Boris Johnson bewildered interviewer Steven Bartlett on Thursday by suggesting it was never his job to come up with a plan for after the EU referendum.
The former prime minister was the mayor of London when he decided to head up the campaign to leave the EU in 2016.
Working with Michael Gove, they became the faces of the Leave campaign – which ended up winning by 52% to 48% – and three years later, he was elected as the prime minister, leading the Brexit negotiations.
However, speaking on the Diary of a CEO podcast on Thursday, the former PM claimed it was never the Brexiteers’ responsibility to come up with a new plan for life outside of the EU.
Bartlett said to the former MP: “You almost disconnect yourself from the fact that there had to be a plan associated with the decision [to leave the EU].
“You seem almost angry that people would expect you to come up with a plan, even though you led the campaign.”
The interviewer then quoted from Johnson’s new memoir Unleashed: “Never at any point in that campaign did we [Boris and Michael Gove] discuss a future Leave-based government because we did not imagine that we would have to be in charge of government.
“The government’s stated policy was to implement the referendum result. It was a referendum not an election.
“We had no plans for government, no plans for negotiations, because it was not our job, and in so far as the next few days were chaotic – which they were – it is utterly infuriating that we should be blamed.”
Bartlett said it’s clear this is a “huge issue”, putting his hands to head in bewilderment.
Johnson just replied: “But why?”
Alluding to then prime minister David Cameron’s decision to step down after his Remain campaign lost in 2016, Johnson continued: “There’s a fundamental misconception.
“When the government decides to put something to the people in a referendum, the government is not saying, ‘oh if it goes against any particular position’, we’ll disappear.”
He claimed: “Plenty of European leaders have had a referendum on the EU and they’ve gone against them but they haven’t vanished from the scene.”
Johnson also noted that if the Leave campaign had been campaigning to form the next government, people would have thought their arguments were based on “advancing their political careers” not the issue of the EU.
Bartlett replied: “If the people in charge say, ‘we should not leave there is no good plan’, shouldn’t we have listened to them?”
The ex-PM said: “No, because I thought they were wrong.”
Watch the full interview here:
