Boris Johnson has refused to reveal the naughtiest thing he has ever done, fearing it could be “terminally politically damaging”.
The prime minister was asked whether it was naughtier than Theresa May running through fields of wheat, which she confessed during the 2017 general election campaign.
But Johnson refused to give an answer to the same question on Sky News’s Ridge On Sunday with the 2019 election campaign got under way.
The PM said he could not answer the question as he had not cleared a response with his “handlers”.
“I would improvise an answer which I’ve not cleared with my handlers and I would bitterly regret it.
“I’m not going to extemporise some answer about the naughtiest thing I’ve ever done.”
He went on: “If I can think of some, some answer about the naughtiest thing I’ve ever done that this is both interesting and not terminally politically damaging, I will try and provide it for you next time indeed.”
Asked the same question in 2017, Johnson’s predecessor May said: “Oh, goodness me. Well, I suppose... gosh. Do you know, I’m not quite sure. Nobody is ever perfectly behaved, are they? I mean, you know, I have to confess, when me and my friend, sort of, used to run through the fields of wheat, the farmers weren’t too pleased about that.”
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Johnson also said he feels “deep regret” over the failure to deliver Brexit on Halloween.
He replied “of course, of course” when asked if he will apologise to those Conservative party members who voted for him as they believed he would deliver the UK’s exit from the EU by October 31.
Told he needed to take responsibility and could not just blame other people, Johnson said: “Well, I do. I do and I’m deeply, deeply disappointed.”
Asked if he was sorry, the PM said: “Yes, absolutely.”
Pushed on whether he would apologise to Tory members who supported him, Johnson said “of course”, and described the situation as “a matter of deep regret.”
Johnson meanwhile refused to rule out extending the standstill post-Brexit transition period, during which the UK will follow EU rules until December 2020, if he has not negotiated a long-term free trade deal in time.
The PM said: “I think our viewers will know that, unlike the EU-Canada deal, or the EU-Korea deal or any other trade deal the EU has done, we start our negotiations in the state of perfect alignment.
“We already have zero tariffs and zero quotas, we already have full regulatory and legislative alignment. So, the negotiations in principle, should be extremely simple.
“I see no reason whatever why we should extend the transition period.”