There is plenty of criticism of Boris Johnson, and I do remember some of it from all the way back when he launched his run as mayor of London.
If you are specifically asking for criticism of his columns at the time when he was a writer exclusively, I don't remember that part of ancient history. But it could see why there would be hesitation to engage with a columnist on a regular basis: it would be seen as attacking a rival, thus exposing you to accusations of financial motivations; it would be somewhat "meta", reinforcing accusation such as the one about the "journalistic bubble" isolated from the world. And his columns were clearly opinion pieces: if you're willing to publish a certain number of critiques of others' journalism, focussing on straight-news items with issues would seem to be more useful.
It's precisely because Owen Jones openly acts as a political activist (speaking at party rallies etc) that criticism of him is fair game.
I can see why people may be uncomfortable with these "dual loyalties", although it's not quite the end of democracy it is sometimes made out to be: all journalists have opinions, so what they seem to be arguing for is for those opinions to be hidden from view, which doesn't strike me as an improvement.
Journalism being a route to political office makes a lot of sense, since these are obviously people interested and knowledgeable in it, trained in the specific skill to quickly familiarise themselves with new subjects, to remain conscious of the limits of their knowledge, and to find and recruit subject matter experts where necessary.
Every country has its own set of common paths to political office. Law is very common for obvious reasons. Teachers figure prominently in some countries, possibly because they have the time, fall-back guarantees, and lots of local contacts. The US, alone among western country, has a tradition of military brass continuing into politics.
Among all of these, journalism strikes me as the least problematic.
If you are specifically asking for criticism of his columns at the time when he was a writer exclusively, I don't remember that part of ancient history. But it could see why there would be hesitation to engage with a columnist on a regular basis: it would be seen as attacking a rival, thus exposing you to accusations of financial motivations; it would be somewhat "meta", reinforcing accusation such as the one about the "journalistic bubble" isolated from the world. And his columns were clearly opinion pieces: if you're willing to publish a certain number of critiques of others' journalism, focussing on straight-news items with issues would seem to be more useful.
It's precisely because Owen Jones openly acts as a political activist (speaking at party rallies etc) that criticism of him is fair game.
I can see why people may be uncomfortable with these "dual loyalties", although it's not quite the end of democracy it is sometimes made out to be: all journalists have opinions, so what they seem to be arguing for is for those opinions to be hidden from view, which doesn't strike me as an improvement.
Journalism being a route to political office makes a lot of sense, since these are obviously people interested and knowledgeable in it, trained in the specific skill to quickly familiarise themselves with new subjects, to remain conscious of the limits of their knowledge, and to find and recruit subject matter experts where necessary.
Every country has its own set of common paths to political office. Law is very common for obvious reasons. Teachers figure prominently in some countries, possibly because they have the time, fall-back guarantees, and lots of local contacts. The US, alone among western country, has a tradition of military brass continuing into politics.
Among all of these, journalism strikes me as the least problematic.