As we all know, Boris is one of those people who keeps his thoughts and opinions to himself. It’s rare that you will ever hear the Mayor speak out of turn, or criticise his party or colleagues. And, of course, you’d never heard of the man having a pop at the Prime Minister. Heaven forfend!
“The Government needs to stop pussyfooting around. The way to get business really motoring in the UK is to cut taxes, cut regulation, create the infrastructure and get behind it. That’s what you should do. That’s what I recommend.
‘There’s a real opportunity to capitalise on the Olympics. [To] look at London as the motor that can drive growth.
‘This is the time to be ambitious about London and what it can do for Britain. One of the ways of doing that would be to commit to further infrastructure – Crossrail 2, more river crossings, a massive house-building programme for the city.’
He added: ‘I think George [Osborne] is actually very much up for big ideas like this.’ But when asked about whether the Prime Minister was cautious, Mr Johnson said: ‘I think there’s a bit of institutional capture, yes. But it’s a totally blind alley. The attempt to try and long-grass it for three years into the other side of the election is just not realistic. Totally mad and it won’t work.”
Phew. For a minute, we at Boriswatch HQ thought that the Mayor had said something controversial. Nothing to see here. Move along…