Family Business: Boris Johnson's Dad Chides Son for Allowing Sewage Dumping on Daughter's Radio Show
10:36 GMT 22.08.2022 (Updated: 15:20 GMT 28.05.2023)
© AP Photo / Jeff J Mitchell
Subscribe
Boris Johnson set himself at odds with his own siblings and father by joining the 'Leave' campaign in the 2016 European Union membership referendum. His journalist sister Rachel has been a strident critic of Brexit, and his brother Jo resigned from his government and stepped down as a Tory MP in 2019 over the issue.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has come under fire from his own father — on his sister's radio programme.
Author Stanley Johnson was a guest on his daughter Rachel Johnson's LBC phone-in radio show.
The Europhile environmentalist accused his son's government of not doing enough to stop private water companies releasing untreated sewage into waterways and the sea — and blamed it all on Brexit.
He said regulations adopted by the European Union's (EU) predecessor in 1975 "transformed the quality of bathing water around the whole of Europe," and as a result "we really did get a clean-up".
Stanley Johnson links Brexit to the increase in raw sewage being released into UK waterways, arguing European regulation had forced Britain to "get a cleanup". @RachelSJohnson pic.twitter.com/EkExtOFiex
— LBC (@LBC) August 21, 2022
Ignoring arguments that the problem dates back to at least 2010 — six years before the British voted to leave the EU and nine before his son became PM, the elder Johnson said the blame fell on his government.
"I would say we have to blame the Government!"
— LBC (@LBC) August 21, 2022
Stanley Johnson tells Rachel Johnson the Government is responsible for the huge increase in raw sewage being released into the UK's waterways. @RachelSJohnson pic.twitter.com/SqCW1GPZMY
He insisted that Downing Street should commit to maintaining the same EU environmental standards which failed to stop sewage-dumping in the past.
Stanley Johnson says the next Prime Minister needs to make "a clear commitment" to maintain the environmental standards "we carried over from Europe" amidst outrage over sewage being pumped into British waterways. @RachelSJohnson pic.twitter.com/NG1iOaSIAZ
— LBC (@LBC) August 21, 2022
The UK's regional water boards were privatised under legislation passed in 1989, under the third Conservative government of PM Margaret Thatcher.
Johnson's brother Jo, another opponent of Brexit, resigned as junior universities minister in September 2019 just two months after Johnson moved into Downing Street. He stood down as MP for Orpington before the snap general election in 2019.
