UK Politics

Cabinet secretary Simon Case has stepped down from his role heading the inquiry into alleged Christmas parties in Downing Street after reports that he attended a drinks event in breach of Covid rules.The move comes as a further blow for Boris Johnson at the end of a week in which he has suffered a rebellion by almost 100 Tory MPs and seen one of the Conservatives’ safest seats fall to the Liberal Democrats in a by-election regarded by many within his party as a referendum on his own handling of a series of scandals.The prime minister resisted demands for the inquiry to be handed over to an external investigator, instead appointing Whitehall mandarin Sue Gray to complete the probe. It was unclear how soon she will be able to issue a report.The announcement that Mr Case was “recusing” himself from the inquiry came hours after The Independent published claims from Whitehall officials that the government’s most senior civil servant was present at an impromptu Christmas event at the Cabinet Office’s 70 Whitehall HQ last December.The reports made his position at the head of the inquiry untenable, with demands from Labour and the Scottish National Party for his removal.Mr Case was asked by Boris Johnson last week to look into reports of a Christmas party in 10 Downing Street on 18 December 2020, after a video emerged of aides joking about the event. The investigation was later broadened to include other alleged events, including some apparently involving the prime minister himself.Now he is himself alleged to have shared drinks with 15 to 20 staff in mid-December 2020, according to two Whitehall officials who attended the event.The informal event, according to a joint investigation by The Independent and Politico, was said to have taken place at his office and an adjoining waiting room in 70 Whitehall.A third official, who did not attend, said the event was discussed the following week and they were asked whether they were at the “waiting room drinks.”A source close to the Cabinet Office said they could not rule out that drinks had been consumed at civil servants’ desks, but a spokesman initially rejected claims of an organised gathering, saying in a statement: “These allegations are categorically untrue.”But by Friday evening, the department had admitted that a quiz event involving drinks had taken place.“Staff in the cabinet secretary’s private office took part in a virtual quiz on 17 December 2020,” said the Cabinet Office in a statement. “A small number of them, who had been working in the office throughout the pandemic and on duty that day, took part from their desks, while the rest of the team were virtual.“The cabinet secretary played no part in the event, but walked through the team’s office on the way to his own office. No outside guests or other staff were invited or present. “This lasted for an hour and drinks and snacks were bought by those attending. He also spoke briefly to staff in the office before leaving.”Moments later, a No 10 spokesperson said: “To ensure the ongoing investigation retains public confidence the cabinet secretary has recused himself for the remainder of the process.“The work will be concluded by Sue Gray, second permanent secretary at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. She will ascertain the facts and present her findings to the prime minister.”At the time of the alleged Cabinet Office party, London was in Tier 2 restrictions, meaning people were not allowed to socialise indoors and were told to work from home where possible.Several bottles of wine and Prosecco were poured in the office, the two officials present claim, as well as in the cabinet secretary’s waiting room. Case allegedly carried a glass through the group as he greeted staff who gathered for what one official characterised as “last-minute” drinks, including civil servants from other departments.Case was described as “in and out” of the gathering, drinking with colleagues. Crisps were also served and there were Christmas decorations on the tables, one of those present claimed. The same official said it was “a fairly regular occurrence” for civil servants to drink at their desks during this time but claimed that the gathering in Case’s office was “a piss-up” including his team and members of other departments.The Whitehall employees who spoke to The Independent and Politico questioned the suitability of Simon Case to lead the inquiry into Downing Street parties.One said: “It would have been better for the civil service to bring in someone from the outside [to investigate] especially as other parties involve [special advisers] who are temporary civil servants.” Another said it was a “joke” that they were leading the inquiry.Mr Johnson has faced sustained questions about staff Christmas parties since the Mirror reported that officials drank wine and exchanged gifts via a Secret Santa on 18 December 2020.Mr Johnson has also apologized “unreservedly” for video footage published by ITV News that shows members of the prime minister’s staff joking about the alleged celebration. Allegra Stratton, Mr Johnson’s former spokeswoman, resigned over the video, saying she would “regret those words for the rest of my days.”The prime minister said last week he had asked the cabinet secretary to “establish all the facts and to report back as soon as possible.” Findings had been widely expected this week. Johnson pledged: “It goes without saying that if those rules were broken, there will be disciplinary action for all those involved.”The Independent reported on Thursday that the prime