TORY leader Boris Johnson’s refusal to apologise for his homophobia “confirms that he harbours a deep dislike for minorities,” Labour’s Lloyd Russell-Moyle has claimed.

Throughout the election campaign, Mr Johnson was repeatedly urged to apologise for calling gay men “tank-topped bum boys” in a 1998 Telegraph article, but he always dodged the question.

On Wednesday, he took the same approach in an interview with Pink News, when asked what punishment a school pupil should receive if they used Mr Johnson’s term against a gay classmate.

The Tory manifesto pledges to “help teachers tackle bullying, including homophobic bullying.”

Mr Johnson responded that no child should “be bullied on account of who they are, who their parents are or the home they come from.”

Avoiding a direct question related to his use of the slur, he said: “I’ve written many millions of words in my time as a journalist and I’ve never intended to cause hurt or pain to anybody.”

Responding to the article, Mr Russell-Moyle said: “Boris Johnson’s refusal to apologise for his history of homophobia confirms that he harbours a deep dislike for minorities, whether that is LGBT people, single mothers, black people, Muslims or others.

“It comes to something when it is no surprise that [he] cannot even bring himself to say sorry for calling gay men ‘tank-topped bum boys’.”

Mr Johnson also claimed to be proud of his LGBT voting record, despite his absences from votes on LGBT rights outnumbering his votes in favour of such rights.

He has never voted on allowing same-sex marriage.