Boris’s blonde ‘told her friends they DID have affair’
Ex-model ‘told friends they did have sex’. But he insists: I have nothing to declare
Boris Johnson has insisted there was ‘ no interest to declare’ over his relationship with an American entrepreneur who reportedly told friends they had an affair.
He faces a police investigation over allegations that he did favours for Jennifer Arcuri, 34, whose firms have received £126,000 of public money.
the pole- dancing model turned businesswoman has reportedly told friends she had a sexual relationship with him when he was London mayor.
Yesterday mr Johnson admitted he had not declared his friendship with miss Arcuri, a now married mother-of-one who lives in Los Angeles, to City Hall officials.
But he said ‘everything was done with full propriety’ dur party ing an appearance on BBC1’s the Andrew marr show.
mr Johnson, who faces up to four inquiries into the matter, at first dodged questions from marr who asked him: ‘As she was certainly a friend of yours, did you declare that interest?’
When pressed again, the Prime minister said: ‘there was no interest to declare... Let’s be absolutely clear, i am very, very proud of everything that we did and certainly everything that i did as mayor.’
speaking later as the tory conference began, he was asked if he had misused public funds and replied: ‘everything i did was in complete conformity with the rules.’
the sunday times reported that miss Arcuri had told four friends she had a sexual relationship with mr Johnson while he was mayor and married to barrister marina Wheeler.
During that time mr Johnson gave speeches for free at her tech conferences and arranged preferential access for her to join him on overseas trade missions, despite her companies not qualifying. He also paid office-hour visits to her shoreditch apartment, which has a nightclub dancing pole, for what he said were technology lessons.
David enrich, finance editor of the New York times, said he had been told of miss Arcuri’s alleged relationship with mr Johnson by classmates on her mBA course in London. He told the sunday times: ‘two friends from her business class said they had been told by Arcuri that she was sleeping with Boris.’
A tory activist who spent time with her before the 2015 election told the newspaper: ‘she told me they were sleeping together.’ And a friend of miss Arcuri’s said mr Johnson had visited her in Cheshire from where she ran business Hacker House with her now husband. the source said: ‘it did leap out at me as being possibly indiscreet.’
Downing street refused to comment on the affair allegations. After mr Johnson was referred to the police watchdog, a spokesman said: ‘everything was done with propriety and in the normal way.’
miss Arcuri could not be contacted. she has said all the grants and trade mission trips were awarded fairly.
‘Very proud of everything I did’