LOL! Boris Johnson tried to hide meetings with News International

After many months fighting its release, Boris Johnson has had his diary published. And it reveals that the man who has ultimate responsibility for the police in London failed to declare a range of meetings and phone calls with News International executives at the height of the Met investigation into phone hacking (or 'codswallop' as he once put it).

These include a phone call with Rebekah Brooks in April 2011 and, a month later, a telephone conversation with James Murdoch and a meeting with NI lobbyist Frederick Michel.

Bear in mind Boris heads the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime - formerly the Metropolitan Police Authority - and so has ultimate responsibility for policing. You would have thought, therefore, that he would want to avoid any impression of impropriety. 

Well, Johnson clearly doesn't see himself as a man that needs to show such restraint:

• In May 2012, it was revealed that News International had offered the Mayor millions of pounds of sponsorship towards pet projects - something that he got very angry about in a subsequent interview with the BBC.
• In June 2012, Boris was forced to admit he had failed to declare in his official diary a dinner with Rupert Murdoch just two days before the launch of the Metropolitan Police investigation into phone hacking. 
• In August 2012, the Mayor invited Rupert Murdoch to be his guest at the Olympic swimming finals, despite the clear evidence of wrongdoing in key parts of the media mogul's organisation.  

All of this paints a picture of a politician less interested in demonstrating an independence from the Murdoch empire than he is trying to court its support.

In the wake of the contemptible episode that was phone hacking - an episode that showed a hugely unhealthy relationship between the police, politicians and Murdoch's companies - Boris Johnson's actions are shameful.