UK Politics

A video has emerged of Commons leader Jacob Rees-Mogg joking about the Christmas party that was reportedly held at No 10 last year. The Conservative MP joked about police investigating the event at this year’s Christmas party for the think tank Institute of Economic Affairs.In a video unearthed by political blog Guido Fawkes, Mr Rees-Mogg told the audience on Monday evening: “I see we’re all here obeying regulations, aren’t we?”He continued: “I mean, this party is not going to be investigated by the police in a year’s time. You are all very carefully socially distanced.. we have moved, I am pleased to tell you, from the metric back to the Imperial system: I notice you are all at least two inches away from each other which is, as I understand it, what the regulations require.”His comments came after a video emerged yesterday of former No 10 press secretary Allegra Stratton practicing answering questions about the party in a mock televised briefing last year. She was asked by Ed Oldfield, a special adviser to the Prime Minister, about “reports” that there had been a Christmas party in Downing Street the previous Friday, to which Ms Stratton asked staff: “What’s the answer?”Prime minister Boris Johnson is facing growing anger about the Christmas party, which would have broken lockdown restrictions at the time if it took place. Boris Johnson’s official spokesperson has repeatedly denied that a party took place while London as in Tier 3 lockdown restrictions and said that Covid rules had been followed at all times. In the video Allegra Stratton jokes about the “fictional” party involving “cheese and wine” and said that “it was not socially distanced”.Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has called on Boris Johnson to “come clean and apologise”. The Metropolitan Police said on Tuesday that it was examining the video of Downing Street staff as part of a review of the alleged breaches. Tory MP Charles Walker reacted to the video, saying: “The No 10 party means that any future lockdowns will be advisory, whatever the law says.” More

Conservative MP Sir Roger Gale has warned the “game’s up” for Boris Johnson if he deliberately misleads the House of Commons over a Christmas party held at No 10 during lockdown restrictions last winter.It comes after leaked footage from Downing Street’s multi-million pound press briefing room emerged on Tuesday evening, showing senior aides to the prime minister laughing as they rehearsed potential questions over a banned festive party.The video, which is reported to be from December 22 last year, refers to a party on “Friday” — which would have been December 18, the same day The Daily Mirror reported there was a staff party where food and drinks were served, and revelries went on past midnight.Just last night, however, a Downing Street spokesperson insisted: “There was no Christmas party. Covid rules have been followed at all times”.Asked on the BBC whether he would believe the prime minister if he claims later today there was no Christmas party, Sir Roger said: “If he says that on the record at the despatch box, yes I will have to believe him because to do otherwise would be discourteous and wrong.“If it is then found he has misled Parliament deliberately then that is a hanging offence. Downing Street saying something and the prime minister saying something at the despatch box are two different matters.”Pressed further, the Tory MP said: “I think the chairman of the 1922 committee Sir Graham Brady would have to carry a very clear message to the prime minister under those circumstances… meaning, the game’s up.”Offering his assessment of the situation as news of the footage emerged on Tuesday evening, Sir Roger also told the BBC Radio 4’s Today programme in a separate interview: “There was first of all incredulity, then hollow mirth, and then I think a feeling of total exasperation”.“There has to be an answer, a clear answer, from Downing Street and it has to happen by lunchtime today,” he said. Asked whether there were changes necessary at No 10, including the prime minister’s chief of staff, he said: “I’m not going to try and scapegoat.“For a start of course the present chief-of-staff was not in post last Christmas when all of this may or may not have happened so I think it would be quite wrong for him to carry the can. The buck actually stops at the top, doesn’t it?”Referring to lockdown trip to Barnard Castle by the former No 10 adviser Dominic Cummings in 2020, which provoked public outrage, the Tory MP added: “I fear that this could be a Barnard Castle moment all over again. It is very serious”.Conservative peer Baroness Warsi also called for anyone found to have attended the festive event to resign. “Every minister, parliamentarian and staffer at the Downing Street party must resign NOW. No ifs no buts,” she posted on social media.The former party chair added: “The rule of law is a fundamental value, the glue that hold us together as a nation. Once that is trashed by those in power the very essence of our democracy is at stake.”Sir Charles Walker, vice chair of the 1922 committee of Tory backbenchers and lockdown-sceptic, claimed that the leaked clip “makes it almost impossible” for the government to introduce any new lockdowns.“These are the consequences of the video – you have to deal with consequences as they come up,” the lockdown sceptic told Times Radio. “Going forward any measures will be advisory.”Sir Charles added: “It will be very difficult to enshrine them in law. I know behavioural psychologists have said that post-Barnard Castle there was a fall-off in compliances … so I think there will be issues about that.”Another Conservative MP, Anne Marie Morris, said: “Clearly there were rules in place that most of us were diligently following (despite how difficult they were) and they decided to break them. It’s not on an, at the very least, they should admit their blatant error and apologise for breaking the rules they imposed on society”.Robert Halfon, chairman of the Commons Education Committee, said that government aides should say sorry – but stopped short of calling for Boris Johnson himself to apologise.“I certainly think that those who were doing the video should apologise for the insensitivity of it when people were suffering and struggling all through that time,” he said.Conservative MP Peter Aldous said the leaked footage of senior No 10 aides laughing about an alleged Christmas party looks “very bad” and casts “the situation in a different light”.He told the Lowestoft Journal he had been inclined “to accept what the PM had said,” but added: “The news overnight and the release of the video does cast the situation in a different light. It does look very bad and gives the impression there is one rule for them and another for the rest of us.”Meanwhile, foreign secretary Liz Truss was forced to answers on the Christmas party controversy on Wednesday after giving a major speech on Britain’s role in the world at Chatham House.Asked about claims of festive events held at Downing Street, Ms Truss said: “It’s in everybody’s interests that we follow the Covid rules. As to alleged events at No 10, I don’t know the details of what happened.”Pressed again on whether the public can trust the government if the government doesn’t follow rules, the senior minister said: “We do follow the rules on Covid. On that particular issue, I’m not aware of the precise circumstances.” More

