Boris Johnson has admitted he “loves” AI and ChatGPT, and revealed that he uses it while writing his books.
The former prime minister praised the AI platform for answering his questions, and said he appreciated it calling him “brilliant” and “excellent”.
Mr Johnson has had a number of books published since 2001, including his most recent autobiography, Unleashed, which was released in 2024.
Speaking to Al Arabiya English, he said: “One thing that really encourages me is AI. I love AI. I love ChatGPT. I love it. ChatGPT is frankly fantastic.”
When asked what he uses it for, he said: “I’m writing various books. I just use it. I just ask questions. You know the answer but ChatGPT always says, ‘Oh, your questions are clever. You’re brilliant. You’re excellent. You have such insight.’
“I love it. I see great promise in this technology because we’re all simple. We’re human beings.”
Aside from using AI while writing books, he said he thought it could be instrumental in cutting costs for the government.
Speaking about HS2, he said: “Most of the cost of that is going on lawyers and environmental impact assessments and planning applications and all sorts of stuff that is not actually digging tunnels or putting down railway lines.
“So much of that can be done with AI. You don’t need this stuff anymore and you can massively accelerate the legal process.”
He added: “The UK is one of the world leaders in AI, we should be using that lead to cut the cost of government and if you cut the cost of government you can put that money back into the pockets of people and stimulate growth. That’s one of the ways to get out of the doom loop regarding tax.”
Mr Johnson said he’s had “a lot on my plate” but has been “very happy” since leaving parliament, saying he’s been “writing a lot and drawing and painting”.
He said he hoped the Tories would come back but compared the possibility of his own return to “being reincarnated as an olive” or “being blinded by a champagne cork”.
He said: “Statistically, anything can happen. But water can flow uphill – it’s unlikely. I want my party to come back and to get organised. That’s the best solution.”
Despite a flurry of media attention, his highly anticipated memoir, Unleashed, failed to make a splash when it was released last October,
Sales slumped, with end-of-year rankings highlighting its underperformance when it only managed to reach number 45 on The Bookseller’s UK chart and failed to secure a place on The Sunday Times’ top 50 list.