minister joined officials who were allegedly enjoying drinks in Downing Street during the first coronavirus lockdown in May 2020.Lobby Akinnola, spokesperson for Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group, urged the cabinet secretary to “come clean about exactly what happened – anything less is a slap in the face to those who have already lost so much to this pandemic”.He added: “The least the government can do for us now is tell the truth”, adding that claims staff at the investigating cabinet secretary’s office “were themselves breaking the rules makes many of us believe they won’t even have the decency to manage that”.Angela Rayner, Labour’s shadow chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, said the claims concerning a Cabinet Office party put “into question” whether Mr Case could offer a “fair and independent judgement” in the investigation.She added that there “is growing evidence of a culture” of rule breaking.Ian Blackford, SNP leader in Westminster wrote to the prime minister about the allegations and questioned the integrity of the investigation.Allegations against Mr Case had “fundamentally and fatally undermined” his inquiry and he should be suspended until they are cleared up, Mr Blackford said.And Conservative MP Richard Holden told Times Radio: “I don’t think it can be the case that he’s investigating something when obviously, there are now questions about that now.”The prime minister is experiencing one of his toughest weeks since becoming leader, and overnight saw his party lose a by-election in a seat the Tories have held for almost 200 years.Earlier this week, Johnson suffered his biggest rebellion in the House of Commons to date over new Covid restrictions, with many insiders saying his credibility has been seriously dented.Stories about Christmas parties keep coming, with the Mirror on Tuesday publishing fresh details of a Zoom quiz hosted by the prime minister, as well as an image of a separate party held in Conservative Campaign Headquarters by former London mayoral candidate Shaun Bailey, who has since apologised.Case was made Britain’s top civil servant in September 2020 — the youngest person ever recruited to the role — after he helped shape the UK’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.He was previously director general at the now-defunct Department for Exiting the EU, where he worked on Irish border negotiations under Theresa May, and has served as private secretary to the Duke of Cambridge, as well as advising David Cameron and directing strategy at intelligence agency GCHQ. More

Furious Tory MPs have said that Boris Johnson must show “humility” in the wake of the devastating by-election loss in North Shropshire by making a public apology for the string of blunders which have shredded the party’s popularity.One former cabinet minister told The Independent that the days of Johnson being able to stride unscathed through scandal after scandal were over, saying: “The Teflon has come off.”While few MPs believe that the prime minister is facing an imminent leadership challenge, many believe that he has only a matter of months to improve his performance or be subjected to a determined bid to remove him.Veteran backbencher Sir Roger Gale became the first to confirm he has submitted a letter of no confidence to the chair of the 1922 Committee, Sir Graham Brady, who will call a confidence vote if he receives requests from 55 MPs.The North Thanet MP said the by-election result – which saw Liberal Democrats take North Shropshire from Tories for the first time in almost 200 years on a stupendous 34 per cent swing – must be seen as “a referendum on the prime minister’s performance”.“The prime minister is now in last orders time,” said Gale. “One more strike and he’s out.”The former leader of Scottish Conservatives, Ruth Davidson, said that Mr Johnson was “drinking in the last chance saloon” after “badly fumbling” issues of sleaze, lockdown breaches and MPs’ second jobs.“The party is looking for a bit of bloody grip to be exerted and if they see that they might hold off,” she said. “But I think the prime minister has been put on warning by his MPs.”The PM said he took “personal responsibility” for the “very disappointing” result – the seventh-largest by-election swing in modern history – and said he would take action to “fix” the operation of his administration.He is facing calls for a clear-out of an under-performing inner circle at Downing Street, with backbench dissatisfaction directed at chief of staff Dan Rosenfield, who was seen by some as lacking the authority to impose discipline on what one former minister described as a “very young and inadequate” No 10 team.“There is a feeling widely shared in the parliamentary party that the No 10 operation is extremely poor,” the senior MP told The Independent. “He hasn’t got a good chief of staff with real authority, the holder of the post is essentially a civil servant. There’s a feeling that junior staff are getting away with murder, as we see with the reports of parties. A strong chief of staff would never have tolerated that – they’d have been out on their ear.”Others said Mr Johnson needed to engage more closely with MPs and respond to their concerns.One former minister said the “appalling” handling of the party reports reflected the complacent view of those around Johnson that his personal popularity made him immune to scandal.