Boris Johnson ‘pushed Sunak to knight father Stanley’ in crunch meeting with PM

PM said to have argued it was ‘customary’ to hand honours to family members

Boris Johnson is said to have pressed for his father Stanley to be given a knighthood during his crunch talks with Rishi Sunak on his honour list.

The former prime minister told his successor his dad should be honoured for his work for the Conservatives and the environment, according to The Times.

Frustrated at his father being cut from the list, Mr Johnson is said to have argued that it was customary for family members to be recognised in a PM’s resignation honours.

But No 10 is said to have worried about how handing Stanley Johnson a knighthood would be perceived. A government source told the newspaper: “It just would have looked terrible.”

Mr Johnson was accused of “nepotism” and “making a mockery of the honours system” when reports he tried to get his father a knighthood first emerged.

In 2021, senior Tory MP Caroline Nokes and a journalist publicly accused Stanley – a former MEP who has campaigned on the environment – of touching them at Tory party conferences.

Having announced he was quitting parliament, Mr Johnson accused his successor of “talking rubbish” over his Lords nominations as the increasingly bitter feud descended into open warfare on Monday.

A defiant Mr Sunak claimed Mr Johnson asked him to either overrule the House of Lords appointments commission [Holcac] – which vets peerages – or “make promises to people” on the issue.

But a furious Mr Johnson hit back said he had merely asked the PM to make sure the Lords’ authorities “renew their vetting” at the 2 June meeting.

Mr Johnson’s spokesman declined to comment on whether Stanley was raised. Downing Street has denied any role in the removal of Stanley – or other Johnson allies, including Nadine Dorries, Nigel Adams and Alok Sharma – from the list.

Boris Johnson accused of nepotism by pushing for knighthood for father (PA Archive)

It comes as Ms Dorries has claimed “posh boys” Mr Sunak and his adviser James Forsyth were behind moves to “duplicitously and cruelly” block her from getting a peerage.

She used an interview with TalkTV to launch a fresh attack on the PM, claiming he used “weasel words” and “sophistry” in a meeting with Mr Johnson last week which left the outgoing MP believing she would be included.

“I’m broken-hearted, not just for me but for everyone who comes from a background like mine,” she said.

Mr Johnson is expected to be found on Wednesday to have deliberately misled MPs over parties in No 10 during the Covid crisis.

A source close to the privileges committee told The Independent they expected to find that Mr Johnson “deliberately” lied to parliament over Partygate – and that MPs will make clear the length of the suspension they would have recommended, had he not quit the Commons.

Nadine Dorries claims ‘posh boys’ stopped her getting peerage from Boris (PA)

The privileges committee has rejected the former prime minister’s defence that senior officials advised him Covid rules and guidance had been followed in No 10, according to The Times.

Martin Reynolds, Mr Johnson’s principal private secretary at the time, advised him in December 2021 that he should remove a claim from a statement to the Commons that “all guidance had been followed at all times”.

However, Mr Johnson has struck a defiant tone, quoting Arnold Schwarzenegger as he told The Express: “I’ll be back.”

Senior Tories expect the damning privileges committee findings to finish off any hopes of a comeback, telling The Independent that it would mark “the end of the circus”.

Allies have warned Tory HQ that any attempt to block Mr Johnson if he seeks another seat could plunge the party “into civil war”.

But one Johnson ally told The Independent it would be “a bit odd” if he was to seek another seat too soon – saying CCHQ and Mr Sunak would not stand for it.

Mr Sunak would block Mr Johnson from running again as a Tory MP before the next election, The Guardian has reported. “I can see no time when he will be a candidate this year or next,” a senior Tory figure said.