‘FCK BORIS’ posters slamming Tory policies appear on London Tube

Doom-announcing ‘Get Ready For Brexit’ ads have been rolled out across the UK, but a protest group have seized upon the campaign and adhacked with their own provocative statements, using Conservative policies, damning statistics, and lies told by prime minister Boris Johnson to highlight the government’s hypocrisy. 

The posters were created by Fck Boris, the same group who organised the London protest outside 10 Downing Street back in July. Made up of a group of anonymous young BAME women who felt “stressed and horrified” at finding out Boris was going to be PM, the Fck Boris campaign are making it their mission to educate people about why he continues to be the worst.

“Did you know… 85 per cent of the UK population are worried about climate change. July 2019 was the hottest recorded month ever. Boris’ leadership campaign received its largest donation of £25,000 from ‘Britain’s leading climate denial group’ Bristol Port. #fckboris,” reads one of the posters, photographed on the London overground line. 

“Did you know... Tory funding cuts to women’s refuges mean they now turn 50 per cent of people away,” reads another.

A spokesperson from the Fck Boris campaign told Dazed: “The posters were something we’d developed a month ago. They’re publicly available on our Instagram. There are eight of them with facts and info about Boris. People were putting them in their windows already and then this adhack came out of that.” They add that all of the stats used are taken from publicly available information, reported over the last two to three years.

The act of adhacking is when you paste over or replace adverts with your own ones. The Fck Boris campaign has been spotted across the tube lines, calling bullshit on BJ and the work he’s doing – or rather, not doing – as PM.

“Despite the PR bluff that Boris puts out, he’s not trying to save our hospitals at all,” the Fck Boris spokesperson said. This seems ironic, they add, given that one of the lies Boris told during the Leave campaign was that the UK gives £350 million to the EU each week, which could be given to the NHS. 

“We’ve seen it all before: the rich are getting richer. Boris doesn’t want to put forward environmental protections, he wants to cut taxes on the rich, and the NHS is not saved at all – the Tories want to sell off NHS contracts to private American companies. On all issues that really matter to people today, like climate change, poverty, and health, he is pushing the same old. I hope the posters make people look beyond the PR he does. He’s not a champion for the people, he’s a racist, sexist, homophobe who doesn’t want to help anyone.”

The posters include a QR code that takes people to register to vote, as well as a link to the Fck Boris website with a Crowdfunder to take the campaign nationwide. The first Fck Boris DIY event is happening in Leeds on November 16. 

The Fck Boris organisers hope that the posters will encourage young people to vote if a general election is announced later today and that it reminds people to get active and resist Boris’s government.

Today, Johnson is trying again for an election on 12 December by tabling a short bill which MPs will vote on. Yesterday, MPs rejected his first attempt. For this bill to be approved, Johnson needs to win a majority of just one. Brexit-wise, leaders from the EU have initially agreed to delay Brexit until January 31, so the plans for the UK to leave the EU on Thursday (Halloween!) have been scuppered.