The National:

BORIS Johnson is “unworthy of the Queen”, according to a historian and cross-bench peer.

You know it’s bad for a Conservative Prime Minister when that’s the criticism being levelled at him. 

After all, the Tories don't seem to mind failing families across the UK on Universal Credit hit with the cost of living crisis ... but when it's her Majesty you're letting down? That's too much.

READ MORE: Jacob Rees-Mogg hits back at archbishop over Rwanda scheme

Peter Hennessy, also known as Baron Hennessy of Nympsfield, laid into Johnson on Radio 4’s Broadcasting House, and said we were in "the most severe constitutional crisis involving a prime minister" that the 75-year-old could remember.

The National: Peter Hennessy is Attlee Professor of Contemporary British History at Queen Mary University of LondonPeter Hennessy is Attlee Professor of Contemporary British History at Queen Mary University of London

Hennessy, made a non-political life peer in 2010, is an academic specialising in the history of government – and didn’t mince his words about the extent to which the UK is led by a “rogue” Prime Minister.

Since the Covid pandemic started, he’s been keeping a daily diary. Speaking on the radio show, he read out one of his most recent.

It proved to be a hit on social media, too.

Hennessy said: “Tuesday the 12th of April, 2022, will be forever remembered as a dark, bleak day for British public and political life.

“It is the day that Boris Johnson became the great debaser in modern times of decency and public and political life, and of our constitutional conventions – our very system of government.

“The moment was captured on film forever. Just after 6pm, Johnson, in a panelled room at Chequers, clutching a prepared statement which he reads to the cameras for Vicky Young of the BBC, apologises, says he’s paid the fine and refuses to resign.

“He was, he added, speaking in a spirit of openness and humility.

“If there were cocks on the Chequers estate, where all this was going on, they would have crowed at their very loudest at this point, as the Prime Minister sealed his place in British history as the first lawbreaker to have occupied the premiership – an office he has sullied like no other, turning it into an adventure playground for one man’s narcissistic vanity.

“Boris Johnson has broken the law, misled parliament and has, in effect, shredded the ministerial code, which is a crucial part of the spinal cord of the constitution.

“And the great weakness of the system is that the Prime Minister, the wrong un in chief, is the guardian of the code, and with it, the supposed protector of accountability and decency.

“The Queen’s first minister is now beyond doubt a rogue Prime Minister unworthy of her, her parliament, her people and her kingdom.

“I cannot remember a day where I’ve been more fearful for the wellbeing of the constitution.”