Boris Johnson was talking to a group of young readers of First News and contributors from Stand Up Be Counted, for the Hotseat series (where First News readers and Stand Up Be Counted contributors grill politicians).

Anushka: Hello and welcome to Hot Seat, a collaboration between Sky News and First News, the UK’s national newspaper for young people. Hot Seat has already seen some of the country’s most powerful men and women questioned by young people about the issues that matter to them.  We’ve seen the Chancellor of the Exchequer refuse to take on a times table test, an Education Secretary defending a parents right to a mild smack and today we are very pleased that the London Mayor, Boris Johnson, has agreed to take the Hot Seat.  Welcome.

Boris: Anushka, thank you, thank you. 

Now let me tell you who you’re up against.  This is the Hot Seat panel, they have been drawn from First News readers and from Stand Up Be Counted, Sky News’ campaign to get young people engaged in politics.  We have Anya Choudry, Robert Ebner-Stat, Charlotte Corrigan, Beatrice Bannister, Nathan Farrington and Sophia Hindmarsh.  Now before they get started, let’s get Mr Johnson to introduce himself and explain just what is it that makes you so important to their lives.

Boris: Well it’s an honour to be invited on this show.  I’m Boris Johnson, I’m the Mayor of London and do any of you live in London?

Yes.

Boris: Okay, in that case I run the buses and the Tubes which you have free transport on by the way and I have to look after the police and fire and housing and loads of stuff like that so I’m responsible for the economic progress of London in all sorts of ways, trying to make sure that there are jobs.  How about that?

Busy man.  Yes, that’ll do.  Right, let’s get started, first up is Anya.  

Anya: Would you like to become Prime Minister and if so, what is the Boris factor?

Straight in there!

Boris: Good God!  Well, I want David Cameron to be Prime Minister and he is doing brilliantly and I think he will be re-elected in a few weeks’ time because I think he has helped to turn the economy around in a very big way.  Things are going very good, very well for our country now, you’ll see a lot of growth, jobs are being created at a rate we haven’t seen for a long, long time and young people are getting into work in a way that we haven’t seen for about 25 years so I think Dave is going to get back in.  I think it is more likely frankly that one of you will take over in some dim distant future than I will.

And the Boris factor, what is it?

Boris: Well search me.  Well I was lucky to get elected in 2008, I think most Londoners would say I was even more lucky to get re-elected in 2012 and to help do the Olympics and … God only knows. I suppose it’s just a question of doing your best, turning up is a very important thing, always turn up. My strong advice to you, turning up is about 90% of success in life. 

Turning up.  Anya, are you happy with that answer?

Anya: Yes, thank you.

Okay Robert, you’ve got a question. 

Robert: If you could take any famous landmark from another country and place it in London which would it be and why?

Boris: Well I’ve got a proposal to do exactly that.  I don't know if you have ever been to Washington, they have in Washington some of the most fantastic museums in the world.  The Air and Space Museum, have you been to the Air and Space Museum in Washington where you can see the rockets that went to the moon, you can see the Apollo space rockets, the machines they were in. It’s called the Smithsonian and we are going to take it, or sorry, we are going to build in London the first Smithsonian outside America.  So it’s going to be a branch of that museum in the Olympic Park in Stratford and it will be a fantastic thing for that part of London, it will attract loads and loads of people from around the world and I hope it will be a great thing for kids growing up in that part of London. 

Robert, do you have a building you’d bring here?

Robert: Yes.  

Boris: Which one is that?  What about, would you bring the Eiffel Tower or …?

Robert: I’d probably bring either the Great Wall of China or the Leaning Tower of Pisa. 

Boris: Well you see, we’ve got a bad reputation in this country from bringing things.  If you remember, we’ve got Cleopatra’s Needle on the Embankment which we took from Carnac or Thebes or somewhere and we took large quantities of the building called the Parthenon from Athens, we took what’s called the Elgin Marbles and they want them back so I think … actually I don’t want to give them back but I don’t want to take any more buildings from elsewhere.  Although I would point out by the way, if you see what’s happening now in Syria where those deluded, demented guys are smashing those statues, it’s quite a good thing that so many of them are in the British Museum rather than in Syria now.  I’m just putting that out there.  

Charlotte, you’re next.  

Charlotte: You fought with a Chinese dragon and you got stuck on a zip wire, do you think you are more interesting than Ed Miliband and David Cameron and why do you think so many politicians are boring?