Senior MPs from across the Commons today united behind the Evening Standard and The Independent’s Skill Up Step Up campaign to help unemployed young people into work.Work and Pensions Secretary Thérèse Coffey hailed it as a “fantastic” move as part of efforts to “unleash the talent of the next generation”. Her Labour counterpart Jonathan Ashworth praised the “ground-breaking project” and the “leadership” it was showing.Liberal Democrat education spokeswoman Munira Wilson stressed the scheme would also help to tackle the labour shortage crisis faced by many businesses in London.Skill Up Step Up is a joint Christmas appeal to support unemployed young people into work through sustainable jobs or apprenticeships and transform their lives.It has been awarded £1million from Barclays and partnered with the Barclays LifeSkills programme to deliver funding over two years for up to five charities. They will help disadvantaged jobless young people to improve their work skills by giving them employability training.HOW YOU CAN HELP: Click here to make a donation and help us give more young people the training they need to get into workMs Coffey said: “As we wrap up a challenging year for some young jobseekers, it’s fantastic to see the Evening Standard joining the cause to get youngsters on that first rung of the career ladder.“Through the face-to-face support offered in our job centres and youth hubs we see the potential of young Londoners every day and it’s vital for business to be a partner in opening up opportunities for them.”She added: “We know it changes lives, with 21,000 young people in the city having secured jobs for employers of all sizes through our Kickstart scheme.” More

