Boris Johnson brings tea for the press to drink outside his house in Thame. Boris Johnson’s family has gone to war over his burka comments, with his brother accusing him of bigotry.
Leo Johnson, who is married to a Muslim, spoke out after other members of the family declared they thought the former foreign secretary had not gone far enough in his newspaper column.
Silence does not mean consent, the younger brother wrote on Twitter. Would be great if this round of competitive bigotry would end.
He addressed the call to both Boris Johnson and their father Stanley who had dismissed uproar about the burka jibes as synthetic indignation that was whipped up by political opponents.
Leo, who is three years younger than Boris, 54, met his Afghan-born wife Taies Nezam, with whom he has two daughters, while working at the World Bank.
An expert on sustainable finance, he co-presents Radio 4’s Future Proofing programme.
He describes himself as the non-political one of the Johnson clan and claims to have missed out on the gene for self-publicity.
Sister Rachel Johnson said Mr Johnson’s column didn’t go far enough to express how oppressive the garment is, while father Stanley also wished Boris had been more hardline.
He wrote: He was against ‘banning the burka’.
Meanwhile housing minister Kit Malthouse, who worked with Mr Johnson at City Hall, criticised the column, in which the former mayor compared women wearing burkas to letterboxes.
Mr Malthouse said: It is certainly not language I would have used, and if I had been in that situation I would have apologised.