Boris: Well I want you to know that being stuck on the zip wire was actually far more painful and it lasted much longer than you think.  It took ages to find a rope so that they could pull me towards the thing at the end.  This was during the Olympics and I didn’t have anybody to tell me, I had a bodyguard which I don’t normally have but they decided it would be so embarrassing if I came to grief during the Olympics that they gave me Tony Blair’s ex-bodyguard, who is a very nice guy called Carl.  After I’d been stuck on the zip wire in some embarrassment and personal discomfiture for about five minutes, I said to Carl ‘Is there anything you can do?’ and he went like this, and he very slowly took out his mobile phone, he took a photograph of my rear end that is what he did.  So that was the most he achieved, on that particular episode anyway.

So Carl was enjoying your discomfort but you are missing part of the question, are you more interesting than Ed Miliband and David Cameron?

Boris: Look, I make no comment on the Leader of the Opposition who obviously must fend for himself but David Cameron is going to go forward to, I hope very much to go forward to victory in the next few weeks and I think he is doing a very good job.  He is a very, very competent and expert leader of the country and he is somebody who I think fills the job of Prime Minister very well and I think he should continue to do that.  In an interesting way.  

In an interesting way, great!  We’ve also had a great response from young people so let’s take our first video question now starting with Keira who is a Stand Up Be Counted contributor. 

Keira: I’m Keira from Liverpool.  5.3 million people live on less than the living wage yet MPs are seeking further jobs because their 69 grand plus salary a year is not enough for them, do you think that an MPs salary is enough and do you feel that MPs now just aren’t representing working class people?

£67,000, is it enough?

Boris: I certainly think that MPs should not be going around trying to take more dosh off the taxpayer.  I think that public service is a privilege and is a great thing to be able to do.  I am hoping also to be elected to parliament in May and I think by the way, our questioner talked about the living wage, I think that is a fine, fine thing, the living wage and we’ve been championing it …I don't know if you know what the living wage is or how it works.  It’s not compulsory so you are not forcing firms to pay it, you’re simply pointing out to them that where they can pay a little bit more to some of their lowest paid employees that is a great thing to do and it works for them.  So just for the people at the bottom you are giving them just a little bit more and it doesn’t mean that the whole firm goes bust because they are very rich firms and we’ve seen a big increase in the number of firms in London who pay it and it’s put about £60 million into the pockets of some of the hardest working people in London, so the living wage I think is a great thing to do.

So speaking about people higher up the income salary, MPs, do you think they should be able to take private jobs and do you think you’ll be able to be both Mayor and MP at once?

Boris: I think that, yeah, I’m going to have to combine both things for about a year, exactly a year in fact, from May … if I’m lucky enough to get in in May this year I’m going to have to do it from May to May and the only reason I think that’s okay is because, well it’s been done before, I did it before actually, I was both an MP  and Mayor for a while.  My predecessor was MP and Mayor for ages.  I think basically it’s like if you’re running a big government department, if you are Secretary of State for whatever it is, for defence or health or something, then you have a huge responsibility plus you’re also an MP so I would do both.

But a private consultancy?

Boris: You know … not as a Minister, I can’t see how you could do that, no.

Okay, let’s go back to the panel and Beatrice has a question.

Beatrice: If you could change one thing about the world now instantly without having to pass any law, what would it be?

Boris: I would change the thing where all these kids, these young people in London and in other places are getting sucked into this Jihadi nonsense.  I don't know whether you’ve seen what’s happened with these young girls going from London schools, young men learning all this absolute rubbish.  It is nothing to do with Islam properly understood, we need to knock it on the head, just change their mind-sets so that they see this as a catastrophic mistake and a false turning. 

I think Nathan this was something you wanted to talk about as well.

Nathan: Yes, again terrorism is rising with people leaving the UK to join the ISIS so what would you do to stop this and should we feel safe in the UK?

Boris: We should feel safe in the UK and this is a very, very safe society.   The police do a wonderful job of keeping us safe, I mean crime is down, murder rates are down, this is an increasingly safe, safe city but you’re so right, Nathan, we do have a problem with terrorism and with young people who are just being driven I think, in my view, off the edge by an ideology which is very seductive but is leading them into terrible disastrous mistakes and criminal behaviour.  So you need to see what they’re doing and I am afraid you need to be able to monitor them.  I think when they are communicating with each other over the internet we should be able to, our police and security services should be able to see what they are doing and … 

Including on social media?

Boris: Yes, including on Facebook or Twitter or whatever, I’m not a great expert on social media but they should definitely have that power and when they come back to Britain they should be arrested, there’s no question. 

Okay, great, Sophia?