“North Shropshire has shown that the Teflon has been stripped off the prime minister,” the MP told The Independent. “Until now, pretty much every crisis has been met with the idea that the normal rules don’t apply to Boris. That is not an approach that will work any more.”Another senior MP said that voters in North Shropshire had sent the government the message: “Get your act together.”It was not too late for Mr Johnson to win disgruntled voters back before the 2024 election, but he must make a public statement that things have changed, said the MP.“The public will expect an apology at the very least,” the former cabinet minister told The Independent. “I think that is important.. It is a demonstration of humility, which I think the public would expect, given what we have all been through. The insouciant ‘nothing to see here’ line simply won’t wash any more. That humility has to be demonstrated in the next few months.”One “Red Wall” Conservative MP told The Independent: “He’s lucky we’ve gone into recess so there’s no one in Westminster for three weeks. The mood is bad, but it would be even worse if people got together to talk.“I don’t think there’s going to be any leadership push quickly. The people who already want Boris out will let him keep finding a bit more rope. It’s bad poll numbers that will rattle a wider group.”Sir Charles Walker, the former vice chairman of the 1922 Committee, said Mr Johnson had “weeks, months, a year to sort himself out”.“If we go on making unforced errors over the next three to six months or nine months, it will become a lot more serious,” he told Times Radio. “It’s serious now but it’s not at a critical level yet.”And the committee’s treasurer Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown said Mr Johnson needed to stop the “self-inflicted own goals”.“I want him to succeed, I am giving him the benefit of the doubt,” he told Sky News.“But in doing that, as one of his seasoned backbenchers, I am asking him to think carefully how he governs the country and avoid these self-inflicted measures.”Former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith called on critics of the PM to pipe down, insisting: “He is our leader, and he will lead us to the next election.”But Sir Iain told the BBC that Mr Johnson needs to impose “structure and discipline” on his administration and be prepared to “get rid of people who are breaking the rules, so he can move on”.“He needs to be out front as the great political salesman, not bogged down having to apologise,” said Duncan Smith.Conservative chair Oliver Dowden insisted that Mr Johnson remains “an electoral asset for the Conservative Party”.While admitting his party had been given “a kicking”, he said the Tories had recovered before from mid-term by-election thumpings, saying: “It happens time and time again.”Johnson himself admitted he had failed to stop “a constant litany of stuff about politics and politicians” from dominating the headlines in recent weeks.“I totally understand people’s frustrations,” said the PM. “I hear what the voters are saying in North Shropshire. And in all humility, I’ve got to accept that that verdict.”Liberal Democrat Helen Morgan won Thursday’s by-election by 5,925 votes, overturning a 22,949 Conservative majority from 2019 in a ballot triggered by the resignation of Owen Paterson after he was found guilty of sleaze. Had Mr Johnson not attempted to block Paterson’s 30-day suspension from the House of Commons, the punishment would have been completed on the day of the vote.Ms Morgan celebrated by popping a giant blue balloon in Oswestry town centre in a symbolic representation of the Lib Dems “bursting Boris’s bubble”.Former Lib Dem leader Tim Farron said that “millions of people have woken up this morning feeling a bit of light has broken into the darkness” thanks to the shock result.“It turns out that if you are incompetent, it turns out if you tell lies, it turns out that if you take the people for granted, there is a price to pay,” he said.“Democracy and justice is alive and well in Britain and the people of North Shropshire have spoken for the whole of Britain.” More

Boris Johnson has called a meeting of the government’s Cobra emergencies committee this weekend in response to the fast-accelerating wave of the Omicron variant of Covid-19.The meeting, which will include representatives of devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, will inevitably spark speculation that further restrictions are being considered in a bid to stem the spread of the virus.The meeting comes just days after the introduction of Plan B restrictions including Covid passes for entry to mass-audience events and mandatory face-coverings in indoor public places.The prime minister’s refusal to order the shutdown of sports fixtures and entertainment venues to prevent social mingling has been criticised both by public health experts – including the Independent Sage group who want a 10-day circuit-breaker lockdown – and by some in the hospitality industry who accuse Johnson of inflicting a “lockdown by stealth” with no new financial support for pubs and restaurants suffering cancellations.Mr Johnson has promised to recall parliament from its Christmas break if new regulations are needed to impose additional curbs on social and economic life.The prime minister today spoke by phone with Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon, her Welsh counterpart Mark Drakeford and the first minister and deputy first minister of Northern Ireland, Paul Givan and Michelle O’Neill.He agreed to collaborate closely with the devolved administrations to protect the public across the UK.A Downing Street spokesperson said: “They discussed the shared challenges including the economic disruption caused by Covid and will continue to work together.“The prime minister confirmed UK government will be convening a COBR meeting over the weekend with counterparts from the devolved administrations to continue discussions.” More

