We should fear blond ambition

So now we know how Boris Johnson sees his role in public life.

He told an adoring audience in Birmingham: “If I have a function here today, it is to try, with all humility, to put some lead in the collective pencil.”

Which presumably is the kind of carry on which led Mrs Johnson to kick him out the family home last month.

The reality is Boris Johnson’s “one function” at Tory Party Conference (for which he prepared with his running through a wheatfield stunt) was to undermine and belittle Theresa May. And to stake his claim to the leadership.

And if anyone was still in doubt about what a Johnson premiership would be like, there can be little left now after that speech in which he attacked tax rises which have paid for the NHS, attempts to tackle the housing crisis and a Brexit which might safeguard jobs.

The future looks very scary beneath that mop of blond hair.