Sophia: You are a very popular Mayor of London, you’ve introduced the Oyster Cards, the Boris Bikes that are very useful, you’ve banned alcohol on transport and you’ve represented London all around the world.  You also have a really cool hair do so why be an MP?

Boris: Oh, right, I have done an awful lot of those things …

He’s blushing!

Boris: I am blushing.  The Oyster Card, I’ve got to admit to you, although it’s brilliant and we’ve massively expanded it, in fact we have got bank cards, you can pay with your bank card if you have a bank card, I don't know if any of you have got bank cards …

Probably not. 

Boris: Probably not yet, quite right, don’t bother.  By the way in a few years’ time you’ll be able to pay with your mobile phone, you will just wave your mobile phone if you have a mobile phone, do you have mobile phones?  Well you’ll be able to wave your mobile phone at the … and in the future you will probably have your little rice sized or smaller microchips embedded in your, I don't know …

You’ll just blink.

Boris: You’ll just blink or just wave and you’ll invisibly pay that way so the technology is changing the whole time.  What was your question?

Why do you want to be an MP?

Boris: Oh right, because … I think to be given the responsibility of serving a constituency, to be trying to do your best for people in Uxbridge and South Ruislip is where I’m trying for, is a fantastic privilege.  There’s a lot of rubbish talked at the moment about how everybody thinks MPs are twerps and so on, I don’t agree, I don’t agree.  I think most people actually understand that MPs are vital, that they do on the whole a good job, most of them are incredibly hard working and yes, some of them do let the side down and we’ve seen some recent stuff about people seeming to want too much money and all the rest of it but most of them really aren’t like that and I think the House of Commons, British democracy, is absolutely wonderful and something that is respected still and admired around the world so I’m keen to get back in there.  

There you go, you heard it here first, MPs are not twerps.  

Boris: Well they’re not, not all twerps.  There may be some but they’re not all twerps, no. 

They’re not all twerps, sorry.  Okay, more selfie questions from our Stand Up Be Counted contributors. 

Angel: Hello, my name is Angel and my question for Boris Johnson is what is he going to do to make sure that youngsters outside the capital can see the opportunities that are available inside the capital to young people so things like apprenticeships, internships, work experience that perhaps we wouldn’t get in smaller cities outside of the capital. 

Basil: Hello Boris, my name is Boris and I come from Greenford High School.  My question is, how would you prove to your Conservative party followers that the policies that you’ve been implementing as the Mayor of London are truly Conservative values and ideologies?

Dom: I’m Dom, I’m 16 from Milton Keynes, I would like to know what is your current opinion on immigration and its potential policy changes?

Can I remind you, kids outside London …

Boris: The first question, apprenticeships and how can kids outside London understand the opportunities.  Get on our website and see … if you’re living outside London, who is in London and who is outside London?  

Surrey.

Preston. 

I’m from London.   

Boris: Okay, well just get on our website, look at the apprenticeship schemes.  Are our policies are Conservative in that they have been about trying to deliver better value services for less money for everybody, yes they are and we’ve cut the council tax in London year after year and we are going to keep cutting it and the previous guys who weren’t Conservatives by the way, the left wing chap who was in before me, he whacked council tax up by 153% and we are going to cut it in real terms by 20% so that’s a Conservative approach.

And immigration?

Boris: And on immigration, I think there are two sides to it.  I think that I don’t want to be hostile to immigrants.  London has a population 40% or almost 40% were born abroad and they are hugely contributing to the dynamism of the economy.  What I don’t want to see is people coming in illegally and  I don’t want to see people kludging and skiving and idling and loafing and leeching and think of another word like that, off the state.  

Do you worry that too many immigrants do that?

Boris: And so I think we need to watch out for that.  I think what David Cameron is proposing on that in that area is very sensible so make sure the controls are tight.  Britain is a wonderful place to be, it’s a privilege, it’s a huge privilege to be able to live here.  Control the people coming in, don’t let them milk the system but don’t be hostile to somebody just because they made the decision to uproot themselves and come and build a life in another country because they will be people very often of a great deal of energy and talent.  My own ancestors came from abroad, I had a Turkish great-grandfather who came to this country in the early part of the 20th century and if London hadn’t taken him in, well I certainly wouldn’t be here.  He then went back to Turkey and got killed but that was because he wasn’t a very successful politician I’m afraid to say.

Okay, back to our panel and Anya.

Anya: What are your biggest regrets in your political and personal life?

Boris: Jeez, regrets!  

Personal and political life. 

Boris: I think I regret bitterly, I still regret my failure to get anywhere as a rock star and a player of the guitar.  I tried at school to master the guitar with a view to becoming a famous …

At Eton?

