No one is even talking about the worst parts of Boris Johnson’s leaked speech

Whether his claims are true or not, it raises one key question: if Johnson is divulging national security and diplomatic information to Conservative supporters willy nilly, what other information could he be letting slip? And to whom?

A lead recording suggests that his ignorance, ideological stance and loose mouth are damaging British interests and possibly our security (PA)

When questioned about foreign secretary Boris Johnson’s repeated interventions into the Brexit process last September, Prime Minister Theresa May simply responded: “Boris is Boris.”

It seems that for as long as his tousled yellow mop of hair has bounced through Whitehall and Westminster, it has been one rule for Johnson and another for everyone else. This was encapsulated by May’s decision to permit Johnson to be the only cabinet member allowed to oppose her plans to expand Heathrow airport earlier this week.

Yet the latest scandal to hit Johnson may be so damaging that even May, his chief apologist, cannot excuse it. In a recording obtained by BuzzFeed News, Johnson can be heard bragging to Conservative activists about his knowledge on a variety of topics, from Brexit to Trump and Russia.

So far, most of the reaction to Johnson’s comments has focused on his demand for more “guts” (whatever that means) in the Brexit talks. But it seems that the most ridiculous, worrying and even sinister revelations are being overlooked.

Firstly, there is his frightening lack of understanding of the Irish border issue almost two years after Britain voted to leave the EU. Johnson ridiculed the concerns about disruption at the borders as “pure millennium bug stuff” and said it’s “beyond belief” that the Northern Irish border is proving to be an obstacle in Brexit negotiations.

Commentators and politicians from Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland have frequently expressed worries that a hard border will ignite unrest and cause major issues for business, trade and production

Comparing a non-existent bug to a 30-year conflict that very nearly tore a nation apart, claiming over 3,600 lives in the process, is misleading and insulting.

In addition, he described Northern Ireland as “so small” – quite insulting to the 1.8 million citizens who live there and will be affected if a hard border is implemented. I can’t imagine that’s going to go down well with the DUP.

Next we hear Johnson boasting about how closely he watched Londoners while he was Mayor. “You know, when I was Mayor of London … I could tell where you all were just when you swiped your oyster card over a tube terminal, a tube gizmo.” He continued: “The idea that we can’t track movement of goods, it’s just nonsense”.

Aside from the fact that our foreign secretary thinks a “tube gizmo” can track goods and people across a 500km border, this revelation is sinister. Might the Information Commissioner, who oversees the use of our data, have something to say about this?

Of course Boris didn’t stop there. He next informed activists of his increased admiration of Donald Trump. “Imagine Trump doing Brexit,” Johnson said. “He’d go in bloody hard… There’d be all sorts of breakdowns, all sorts of chaos. Everyone would think he’d gone mad. But actually, you might get somewhere. It’s a very, very good thought.”

What is most worrying here is that Boris seems to admire the chaos that encircles Trump. Suggesting that a man who simply can’t decide whether he wants a summit with North Korea or not, and whose shambolic and widely condemned decision to move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem resulted in the slaughter of 100 Palestinians, shows borderline contempt for the wellbeing of UK citizens and those abroad.

It further shows that the elites who run our government, and control Brexit, couldn’t care less about the consequences of their actions.

Johnson also divulged information relating to Britain’s foreign policy. He suggested that Theresa May will use the G7 summit in Canada to propose a new international “rapid response unit” to deal with Russian cyber attacks and assassinations.

He also revealed that he’d spoken to Mike Pompeo, the US secretary of state, about the situation in North Korea earlier that day. The Americans want Britain to “use our nuclear expertise to dismantle Kim Jong-un’s nuclear missile”, Johnson disclosed. “That’s what he asked me to do today.”

Whether any of his claims are true or not, it raises one key question: if Johnson is divulging national security and diplomatic information to Conservative supporters willy nilly, what other information could he be letting slip? And to whom? Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid was derailed for deleting emails – surely Boris cannot keep his job after this.

Years of watching Boris play the fool has created a culture of “boys will be boys” – or indeed “Boris is Boris”. But far from being a harmless fool, this recording suggests that his ignorance, ideological stance and loose mouth are damaging British interests, and possibly our security.

Instead of sweeping his latest blunder under the rug, we owe it to ourselves to ask the right questions about this recording.