Boris Johnson 'admitted that race issues are difficult for him', says chairman of racism inquiry

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Boris Johnson allegedly admitted that questions about racism were "difficult for me" during a meeting on a major report on the issue.

L he former prime minister has come under fire on several occasions, including for calling black people 'piccaninnies' and describing them as having 'watermelon smiles'.

The chairman of a controversial commission commissioned by Mr Johnson when he was in Downing Street suggested the former Prime Minister had been candid about his personal record.

Lord Sewell said that, during a meeting on the 2021 report, Mr Johnson admitted 'the race is hard for me'.

In an interview with The House magazine, Lord Sewell added that in his view Mr Johnson "cannot ... deliver a nuanced argument on race given its track record”.

Published in March 2021, the government-backed review of racial disparities in Britain was commissioned in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement.

< p>But some of its findings have faced backlash, particularly Lord Sewell's remarks in the foreword that "we no longer see a Britain where the system is deliberately rigged against ethnic minorities" , and a suggestion that there was no evidence of "institutional racism".

Critics accused him of being culturally deaf, out of touch with public opinion and "steeped in denial ". Lord Sewell has previously defended the report and questioned whether critics had actually read it.

In 2018, Mr Johnson was the subject of a investigates by his own party a newspaper column in which he compared women who wear the burqa with bank robbers.

Boris Johnson has been repeatedly criticized for his race comments

(PA Wire)

< p>He also told The Daily Telegraph that the full veil shouldn't be banned, but that it was "absolutely ridiculous" that women chose to "walk around looking like boxes to letters".

Opposition politicians have said Mr Johnson's reported comments show the former Tory leader should never have been allowed to lead the country.

Anneliese Dodds, Secretary of State for Ghost Women and Equality, said: "It is clear that Boris Johnson...