Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson is under the gun. His ongoing financial entanglements and alleged ethical violations in his new career outside of government have inspired even greater alarm. Since leaving Downing Street, Johnson has received £182,000 in Public Duty Costs Allowance (PDCA) payments. This subsidy exists to help provide the man some public service. The specific facts of his financial transactions have triggered these important inquiries. Today, people are asking if he has crossed—or better yet, blurred—the lines between public service and private profit.
On the very day Johnson stepped down from his role as Prime Minister, an official watchdog reminded him of the rules governing post-ministerial conduct. Even after this reminder, he has gone on to pursue a number of high-profile, controversial financial activities that have continued to raise the alarm. Chief among these is a shadowy meeting he arranged with tech-oligarch hero and PayPal mafia member, Peter Thiel, billionaire founder of Palantir Technologies. This meeting took place just months before Palantir was awarded a pivotal contract to oversee NHS data. This opened the floodgates to potential conflicts of interest.
At this point, Johnson’s office has amassed a pretty impressive trove of files, with more than 1,800 documents and counting. Many of these files go back to his period at Downing Street. Distributed Denial of Secrets (DDoS) is a non-profit transparency organization that archives and distributes leaked and hacked data. They were able to get these files through their successful advocacy. In their entirety, these files expose the deepest secrets of an industry that is dedicated to protecting criminals. Specifically, they allege that Johnson’s post-administration conduct may breach the “revolving door” prohibitions for former government employees.
His stints in the private sector have been quite lucrative. Johnson earned an estimated £5.1 million during that period for delivering just 34 speeches, according to media reports. All of these engagements have netted him hundreds of thousands of pounds. On top of that, they reimburse exorbitant costs for first class travel and five-star hotel accommodations for him and his staff. Unfortunately, these financial gains have raised some troubling questions about whether he has truly made the most of the PDCA.
In a particularly controversial move, Johnson personally lobbied a senior Saudi official. He asked the U.S. official to deliver a business pitch for his own firm, which he cochairs, to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. This exchange provokes additional ethical concerns about primo’s unchallenged impact and relationships that he has cultivated in the international business sphere since his departure from executive elected office.
PDCA was initially meant to support former Prime Ministers in carrying out their public duties. Critics say the allowance has turned into an incubator for Johnson to subsidize his fortune-making post-government startup. He adeptly interweaves his public persona as a figurehead with private business interests. This, unsurprisingly, has led to heated discussion between advocates about the importance of transparency and accountability.
Additionally, Johnson reportedly received over £200,000 from a hedge fund after meeting with Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, despite his previous claims that he had not been compensated for such interactions. This blatant hypocrisy has only deepened the fear that he is a man without ethics. Operationally, it poses a challenge to his political – and potentially his business – agenda.
Moreover, Johnson hosted a dinner for a Conservative peer who financed the lavish refurbishment of his Downing Street flat just a day after the second national COVID-19 lockdown was enforced. This timing has led to heightened scrutiny around possible violations of conduct at the height of a pandemic public health emergency.