Hampshire attraction Peppa Pig World is 'very much my kind of place', prime minister Boris Johnson tells business leaders

Boris Johnson used his speech to business leaders gathered in Newcastle to tell them about his weekend visit to Peppa Pig World, in Paultons Park Home, Romsey.

The prime minister described Peppa Pig as ‘pure genius’, despite resembling a ‘Picasso-like hairdryer’, with the show becoming a £6 billion global success story after its creation by a London based studio in 2004.

Mr Johnson, who has six children including a one-year-old boy, said: ‘Yesterday I went, as we all must, to Peppa Pig World.

‘I was a bit hazy what I would find at Peppa Pig World – but I loved it.

‘Peppa Pig World is very much my kind of place.’

Peppa Pig World features nine rides and the opportunity for children – and prime ministers – to be photographed with Peppa Pig and her family.

Mr Johnson added: ‘It has very safe streets, discipline in schools, a heavy emphasis in new mass transit systems, I noticed, even if they are a bit stereotypical about Daddy Pig.’

Johnson asked the audience of business executives who had been to the theme park, saying he was ‘surprised you haven't been there’ to those executives who had not visited the park.

Praising the private sector, Mr Johnson said ‘no Whitehall civil servant could conceivably have come up with Peppa’.

He added: ‘Who would have believed that a pig that looks like a hairdryer or possibly a Picasso-like hairdryer, a pig that was rejected by the BBC, would now be exported to 180 countries with theme parks both in America and China?’

Several Peppa Pig resorts and theme parks are planned across the globe, including in Shanghai.

The prime minister defended his speech, saying he believed it ‘went over well’, after Labour mocked Mr Johnson online by saying ‘the joke’s not funny any more’.

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey added: ‘Businesses are crying out for clarity. Instead, all they got was Boris Johnson rambling on about Peppa Pig.

‘It is a perfect metaphor for Johnson’s chaotic, incompetent Government as it trashes our economy, but it is not worthy of a British prime minister.’

The prime minister also set out to business leaders his plan for a ‘green industrial revolution’, which saw the PM quote Soviet Union leader Lenin, mimic the sound of a roaring car, and compare himself to Moses bringing down the 10 commandments.

A message from the Editor, Mark Waldron

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