Boris Johnson has been accused of neglecting vital national security issues facing the UK by a committee of senior MPs and peers.Politicians on the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy (JCNSS) told the prime minister they were “profoundly concerned about what appears to be a more relaxed approach to national security”.In a stinging letter to Mr Johnson, chair Dame Margaret Beckett said she was troubled by a significant reduction in the prime minister’s personal engagement with his own National Security Council (NSC).The Labour MP urged the PM to “increase the frequency of your attendance at the NSC” by chairing it at least once per fortnight, and asked him to start “leading by example” when it comes to reviewing Britain’s recent pull-out from Afghanistan.The committee cited the “chaotic withdrawal” from Afghanistan – along with the lack of planning for the Covid pandemic – as evidence that the government was failing to take security threats seriously enough.The chair’s letter also said the recent reports that the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) was planning to cut staff numbers were “simply staggering”, given the government’s stated ambitions for a “global Britain”.The committee was struck by the “apparent complacency and lack of urgency within government in the wake of the disastrous experience” for the UK and its allies in Afghanistan, the chair wrote.Dame Margaret said the messy withdrawal had exposed the NSC’s failure to direct coherent plans for crises like the rapid Taliban takeover. She also described the delay in setting up the Afghan Citizen Resettlement Scheme by the Home Office as “unforgivable”.She wrote: “We are deeply troubled by the persistent signs that our nation’s security is no longer a priority for the government … This is a wholly unsatisfactory state of affairs that requires your personal attention to remedy.”The warning comes as Mr Johnson spoke to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday afternoon about build-up of Russian forces on Ukraine’s border.No 10 said the PM had “underlined that the UK will use all its diplomatic and economic powers, in concert with allies, to prevent any Russian aggression towards Ukraine”.Earlier this week the prime minister dismissed claims of staff cuts of 10 per cent at the Foreign Office as “fake news”.An email to FDCO staff, passed to the i newspaper, stated: “We are planning on the basis of just under a 10 per cent reduction in our overall workforce size by March 2025.”Junior FDCO minister James Cleverly told MPs “there will not be a 10 per cent staff cut” but declined to say what reduction will be imposed.Questioned on the email, Mr Cleverly said: “Internal work has taken place that has not been signed off by ministers,” adding: “Ministers will make the final decisions on workforce changes in the spring.” More

A Home Office minister has been accused of making false claims to a Commons inquiry, as he sought to blame pig firms for a post-Brexit butcher shortage.Kevin Foster found himself under fire for rejecting a recommendation to make it easier to bring in EU workers, to plug the shortfall – which, a senior Tory MP told him, is “destroying” British farming.But, downplaying talk of crisis, the immigration minister instead claimed only one of the UK’s four major pork processors had applied for a licence to sponsor visas for overseas staff.After the grilling by the Commons environment committee on Tuesday, all four companies protested that they are sponsors – with the information on the Home Office website.Now Neil Parish, the committee’s Conservative chair, has written to Mr Foster demanding an explanation and alerting George Eustice, the environment secretary, to the situation.A letter reads: “Your point that only one major pork processor had a Skilled Worker Sponsor Licence was a key part of your argument that the pressures on the sector are not as serious as had been described and that the sector was not doing enough to access the support available through the immigration system.“If it turns out your argument is not supported by the latest information, I’d be grateful if you could revise your remarks and commit to reviewing the support that the Home Office is providing to the sector.”In a second row, the minister also claimed that workers seeking visas only needed the equivalent of a GCSE English pass at grade ‘G’ to pass a language test.“We’re not asking people to analyse the works of Shakespeare here. We are asking for basic conversational English,” Mr Foster told the committee.But this is also misleading, the committee has been told, because it “would not be appropriate to compare grades” in England with the framework in mainland Europe without “an in-depth analysis”.Mr Foster has been given until Monday 5 January to provide satisfactory explanations – without which he is likely to be recalled to face the committee again.Warnings of farm labour shortages have raged for months, after Brexit slammed the door on the ability of EU nationals to move to the UK and work freely.In October, ministers performed a U-turn by allowing 800 butchers and 5,500 poultry workers to enter the UK on short-term visas.But, this week, Mr Foster admitted the number of butchers actually in place is under 100 – after the farming industry protested at the cost and bureaucracy of the visa system.He criticised companies that have failed to apply to sponsor visas, telling the committee: “They could be used immediately if people wanted to do so.” More

