“It was less Vini, Vidi Vici: more Veni, vidi, patrocinari when UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson blew into town,” reckons Rob Hosking, writing in the latest NBR.
“He came, he saw, he patronised.
“He is, as has been often noted, a kind of endearing toff, of the kind the Brits do very well. The worry is that too many New Zealanders fall for the routine.
“There is no particular reason to do so.”
Basil Brush in a pinstripe suit?
“Mr Johnson puts on a good show, there’s no doubt about that,” Hosking writes. “He is rather like Basil Brush in a pinstripe suit: all dishevelled and slightly irreverent charm, a good accent and the odd music-hall-ish joke.
But in terms of substance, it was more like a kind of royal tour without the royals: a cut-price goodwill sojourn.
- Read the full Hosking piece here (pay site).
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