Boris: Exactly and it was hopeless.  Then I thought right, I’ll master the piano and that went even worse so that’s my real … If you do have the slightest musical ability, if anybody has the slightest musical ability then keep going, I would encourage people with any talent whatever not to waste it because I frankly had none and it’s painful to see people who do have talent waste it. 

So that’s personal, political?

Boris: Oh … let me think.  Yes, I’ll tell you, an obvious one.  I think that in 2003 I was naïve and unrealistic about my expectations about the level of planning that we had done for the aftermath of the Gulf War, of the removal of Saddam Hussein.  I thought that the Pentagon must have worked out a way forward, I thought that actually if we were going to kick this tyrant out we had worked out a way in which a new government would come in, a new society would be organised and how power would be transferred.  The tragedy was there was no transfer of power to anybody, it was more or less anarchic and it was one of the reasons why we have now got the shambles in Iraq and Syria that you see today so I certainly regret that. 

Okay, thank you.  Robert.  

Robert: Do you have a crush on any celebrities?  If so, who?

Boris: That’s a really difficult … I mean you are bowling them right on middle stump here.  I have to be very careful what I say here.  I have … let me think.  I have previously admitted to … it’s too embarrassing, it’s too embarrassing.  

Oh come on!

Boris: No, no, I can’t.  I’m taking the fifth amendment on this.  Basil Brush, how about that?  

Robert: If you did want to go on a date with Basil Brush I think you might want to brush your hair so here’s a comb. 

Boris: Oh thank you very much! 

There you go.

Boris: Thank you very much, thank you.  I’m not going to comb it now but thank you very much. 

But before you see Basil.  All right, Charlotte, you’re next.

Charlotte: Do you agree with Ed Miliband that tuition fees should be cut?

Boris: Er, no, I don’t, I don’t agree with that policy.  I think that what Labour are proposing would be absolutely disastrous for university finance.  We have got some of the best universities in the world here in London and four of the top ten universities.  They depend on being properly financed, the best people to contribute to the financing of those universities are the students who benefit from, over their lifetimes graduates from universities will earn massively more than people who don’t go to university so I’d rather see them subsidise the universities than general taxpayers who don’t benefit from that education so I’m not a taker for that policy at all. 

Okay, fantastic but you did of course benefit from free education yourself.  

Boris: I did, I did, but that was at a time, Anushka, when a much smaller proportion of the population went to university.  We have hugely expanded higher education provision in this country, rightly because it’s a great thing but it needs to be paid for.  Who’s going to pay for it?  Should it be everybody including lots of people on very low incomes or should it be the university graduates who are in a much stronger financial position as a result of their education?

A left-wing defence of tuition fees.  Beatrice.

Beatrice: What sort of dad are you?  Do you embarrass your children?

Boris: You’ve got to ask them and I think that, yeah, you know, I would be embarrassing them even more if I were to attempt to answer that question. 

Well you can answer the first part, what sort of dad are you?

Boris: Embarrassing probably.  

An embarrassing dad!  Nathan. 

Nathan: Obesity in the UK has become a big problem with 67% of men and 57% of women being overweight or obese, how will you reduce this amount particularly in children?

Boris: Well we are trying to do all sorts of things in London to help with that problem.  It is pretty bad but it is getting a little bit better.  Would you believe it, London kids are getting a little bit lighter and that is good news.  We are trying to help with all sorts of exercise programmes, we’re supporting walking, cycling, sport, we have a huge grassroots sports operation trying to get kids involved in sport, we are trying to encourage healthy eating in schools, we’ve got stuff in the London … we’ve got stuff to discourage councils from giving permission to chicken, fast food joints and greasy food shops being set up right next to schools.  Let me ask you, do you prefer, if you had the choice at lunch between pizza and chips and … 

You’re trying to think of something healthy?  Do you want me to help you?

Boris: Yes, go on. 

Vegetables.  

Boris: Vegetables!  So pizza and chips and a lovely ratatouille, a lovely vegetable ratatouille with salad, which would you rather have?

Nathan: Probably the pizza.  

Boris; Yes, you see, that’s the problem.  

So you think restrict choices but isn’t that a bit nanny state?

Boris: Well, you know, I think you’ve got to encourage kids to eat healthily somehow or other.  

Do you eat healthily?  Would you have chosen the pizza or the ratatouille?

Boris: I’d probably have had both, that’s the tragic answer.  

Sophia, you’re next.

Sophia: You are very good at Latin so what does princeps esse volen mean?

Boris: Well I know what you’re trying to get me to say!  Volo David Cameronem esse principe.  

