The race to replace Boris Johnson has begun (Gareth Fuller/PA)
(Picture: PA Wire)Boris Johnson’s bid to encourage a young graduate to apply for a job at City Hall after they allegedly had an affair has not sparked an immediate request for an ethics probe.
The Sunday Times reported on Sunday that Mr Johnson, soon after his election as mayor in 2008, lobbied for the woman, then in her twenties, to be given a post and was disappointed after her application was blocked by his then deputy, Kit Malthouse.
City Hall said on Monday that no complaint had been received by the Greater London Authority’s monitoring officer, Emma Strain. As such, the process of considering whether there were grounds to consider a possible breach of the GLA’s code of conduct cannot start.
Any inquiry could also be hampered by the amount of time that has passed. There is believed to be an eight-year time limit on any inquiry by the monitoring officer.
Another factor that would limit the scope of any inquiry is that Mr Johnson was not police and crime commissioner for London at the time — meaning that any breach of the code could not be referred to the Independent Office for Police Conduct.
A GLA spokesman said on Monday : “If a complaint is received related to this matter, the GLA’s monitoring officer will deal with it in accordance with the GLA’s procedures.”
The newspaper published a recording of a meeting between Mr Johnson and the woman, now a married mother of two, in 2017, when she decided to confront him over what happened nine years earlier. In the recording, Mr Johnson can be heard saying: “I did suggest you for a role and I was very disappointed when you didn’t get that role.”
But he denied being “malicious” and added: “Whatever happened, I don’t remember myself that I behaved in any way improperly.”
