OTTAWA — Former British prime minister Boris Johnson said he was inspired by the “dynamism” of Canadian conservatism and told a raucous crowd at the Canada Strong and Free Network conference to keep embracing the “single Anglo-Saxon idea of freedom” as the glue to unite the conservative movement.

Johnson was joined on Wednesday by former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott and moderator John O’Sullivan, a British political commentator who worked as a speechwriter for former U.K. prime minister Margaret Thatcher, to kick off the conservative networking conference in Ottawa.