Calls for Boris Johnson to resign have intensified after the prime minister admitted at PMQs that he had attended an illegal party in the garden of No 10 during the height of the first lockdown.
Although Mr Johnson apologised to the British public for his actions, he tried to lessen the blow by claiming he had mistakenly taken the gathering for a “work event”.
Senior Tory Roger Gale had no truck with this excuse, saying the prime minister was a “dead man walking”.
Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the SNP also called on the prime minister to do “the decent thing” and resign his position. “The prime minister is a man without shame,” Labour leader Keir Starmer told the Commons at PMQs.
After his apology, Mr Johnson said he would not be commenting further on the incident until the end of a civil service investigation into the Downing Street parties. This was greeted by boos from the opposition benches.
Rishi Sunak skips PMQs
There was one highly notable absence at PMQs earlier…
Chancellor Rishi Sunak decided to avoid the PM’s awkward grilling by escaping to Devon for the day.
Mr Sunak, the favourite to replace Boris Johnson at No 10, said he was “excited” to be in Ilfracombe with North Devon Tory MP Selaine Saxby, where he visited a purifying pharmaceutical company, which recently created 200 new jobs.
No 10 party was ‘thank you’ to Dominic Raab, says Tory MP
In a new development to the No 10 party saga, a Conservative MP has claimed the event was a thank you to deputy prime minister Dominic Raab for stepping in during Boris Johnson’s illness early in the pandemic.
Simon Hoare told Sky News: “As I understand it, and this is a third-hand understanding, this was a party organised to say, in the first instance, welcome back prime minister.
“He had been in hospital, I think I’ve got the timeline right, and recuperating at Chequers.
“It was also a way of saying thank you to Dominic Raab for holding the fort.
“So whether the prime minister knew it was taking place or whether everybody just jumped out of the shrubbery and said ‘Surprise’, I don’t know.”
The North Dorset MP added that he was unsure if Mr Johnson’s premiership would survive.
Johnson ‘a dead man walking,’ says senior Tory MP
Our deputy political editor Rob Merrick reports:
One Conservative MP has given a snap judgement on Boris Johnson’s confession that he was at the No 10 garden party – concluding he “misled” the Commons with his previous denials.
“Politically, the prime minister is a dead man walking,“ Roger Gale said – calling on the 1922 Committee of backbench Tories to ”determine how we proceed”.
Sir Roger pointed out that Mr Johnson previously told the Commons that he had been “assured that these allegations were unfounded and that no Covid rules were broken”.
“There is no history of bring a bottle work events at Downing Street,” the MP told BBC Radio 4 – ridiculing the prime minister’s defence that he somehow did not know that the party was a party.
However, Sir Roger is a well-known Johnson opponent – and other Tories are willing to wait for the verdict of Sue Gray, the senior civil servant leading the ‘partygate’ investigation.
Stephen Hammond, a former minister, told the BBC: “It clearly was not a work event and that is the problem.”
But Mr Hammond echoed other Conservatives in saying he had “earned the right for us to wait and see what Sue Gray says”.
Watch: PM apologises for attending lockdown party
PM’s apology all about denying personal liability, says barrister
Interesting analysis here by human rights barrister Adam Wagner, highlighting the fact Boris Johnson’s apology sought to explicitly deny personal liability.
The suggestion is, then, that if Sue Gray concludes rules were broken, the PM will continue to claim he “implicitly” believed the event he attended was work-related, effectively pleading ignorance to avoid having to resign.
“Also, PM has probably been advised that the only possible personal liability would be as an accessory to others’ criminal offences (he wasn’t outside of his home so not subject to the restriction on movement regulation). So has to say he ‘implicitly’ didn’t believe it broke rules.”
Read Wagner’s full thread here:
Tory MP ‘sends tombstone emoji after PMQs’
Boris Johnson appears to be facing just as much trouble internally as he is from competing political forces, following the revelation that he himself attended a potentially lockdown-breaching event.
Isabel Hardman, assistant editor of the right-wing Spectator magazine, tweeted to say a Tory MP had sent her an emoji of a tombstone following today’s PMQs.
Meanwhile, senior Tory MP Sir Roger Gale, who is a staunch critic of Mr Johnson’s, questioned the validity of the PM’s argument that he attended a BYOB gathering – but thought it was a work event.
“Very thin ice indeed,” he said of the PM’s position this afternoon.
‘He needs to go’: More calls for PM to resign
MPs are continuing to call for Boris Johnson to resign after he admitted to attending a BYOB “work event” during lockdown.
Labour MP Toby Perkins said Boris Johnson has “debased” the office of PM. “We all know the Prime Minister was sacked from two previous jobs for lying,” the Chesterfield representative told colleagues in the Commons.
“So, can he explain to the House why he believes that the great office of prime minister can be held to a lower standard than those previous jobs that he was sacked from?”
The PM responded to Mr Perkins by suggesting to him “respectfully that he waits until the inquiry [into No 10 parties] is concluded, which I hope will be as soon as possible”.
Elsewhere, a Conservative voter and former party member told reporters the PM “is finished”. John Coleman, 47, an English teacher from Harrogate, in North Yorkshire, said he may vote Labour in the next election because of the admission by the PM that he attended a party at Downing Street.
“I speak as a conservative voter and former party member… This government needs to fall and it needs to fall now!! Amoral leadership #JohnsonOutNow,” he said on Twitter.
Speaking to the PA news agency, he added: “At the moment it is highly unlikely I will vote Conservative next time round. There are too many sycophants and lightweights in Cabinet and an amoral clown at the top. He is finished … he needs to resign.”
Celebrities weigh-in on PM’s No 10 party apology
Piers Morgan has said Boris Johnson is in “big trouble” after apologising for attending an illegal party at No 10 in May 2020.
Watching the scenes in parliament as they were televised, the former Good Morning Britain co-host tweeted: “Boris Johnson says he thought the massive p***-up in his No10 back garden was a ‘work event’. More pathetic lies that negate any sincerity with his apology.
“Humiliating PMQs for @BorisJohnson – and very telling unsupportive silence from most of his own MPs/ministers as opposition leaders all call for him to resign. He’s in big trouble.”
Meanwhile, game show Pointless co-host Richard Osman joked: “I’m going to need a couple of stiff workplace events to get over this.”
Our culture reporter Isobel Lewis has the full story:
PM’s apology takes Britons ‘for fools,’ says Rayner
Angela Rayner, deputy leader of the Labour Party, has given her verdict following Boris Johnson’s apology in the Commons today.
She says the PM “attended a party, and now he is treating [the British public] like fools by suggesting he doesn’t know what a party is”.
Watch: PM ‘completely destroyed’ Allegra Stratton’s career
Chris Bryant has said the prime minister “completely destroyed” the career of Allegra Stratton, his former political aide, but was not willing to take proper responsibility for his own actions.
The Labour MP told the Commons: “I mean how stupid does the prime minister think the British people are. The worst of it is he’s already managed to completely destroy Allegra Stratton’s career, he’s tarnished the reputation of Lord Geidt, and now he’s making fools of every single MP who cheered him earlier, every single one who goes out on the radio and television to defend this shower of shenanigans.
“Would it not be absolutely despicable if, in the search for a scapegoat, some junior member of staff ends up losing their job, but he kept his?”
