He’s got Daddy’s hair!
Meet Wilfred Lawrie Nicholas Johnson
BORIS JOHNSON and Carrie Symonds gave the world its first glimpse of their baby son yesterday – and the three-day-old already had Dad’s hair.
The Prime Minister and his fiancee revealed the blond boy’s full name to be Wilfred Lawrie Nicholas Johnson, in part a tribute to two leading NHS doctors who ‘saved Boris’ life last month’ following his t ouch- and- go battle with Covid-19.
Ms Symonds also said that ‘my heart is full’ in the caption accompanying the only picture of the pair’s first child. She added: ‘ Thank you so, so much to the incredible NHS maternity team at UCLH that looked after us so well. I couldn’t be happier.’
Mr Johnson is understood to have told friends he is ‘utterly thrilled’ with the arrival of his new son, who is believed to be his sixth child.
Ms Symonds, 32, gave birth at University College London Hospital in London at 9am on Wednesday with the PM at her side, just days after his own release from hospital after the coronavirus had landed him in intensive care.
The new mum called the team at UCLH’s Elizabeth Garrett Anderson maternity wing, named after a pioneering doctor and women’s rights campaigner, ‘incredible’.
UCLH chief executive Professor Marcel Levi last night congratulated the couple saying: ‘We wish them every happiness at this special time. I would like to thank the teams who cared for Carrie and her baby.
‘ They are an incredibly skilled, dedicated and compassionate group of professionals.’
Until last night’s picture, showing Ms Symonds in what appeared to be a £225 Poets Road dress by Justine Tabak, a London fashion label she is known to support, the couple had been reluctant to reveal any details of Wilfred’s birth.
And The Mail on Sunday has learnt the pair do not intend to make their newborn a ‘public figure’, despite growing up in the flat above 11 Downing Street.
Ms Symonds is understood to have chosen a picture that deliberately did not show the baby’s face and will shun the path taken by some previous Prime Ministers who had babies while in office.
Both David Cameron and Tony Blair regularly posed for photographs in and around No10 with their newborns Florence and Leo. However Gordon Brown maintained strict rules against photographing his young sons when he lived in Downing Street, with the world only ever seeing the boys when they accompanied the departing premier on his last day in office.
An insider said last night: ‘I would expect Boris and Carrie to be more Gordon than Tony.’
The new arrival has significantly lightened the mood in No 10 after a dark month in which the PM almost lost his life. When it became clear that Mr Johnson’s new baby would arrive at the end of his convalescence from coronavirus, his ‘inner inner circle’ were confronted with the ultimate diary clash.
A secret plan to bluff the Westminster grapevine was hatched in Downing Street.
Only a tiny handful of core aides and friends knew how far advanced Ms Symonds’ pregnancy was, and were determined to fulfil the couple’s wishes to avoid the media storm that would have inevitably followed had the news of the baby’s impending birth leaked out.
A source said: ‘As a first-time mum, Carrie was rightly determined to do this her way and wanted as much privacy as she could possibly get.’ On Tuesday, the core team were told that Ms Symonds would be admitted to hospital shortly before Mr Johnson was due to make his Commons return at Prime Ministers Questions.
No 10 officials allowed journalists to speculate that Mr Johnson had not confirmed his attendance because of lingering health concerns. After all, he had only been back in Downing Street from his convalescence at Chequers for two days.
The Telegraph newspaper swallowed the line whole, quoting one, clearly junior, official as saying: ‘He is still not well enough.’
Several social media users were also left red-faced after claiming Mr Johnson was ‘frit’ and ‘a coward’ too scared to face down new Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer at the Dispatch Box.
Ministers left in the dark were also passing dark mutterings to journalists about the PM’s ill health, speculating whether he had returned to work too fast. In fact, the couple slipped out of Downing Street in the early hours of Wednesday, being sure not to be snapped by photographers.
Mr Johnson was by Ms Symonds side for the birth but, despite leaving PMQs to Foreign Secretary and caretaker Prime Minister Dominic Raab, he was back at his desk in Downing Street by 1pm on Wednesday for a video call with Sir Keir.
Strict Covid-19 rules applying to all new dads meant Mr Johnson could not stay in the hospital with Ms Symonds and their son, but they remained in contact via Facetime until she returned to Downing Street later in the week, again managing to avoid photographers and even most of the staff.
For all the misinformation about Mr Johnson’s health – and concerns provoked by his breathless return to the daily coronavirus press conference on Thursday – in reality, staff at No 10 had been struck by how buoyant the PM has seemed. ‘He is firing on all cylinders,’ said one.
Although he is still on the mend from his debilitating three-day intensive care stay, sources insist that he is reinvigorated.
‘In some ways, certainly in mood, he is in better shape than when he left,’ said one. ‘The illness finally forced him to take some proper rest.’
Another friend of Mr Johnson’s added: ‘He hasn’t stopped since this time last year. First there was the stress of when the leadership contest would be, then the battle itself, then straight into Brexit hell and straight into a General Election, swiftly followed by the biggest crisis to face a PM since the war. No wonder he needed some sleep.’
Meanwhile, the private circumstances of the birth have put Ministers in a quandary: do they send presents to the PM, or would that look too ‘suck-uppy’, as one put it. In the end, the consensus was to send gifts, but with restraint.
‘No one wants to look like teacher’s pet, except maybe Michael Gove – he will no doubt lead the whip-round,’ one Cabinet rival quipped.
I’m utterly thrilled The PM’s ‘inner inner circle’ plotted to keep birth secret