Giggles and Groans at Boris Johnson’s Sydney Show

Scott Morrison introduced him as “Bo-Jo!” and the scruffy-haired, dumpy, charmingly befuddled former UK Prime Minister stepped onto the podium amid rapturous applause. Boris Johnson was in Sydney and he did exactly as you would expect: he played to the crowd. That is to say, he played to the crowd until he talked policy.

The 2023 John Howard Lecture was a curious event. Morrison spoke competently and with conviction about the former British prime minister’s emphasis on sovereignty. John Howard is a superb elder statesman and reminded us with his response to, and interview with, Johnson why he could win over a party room and a nation for so long .

Boris was a mixed bag. The 1000-strong audience at the Fullerton Hotel ballroom waited with baited breath. Johnson peered out with gaiety in his eyes, ready to crack his first joke. In many ways his very persona is the joke. Johnson acts baffled, looks unkempt and speaks in a manner that makes one think of Bertie Wooster. He did not disappoint the crowd gathered under the auspices of the Menzies Research Centre (whose video of the address is embedded below).

Johnson opened with a cracking tale about being mistakenly invited to be a visiting fellow in European Thought at Monash University. He reportedly turned up in Clayton and carried out his duties by raging against the European Union, despite them getting the wrong Johnson. This anti-EU passion is what makes him a true conservative hero in the Anglophone world. He made the case for Brexit and helped the Tories execute it.

For this, he is rightly lauded, despite the shambles that Brexit has turned out to be, and despite the current Tory administration helicoptering in Johnson’s referendum opponent as the new Foreign Secretary. British politics can be boring, but it certainly isn’t at this juncture.

Neither was Johnson’s lecture, which was replete with some ill-prepared and oddly delivered praises of Australia’s greatest living prime minister, John Howard, along with fond recollections of working with Scott Morrison on AUKUS and the COVID pandemic. The latter issue was one on which Johnson came unstuck. I have no reason to doubt that he was speaking with real conviction, but public revelations about the efficacy and safety of the various COVID vaccines, including the AstraZeneca vaccine upon which Johnson heaped praise, made his extensive and repeated comments about Western democratic triumph in the face of the pandemic seem hollow, even tone-deaf.

Perhaps even more egregious was his doubling down on “net-zero.” Australia is in the throes of a serious debate about this issue, and the recent COP28 meeting in Dubai reveals that any utopian transition from fossil fuels is surely a pipe dream. Nevertheless, Boris, complete with a comical grumpy frown at the Australian chain-draggers, repeated his call for a zero-carbon future.

The room, filled with Liberal Party policy wonks, conservative-minded business leaders and other interested onlookers, seemed unsure how to respond to this. A collective sigh of relief was released when Johnson moved from propounding “green free-market” solutions to proclaiming “We need nuclear!” The audience broke out into enthusiastic cheers and applause, a sentiment which reflects the seemingly inexorable direction of energy policy in Australia. Nuclear must become our baseload, and it must do so as soon as possible.

Much of the rest of the speech was taken up with Johnson imitating Winston Churchill, the topic of his recent book. He has obviously lost none of his passion on the issue of Ukraine. “They will win, and they must win!”, Johnson cried while pounding the podium. He then claimed “they are fighting for all of us, and for freedom everywhere.” That received a smattering of applause, but most of the crowd would have been all too aware that military and diplomatic realities point away from a Ukrainian victory. Many world leaders, including those in the White House and Congress, seem to have realised that, while Putin may not exactly win, Ukraine will probably lose.

Johnson’s rhetoric of placing freedom in a cosmic battle against autocracy came across as hollow. He located Ukraine alongside Israel, arguing that we need to “stick up for these two democracies.” Democracies, plural? Ukraine might be under the thumb of a Russian autocrat, and perhaps the Ukrainians aspire to democratic credentials, but Volodymyr Zelensky’s government is hardly the equivalent of New Zealand’s or Norway’s.

This is why, I suppose, Johnson had to widen his lens to unveil a “great global continuum of evil,” wherein he grouped Iran, Russia and China. Once again, evil autocracies versus virtuous democracies. As virtuous democracies, we must fight for freedom everywhere against every foe. Even in Nagorno-Karabakh, I asked myself? Will we also go into Guyana?

It is a nice idea to fight for freedom against evil, just as it is a nice idea to abandon dirty fossil fuels in favour of green free-market alternatives. But Bo-Jo, as he was affectionately introduced by Sco-Mo, seemed out of touch. Luckily, he was a barrel of laughs, which covered a multitude of sins.

Simon Kennedy is an Associate Editor at Quadrant. He is also a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Queensland and a Non-Resident Fellow at the Danube Institute