Johnson domestic dispute dominating PM race

The on-going furor over Boris Johnson's private life shows no sign of abating as Britain's ruling Conservative Party tries to shift the spotlight onto his contest with Jeremy Hunt to be the party's next leader and the country's new prime minister.

Just hours after the pair were confirmed as the final two candidates in the leadership race on Thursday, police were called to the apartment Johnson shares with his partner Carrie Symonds after neighbors reported hearing an angry argument.

According to The Guardian newspaper, which heard a recording of the dispute made by a neighbor, Symonds told Johnson he had ruined a sofa with red wine, adding: "You just don't care for anything because you're spoiled. You have no care for money or anything," and later saying, "Get off me" and "Get out of my flat".

A neighbor told the BBC: "I heard a female voice, shouting and screaming, and then I heard things smashing, it sounded like plates or glasses."

Johnson and Hunt are now spending a month trying to win the support of Conservative Party members nationwide, who will make the final decision, At a campaign event alongside Hunt on Saturday, Johnson refused to answer questions about the row.

Monday morning's newspaper front pages displayed a battle between the pro-and anti-Johnson camps.

The Sun newspaper referred to the couple having had "explosive rows" and "corrosive arguments" as part of a "very volatile relationship".

The Daily Mirror said Johnson wanted to get back together with his second wife, who is in the process of divorcing him, but the tabloid Daily Mail ran photographs of Johnson and Symonds enjoying a quiet drink at a country pub.

Critics have said those supposedly off-guard pictures look staged, and have contrasted them with the reaction some of Johnson's supporters had to neighbors' recording the argument at the flat, which they say invaded his privacy.

Hunt has avoided direct questions about Johnson's private life, but has repeatedly requested that he take part in a planned televised head-to-head debate on Tuesday, after Johnson failed to join the other candidates for another debate earlier in the process.

Now, Sky News, the channel hosting Tuesday's discussion, says it will postpone it if Johnson does not take part. That would be another high-profile embarrassment for his leadership bid.

Johnson has long been viewed as the popular favorite to succeed Theresa May as party leader but the negative publicity has already taken its toll. Johnson is falling behind Hunt in an opinion poll of party members. Nearly 40 percent of them are aged 66 or over and unlikely to overlook his behavior.

Defense Minister Tobias Ellwood told the BBC that "a dozen or so" Conservative members of Parliament could support a vote of no confidence against Johnson if he becomes prime minister. If the government were to lose such a vote, a general election would be triggered.

julian@mail.chinadailyuk.com

(China Daily 06/25/2019 page11)