THE Boris Johnson Show came to Dorset as the former London mayor swept in, accompanied by most of the national media.

The Conservative MP arrived on the Vote Leave battle bus to claim British businesses would do “even better” if they left the EU.

As soon as he stepped off the bus at Christchurch company Reidsteel, he was doorstepped by Channel Four News political editor Michael Crick about the row over ITV’s planned debates .

A Vote Leave source, upset that ITV had chosen to pit David Cameron against Ukip’s Nigel Farage rather than a member of the official Leave campaign, had warned “there will be consequences for its future”, adding that “the people in No 10 won’t be there for long”.

Mr Johnson responded by saying “I don’t know what you’re talking about” and later criticised the media for obsession with “trivia”.

“This is the kind of microcosmographica to which they will try to reduce this debate,” he said.

“I would much rather talk about the issues that matter to the people of this country and the great choice we face in a few weeks’ time and the more we bang on about who’s going to be talking to whom, the more people’s eyes will threaten to glaze over.”

Mr Johnson took a steel grinder to a metal placard representing the £350million a week which Vote Leave says the EU pays to belong to the EU.

Remain campaigners point out that the figure takes no account of a rebate which brings the figure down to £276m, or private and public sector receipts which reduce it to £161m.

Mr Johnson thanked Reidsteel director Simon Boyd for “allowing me to grind steel so inelegantly” and said the company did business all over the world, including supplying bridges to Somalia.  “If it wasn’t for Christchurch in Dorset, we wouldn’t be able to cross creeks in Somalia,” he said.

He added: “I believe that great British companies like this can in fact do even better than they’re already doing if we take back control of our country

“The people ranged against us are very considerable and very powerful. We have the entire establishment against us, all the people who got it wrong last time”.

He added: “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for us. There are millions, if not hundreds of millions, across the whole EU area who think as we do, who are waiting for the British to speak up for common sense.

“This is the only chance we will ever get to defend our  makers, to hold our politicians to account and to give back to the people that vital power to sack at elections the people that take decisions. That’s the greatest thing Britain gave to the world, is our democracy.”

Mr Johnson brushed aside the concerns of some of Dorset’s major  employers who want to stay in the EU – including JP Morgan, Barclays, Siemens, BAE Systems, Lush and Sunseeker.

He insisted Britain could see around 300,000 more jobs if it signed its own trade deals with the world outside Europe.