'Tell that to those whose lives were devastated!'

Fury at Boris Johnson after he claims the money spent on investigating historical sex abuse was 'spaffed up the wall'

Boris Johnson is Britain's former Foreign Secretary, who wants to become Theresa May's successor as Prime Minister.

A week ago, Boris Johnson has sparked fury by claiming millions of pounds of police funding is being 'spaffed up the wall' investigating allegations of historic abuse.

The former Cabinet minister and favourite to succeed Theresa May as Tory leader made the crude reference as he suggested 'an awful lot of police time' is being spent looking at 'historic offences and all this malarkey'.

See video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_FSqfXyUFk

His comments sparked a storm of criticism on Twitter, with former CPS chief prosecutor Nazir Afzal tweeting: 'Boris Johnson thinks spending money on delivering justice to victims of child sexual abuse is wasted.

'Tell that to those whose lives were devastated by abusers. Tell that Frances Andrade who took her own life 30 yrs after the abuse she lived with every day.'

After being asked in an LBC interview whether police cuts had contributed to the problems on London's streets, he replied: 'Keeping numbers high on the streets is certainly important. But the question is where you spend the money and where you deploy the officers.

"One comment I would make is that I think an awful lot of the money, an awful lot of police time, now goes into these historic offences and all this malarkey - £60 million I saw was being spaffed up the wall on some investigation into historic child abuse and all this kind of thing."

His comments sparked an angry reaction, with one critic describing them as an 'insult to every survivor of child sex abuse'.

Katie Russell, from Rape Crisis, said:

'Both the suggestion that investigating these devastating crimes is a waste of resources, and the highly inappropriate use of language, are deeply insensitive and offensive towards the hundreds of thousands of people impacted by sexual violence and abuse living in this country.'

Hundreds of thousands? More like millions. She should know.

Johnson's comments were made as the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, which was set up after Jimmy Savile was exposed as a serial paedophile, continues a three-week probe into allegations involving politicians.

According to The Guardian,

anti-Johnson feeling among [Tory] MPs appears to have risen in recent weeks, especially among female Tories incensed by his comments suggesting money on historic child sex abuse cases was being “spaffed up the wall”.

Johnson is the current favourite [as a successor to May] of Brexit-backing Tory activists.