First minister Nicola Sturgeon has urged Boris Johnson to bring in financial support for businesses, arguing that she cannot cancel large events in Scotland without more money to compensate the industry.Ms Sturgeon acknowledged the damage done to hospitality and events firms hit by Omicron cancellations after she urged Scots to “stay at home” either side of Christmas.She announced a £100m package of Scottish government money “for the impact businesses are already suffering”, including £66m for hospitality, but conceded it was not as much as needed.Asked why she not yet ordered football matches and other big events to be cancelled, she said: “I can’t do that when I can’t compensate people … I don’t have the ability compensate events.”Ms Sturgeon said: “Had we the financial support mechanisms in place that were in place earlier in the pandemic, I would be able to give more straightforward advice to events to say, ‘Don’t have events go ahead right now’.”The SNP leader said she would speak to Mr Johnson later on Friday and would ask him to bring back support schemes “available earlier in the pandemic” – though she stopped short of calling specifically for a return to furlough payments.“The UK government has to get its finger out – it has to step up and provide this support,” said Ms Sturgeon.Welsh first minister Mark Drakeford confirmed on Friday that nightclubs in Wales will close from 27 December to combat the risk of Omicron super-spreader events over New Year.The Labour leader said the Welsh government would provide a package of £60m in financial support to nightclubs – but condemned Mr Johnson’s government for its “refusal” to bring back furlough payments.He said Wales was “severely constrained by the current position of the UK Treasury and its refusal to open vital support schemes, such as furlough”.Mr Drakeford also hinted at the prospect of further restrictions in hospitality settings in Wales after Christmas, such as the return of the “rule of six” limit on gatherings. “We may need to put some extra protections in place,” he told BBC Breakfast earlier on Friday.The Welsh first minster said he will make an announcement on Monday about whether changes will be needed to allow large sporting events to go ahead.Ms Sturgeon told the press conference that Omicron has replaced Delta as the dominant Covid strain in Scotland and the R rate of the variant’s reproduction is possibly above 4 in Scotland, adding: “The tsunami is now starting to hit us.”Mr Drakeford said Wales should now brace itself for the “storm of Omicron” ahead in the next few weeks. More

The UK has abandoned its attempt to strip EU judges of the power to oversee the Northern Ireland Protocol, in another Brexit climbdown.The U-turn – denied by Downing Street just days ago – would allow the European Court of Justice (ECJ) to interpret the agreement, despite repeated pledges to “remove” its role.The move comes after David Frost, the Brexit minister, also pulled back from threats to trigger Article 16 of the Protocol, despite Unionist anger over the trade barrier created in the Irish Sea.In October, Lord Frost travelled to Lisbon to vow the ECJ would not be allowed to have a remit – but new UK proposals would see it interpret matters of EU law.Disputes would be settled by an independent arbitration panel, rather than the European Commission, a model offered to Brussels by Switzerland.The climbdown also follows the UK government quietly issuing more fishing licences to French boats, helping to calm a second Brexit dispute that raged in the autumn.However, the EU appeared to stamp on even the compromise plan for the Protocol, with disputes over customs declarations and physical checks on goods also set to tumble on into 2022. At a Brussels press conference, Maros Sefcovic, the Commission vice-president, said the UK signed up to the ECJ’s existing remit, so it was “a topic we are not ready to include in our discussions”. Jenny Chapman, Labour’s Brexit spokeswoman, attacked the government’s “incompetent approach to these negotiations that is starting to wear thin with the public who are paying for it all”.“And all this is happening without the voice of Northern Ireland in the room,” she told The Independent.“The fact that Johnson’s government was prepared to use the issue of access to medicines for UK citizens as leverage tells you a lot about their priorities.”That dispute – to ease the flow of medicines from Britain to Northern Ireland – is now likely to be settled, after the UK agreed to seek a piecemeal agreement on Protocol clashes.Brussels has welcomed that approach as the UK finally waking up to reality, after it insisted there was no question of scrapping the ECJ role, given Northern Ireland remains in its single market.But it is certain to infuriate many Conservative backbenchers and the Unionist parties, who face perilous elections to the Stormont assembly next year.A government source said: “Since the EU won’t address all the issues we put on the table now, we are willing to look at interim solutions which deal with the most acute problems.“But any such interim agreement must put a stop to the ECJ settling disputes between us and the EU, now and in the future.”The choice of words allows for the court to retain jurisdiction to interpret matters of EU law – a concession first made by the prime minister a year ago. More