, because as you know, there’s a lot more to Boris Johnson than what most of the Press and media reported last year, and there’s a lot more to say about that period.
"Now this is one story that has been pretty topical this weekend. They did have a bit of a showdown but for the reason that the man who is now king criticised what was A) an extremely popular government policy and B) a very central government policy and C) on the eve of the two of them going to the very place at the heart of the story - Rwanda.
"It wasn’t a fight. Obviously, they didn’t square up to sort of get in the ring. Boris rightfully challenged the unelected royal at the time. What was it for him to call a key government policy 'appalling'?"
When asked how he knew the Rwanda policy was "extremely popular". He added: "I’m slightly uncomfortable with it. It took me a while to sort of see that it was necessary.
"But if you were looking at the focus groups, opinion polls and all that, everywhere across the places that voted - 14 million at the last election for a government led by Boris Johnson, breaking the deadlock that had crippled Britain for a while, they feel very strongly about illegal migrants coming her on small boats across the channel.
"When other people with legitimate cases that can’t get here through legitimate means. So this is a popular policy, whether you like it or not, and it’s not really for a future king to criticise it."
Unprecedented is set to be a new political memoir podcast series, which provides a first-hand account of Guto Harri's time as director of communications in Downing Street.
In the podcast, which will be released on Thursday, May 11, Guto is set to detail his experience working for the former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, attending top secret meetings about Brexit, Covid, the war in Ukraine and the countless scandals that plagued the Conservative party.
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