Boris Johnson & Time Out: The Mag Responds

The following is a letter sent to the Evening Standard - though not yet published there - by a Time Out spokesperson concerning Boris Johnson's non-appearance at the magazine's forthcoming hustings:

"We are incredulous that Boris's team is angry about the way we have handled our hustings event on April 2. We have bent over backwards to accommodate Boris Johnson and his campaign team so they can attend the event.

Initially, We were informed by his team that April 2 was free but they would not agreeing to anything until we had a definite 'yes' from Ken. Ken's office briefly confirmed April 3 as a date, but as that wasn't good for other candidates they then changed back to April 2. Boris hadn't said yes to April 3 and we informed him of the change back to April 2 as quickly as possible.

When we went back to Boris, they said they'd just booked in a dinner function at Heathrow. None of the other candidates had given us any conditions about appearing. We then tried to negotiate a change of time with Boris' team so that we could fit in around his engagement and even asked them for a better date. We received no answers to any of our phone calls or e-mails. Likewise, when other senior members of our editorial team, and our editor, tried to contact them about the event they were also met with unreturned phone calls and e-mails.

We then interviewed Boris in person and asked him if he would be attending the event. He told us he was interested but I needed to sort out the details with his PR, who was also there at the interview. We discussed various possibilities in case Boris could not turn up in person; including a mobile or video link up She told me she would 'sort something out.'

We immediately contacted her following the interview with details of an audio link up. After a week of trying to set this up with her and her team, she finally got back to me on March 28th saying neither a mobile or video link up was possible. We asked if she wanted to send a representative from his team and she said no. At that point we withdrew Boris's name from the ticket information.'"

Letter ends.

Comments

[The Tory Troll]

Thanks for chasing this up Dave.

This doesn't quite fit with Team Boris' 'longstanding engagement' claim.

What an utter shambles.

[jeh]

Sounds like Time Out has got sour grapes. Bless 'em. Sure that Ken and Brian will enjoy themselves just fine without Boris nonetheless.

[jeh]

What are your thoughts on Ken pulling out of the Centre for Social Justice hustings then?

No…wouldn’t dream of it…oh hold on, news reaching me, yes Ken has also failed to confirm his plans to attend the No2ID event as well which the other major candidates are attending. Where’s Ken?

Seems like this story should be given some more oil especially in light of the Boris one. Same difference no?!