AS BORIS JOHNSON, MP for Uxbridge becomes a shoo-in for the next Tory Party leader and as a result the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, let us not forget what we are really getting — the next instalment of the Boris Johnson show.

While l was at City Hall for the whole of his two terms, my abiding memory of Boris Johnson as mayor of London was when the riots started in the summer of 2011. He did not want to come back from his holidays when London was burning.

It was the only time he was well out of kilter with the public mood in London and so much so that he got a very hostile reception when he did eventually get back to a public meeting. At that critical point the English riots of 2011 were very much a London affair before spreading throughout England. The London mayor was criticised by locals over the slow police response to high street looting and his sluggish return from holiday as he was heckled in Clapham Junction over the London riots.