Oh beautiful, what does that mean?

Boris: I want David Cameron to be Prime Minister, there you go.  

What, forever?

Boris: No, but you know, for as long as possible. 

Go on, you can tell us, what does it really mean?

Sophia: I want to be leader.  

Clever little question there. 

Boris: Very good question, yes.  

Do we have time for some more questions? Fantastic, Anya.

Anya: Okay, with the upcoming general election what advice would you give to other politicians to make them appeal to the youngsters of our generation?

Boris: I think you don’t need to do anything special to appeal to … politicians can’t appeal to youngsters just by putting on baseball hats and break dancing around or whatever you young people do these days, that’s not going to work is it?  You’ve got to show that this election matters to you because ultimately it’s about what kind of economy we’re creating, it’s about the jobs that we’re creating, it’s about the way we’re taking our country.  This country is growing hugely at the moment, London’s population is growing, we need more homes.  What kind of homes are they going to be?  Are they going to be beautiful homes, are we going to protect the environment, are we going to plant more trees, are we going to manage growth in a way that is sustainable and lovely or are we going to make a mess of it?  So the policies that we have are incredibly important for everybody and I think young people get that, I think they totally get that. 

We’re running out of time so what I’m going to do is get two of you to ask a question one after the other then you can give us a quick answer.   So Robert.

Robert: Which football team do you support and who do you want to win out of the two London clubs at the cup final on Sunday?

Boris: I support all London clubs.  I levitate like … I support all of them. 

You’re not allowed to do that in football, you know.  

Boris: Well all right.  For some reason I cannot fathom my sons support Newcastle United.

Do you know who is in the cup final?

Boris: I haven’t got the faintest idea, I’m sorry.  

Do you want to tell him?

Robert: Tottenham and Chelsea.  

Boris: Tottenham and Chelsea, right …

You want them both to win?

Boris: Obviously London is going to come out well from that particular encounter so that’ll be good.  

Now this time don’t cut in, we’re going to do two questions, Charlotte and then … 

Boris: Oh sorry. 

It’s all right. 

Charlotte: I’ve seen the photograph of you in Iraq holding a gun, in your role as Mayor of London do you think this is irresponsible?

Thank you, good question. 

Beatrice: How would you sum yourself up in three words?

Very good question. 

Boris: Very good question.  Okay, no, I don’t think it’s at all … I think it was right for us to go and show solidarity with the Kurdish Peshmerga who are the only people who are actually making a difference out there at the moment really.  We talked earlier about the terrorists who are threatening people and some of them coming back to Britain, these Kurds are really doing a good job of keeping them under control, driving them out of Northern Iraq so we have got British troops there as well who are supporting them, trying to train them and I was showing my strong feelings of support.  And the three words?  Mayor of London, how about that?

Very, very good.  Quickly the last two, Nathan and Sophia. 

Nathan: What makes you angry?

Sophia: I noticed that you went to the east coast of America, were you given any gifts or souvenirs?

 What is the most unusual gift that you have ever been given?

Boris: Oh, the most unusual gift?  Oh … let me think. 

You must have had a few.

Boris: Yes, yes, yes, no, absolutely.  I’m just trying to think. When I was in the Gulf I was, they laid on a banquet for us and I was asked to, we had to eat camel which I thought was pretty … have you ever eaten a camel?  The answer is one bite at a time basically and it was …

What did it taste like?

Boris: It tastes rather like mutton, it tastes like a big sheep.  

A big sheep as opposed to a small sheep.  And what makes you angry?

Boris: Er … I think very, very little is the truth except possibly being beaten at tennis or any other game by one of my brothers and sisters.  I don’t get really angry, I don’t want to encourage anybody to get angry when it’s just about losing a game. 

So you are not an angry man?

Boris: No, no.  Well one thing I do object to, normally I don’t have a … but when lorry drivers come up behind me and I am just cycling innocently in the middle of the road, well keeping to my side of the road and they decide that because they’re so big and their lorry is so powerful they want to just clear me out of the road and they hoot aggressively then I do see red a bit, I do and sometimes at the traffic lights if I draw next to them I will give them a piece of my mind.

Do you?

Boris: I do.  Such as it is, yes, I do. 

I’d love to see that.  Thank you very much, that is it for this edition of Hot Seat and I’d like to thank our panel and all those who sent in their questions and thanks of course to the London Mayor, Boris Johnson, perhaps next time he’s in the Hot Seat he’ll be an MP or maybe an even higher office, let’s see.

Boris: Thank you.  

Sky News

Isabel Moore

isabel.moore@bskyb.com