Boris Johnson is frustrated with Britain's migrant crisis and the Ukraine war... but above all, he is frustrated that he is no longer PM

But more than anything, I suspect, with the fact that he is no longer Prime Minister.

We were meeting for our third interview for GB News in the last couple of years. In Edinburgh, where he was speaking at “An Evening With Boris Johnson” (tickets starting at £49).

He is his usual affable, entertaining self. And he’s still passionate as ever about Ukraine.

When we’d last met, it had been at the Munich Security Conference in February, shortly after Donald Trump had horrified allies by picking up the phone and talking for an hour and a half to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Johnson had defended Mr Trump then, accusing European leaders of “headless chickenism”.

Six months later, Mr Putin continues to bomb Ukraine and a fortnight ago Trump applauded and literally rolled out the red carpet for the Russian President in Alaska.

Of what many regard as US appeasement, Mr Johnson says: “I understand people's frustration about the kind of moral equivalence that is drawn between Russia and Ukraine by the White House.

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"It's infuriating to hear this kind of thing. We know who's in the right. It's black and white. It's good versus evil. Ukraine is a completely innocent wronged party.

"We all know that it was, you know, frankly, sick making to watch Putin being welcomed to America like that.”

But despite his clear frustration, he stresses that Mr Trump has agreed to security guarantees and believes that if the US finally piles on the pressure it keeps threatening, “the war could be over by Christmas”.

He also praises the tariffs the US has slapped on India because of its continuing use of Russian oil and gas.

Mr Johnson’s frustration though, is not confined to Trump/Russia/Ukraine.

Asked about the continuing small boats crisis, he retorts: “We had a plan, which I think I announced only a couple of months before, tragically, I had to leave office in April 22 or thereabouts, with the Rwanda plan. And actually, it is the right plan. It is, you know.

"And what's so infuriating is to watch a brilliant British idea, which is what the Rwanda plan was now being taken up by other countries.”

The US are using Rwanda for migrants, and Johnson says the Home Secretary Yvette Cooper “should swallow a lot of pride and implement the Rwanda plan".

"That's what they need to do. They should, they should go back to Kigali. They should say, look, we've goofed, we've made a big mistake.”

It’s not going to happen, I say. He hits back: “They've done plenty of other U turns. They've done plenty of other U turns. They did a U turn on the winter fuel payment why don’t they do a U turn on this?”

When I point out that the election was called before the flights could take off and so we don’t know if it would have worked, he exclaims: “I didn't call the election. I would have won the election.”

And there we have it. Rishi Sunak called the election, following the Tory Party having got rid of Mr Johnson and then Liz Truss in quick succession.

There is a parallel universe in Boris Johnson’s head where his MPs didn’t take him out and he would have swept them to another victory.

Wishful thinking.

But I’m stuck by how, despite my best efforts, he won’t dwell on Kemi Badenoch, or Nigel Farage, or current problems. He’s talking about what he did, what he could have done if he’d been allowed to stay on.

Even when I confront him with the “Boris Wave”, where legal migration surged to almost a million on his watch, he bats it away, and insists, that with Brexit “I did take back control of our borders.”

Boris Johnson has unfinished business. Kemi Badenoch is so far unable to cut through and it’s debatable that another leader in the current crop could reverse the party’s dire fortunes, when Nigel Farage is hogging the microphone and the headlines.

But Boris Johnson, like Mr Trump and Mr Farage, has (had?) an astonishing gift in his ability to connect with the public.

Could he come back?

I wouldn’t hold your breath. But if you think it’s impossible, just remember how Mr Trump was written off after his first term.

Never say never.