NICOLA Sturgeon has revealed she felt “a sense of affinity” with Boris Johnson while reading the former prime minister’s autobiography.
The former first minister has reviewed Johnson’s Unleashed and said she was pleasantly surprised by parts of the 784-page tome.
Despite her personal dislike of the former PM, Sturgeon said she wanted to steer clear of a “hatchet job” and delivered an even-handed review of the book, saying: “While it is unlikely to make my favourite-books-of-the-year list, it’s not as bad as I thought it would be. It might be a reflection of my low expectations, but if the book surprises at all, it is on the positive side.”
But she criticised Johnson for not taking “anything entirely seriously”, adding: “There is nothing that he won’t make a crass joke about if it serves his narrative purpose.”
In her review for the New Statesman, Sturgeon (above) also offers a riposte to Johnson’s description of her with her “lips pursed, brow furrowed”, by hitting back: “Perhaps he thinks I should have created more of a party atmosphere.”
She added: “It is often the lot of women in politics to have our physical appearance uncharitably critiqued by men who want to bring us down to size, and Johnson is a master of the ‘art’.”
Sturgeon also admits that she found Johnson’s description of his conflicted stance on Brexit before coming out for Leave “passably persuasive”.
But she criticised him for a number of factual errors in the book, writing: “He gets the month of Dominic Cummings’ visit to Barnard Castle wrong. And he asserts that the Scottish government that controversially released the Lockerbie bomber in 2009 was Labour led. In fact, it was SNP.”
And she slams him for failing to accept responsibility in the Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe (above) saga, which saw Johnson inadvertently aid the Iranian government’s case for arresting her before “going on to make himself the hero of her eventual release”.
On their similar roles during Covid, Sturgeon said she found his writing on the pressure during the pandemic relatable. She said: “However, as I read his account of the almost unbearable burden of responsibility he felt for every Covid decision (so did I), or the devastation of having to ‘cancel’ Christmas in 2020 (one of my own lowest points), I felt a sense of affinity with him.
“And then I remembered that this was rarely how he seemed at the time.”
She also described Johnson (below) as possessing a “messiah complex”, adding: “He is never wrong. His gaffes – which he freely admits – come about only because he insists on telling it as it is.
“His mistake in partygate was to apologise rather than defend himself more firmly. He is always the sinned against – by Rishi Sunak, Michael Gove and Dominic Cummings, who, we learn, committed the unforgiveable betrayal of briefing against Dilyn the dog – and never the sinner.
“His resignation came about not as a result of anything he did, but because everyone had it in for him.”
Of Johnson’s prediction that the Tories would have won against Labour at the last election had he still been prime minister, Sturgeon said: “It is a sad reflection of the state of politics that he might be right.”