Boris Johnson’s government went to ground on Wednesday morning following the release of a video showing No.10 officials joking about a banned Christmas party. In a highly unusual turn of events no government minister was made available to broadcasters on Wednesday morning to defend Downing Street’s record, despite invitations.All Britain’s main national broadcasters empty-chaired the government as the political storm broke. It is understood that Sajid Javid, the health secretary, was due to appear on the BBC, ITV, and Sky News at breakfast time – but withdrew from the regular slot following the release of the video.The dynamite footage, obtained by ITV News, shows the prime minister’s then spokesperson laughing and joking with other officials about the Christmas party – which No.10 insists did not happen despite mounting evidence. She jokingly suggests referring to the bash as a “business meeting” or “cheese and wine” to get around the rules.Amid fury over the footage no alternative minister was offered to broadcasters by the government to represent its position – prompting speculation that the administration was unable to muster anyone willing to go on air and defend it.The Independent understands that even allies of the prime minister were shocked by the footage and believe it is indefensible.Speaking on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, presenter Nick Robinson said: “We were expected to speak to the Health Secretary. That invitation was kept open after the video emerged last night, but the government chose to withdraw that interview with Sajid Javid.”Viewers on BBC Breakfast television were meanwhile told: “Usually at this time here on Breakfast we would be able to put your questions to a government minister as part of a slot we’ve had on the programme at 7.30am pretty much every morning since the start of the pandemic. “We had been hoping to speak to the health secretary Sajid Javid … but this morning no one has been available to speak to us. So this is the shot of the Westminster studio that we would normally show to you this time most mornings of the week. As you can see there’s nobody there today, and that’s every unusual. The camera’s ready, the seat’s there, we can take an interview at any moment.”The presenters of ITV’s Good Morning Britain said they were “still waiting for somebody from the government to turn up today”, and issued a challenge”:“If any Conservative MP, anybody connected to the government is watching and you would like to take your duty and answer to those people who lost family members, there is a Westminster seat available for a government minister this morning. “We’ll take anyone. Anybody from the Conservative party, any MP who feels that it is their duty to address the nation, address their constituents, address the 140,000 people who lost family members in hospitals, followed the rules, couldn’t attend funerals, couldn’t be at hospital bedside while people partied in Downing Street.”And on Sky, presenter Kay Burley said: “Normally we’d ask a government minister about this. We were told originally that it was going to be the health secretary Sajid Javid because of course it’s the first anniversary of the first vaccine being administered. But sadly now we’ve been told that nobody’s accepted our invitation. We’ve not even had a proper RSVP.”Boris Johnson is due to be grilled by Labour leader Keir Starmer and other MPs at a session of prime ministers questions later on Wednesday.Polls conducted before the release of the video showed a large majority of people want Mr Johnson to apologise, believe that the party happened, and that it could not have happened within the rules at the time.Speaking on the BBC on Wednesday morning, Labour’s shadow foreign secretary David Lammy said: “Why would it be acceptable for the Prime Minister and his staff to pick up a drink and gather, and for everybody else not to be able to? “It the staff of the Today programme had done this, you would have breached the rules. And like other journalists that breached the rules at the time, you would be under tremendous pressure in your job if you had done that. “Why is there one rule for the Prime Minister and his staff and another rule for other people? Why have we got the Prime Minister spokesperson being frivolous and humorous about this fact?”Mr Lammy said his party leader Sir Keir would “ask questions on behalf of the British people” at PMQs and also called for “a proper police investigation”.Further footage emerged in the early hours of Wednesday morning of Tory Commons leader Jacob Rees-Mogg also joking about the unlawful government event.In a bizarre stand-up routine for a crowd at a right-wing think-tank the Tory MP can be heard telling an audience, to laughter: “This party is not going to be investigated by the police in a year’s time.” More

A leaked video that shows staff members in British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s office joking about holding a lockdown-breaching Christmas party is adding fuel to allegations that government officials flouted coronavirus rules they imposed on everyone else.For days, the prime minister’s office has been trying to rebut reports that Johnson’s staff held a December 2020 office party – complete with wine, food, games and a festive gift exchange – when pandemic regulations banned most social gatherings. According to multiple British media outlets, the party took place on Dec. 18, when restrictions in London prohibited indoor gatherings, and a day before Johnson tightened the rules even further, ruling out family Christmases for millions of people.In response to the footage, aired late Tuesday by broadcaster ITV, the prime minister’s office said: “There was no Christmas party. COVID rules have been followed at all times.” The video, recorded on Dec. 22, 2020, shows then-press secretary Allegra Stratton appearing to joke about an illicit party at the prime minister’s Downing Street office.The recording appears to be a mock press conference, held as a rehearsal for televised daily government media briefings.Another aide, playing a journalist, says: “I’ve just seen reports on Twitter that there was a Downing Street Christmas party on Friday night, do you recognize those reports?” As laughter is heard, Stratton, the press secretary, says: “I went home” and asks colleagues: “What’s the answer?” Another voice can be heard saying: “It wasn’t a party, it was cheese and wine”. “Is cheese and wine all right? It was a business meeting,” Stratton says, laughing.Thousands of people in Britain have been fined since early 2020 for breaking restrictions by holding illegal gatherings. London’s Metropolitan Police force said officers were reviewing the leaked video in relation to “alleged breaches” of coronavirus regulations.Opposition Labour Party leader Keir Starmer said the prime minister should “come clean and apologize.”“People across the country followed the rules even when that meant being separated from their families, locked down and — tragically for many — unable to say goodbye to their loved ones,” Starmer said. “They had a right to expect that the government was doing the same. To lie and to laugh about those lies is shameful.” The Christmas party allegations are the latest in a string of allegations of rule-breaking and ethics violations by Johnson’s Conservative government. More

Olaf Scholz is set to take office Wednesday as Germany’s ninth post-World War II chancellor, succeeding Angela Merkel after her heralded 16-year tenure. Scholz’s government takes office with high hopes of modernizing the European Union s most populous nation and combating climate change, but faces the immediate challenge of handling Germany’s toughest phase yet of the coronavirus pandemic.The 63-year-old, Germany’s vice chancellor and finance minister since 2018, brings a wealth of experience and discipline to an untried coalition of his center-left Social Democrats the environmentalist Greens and the pro-business Free Democrats. The three parties are portraying the combination of former rivals as a progressive alliance that will bring new energy to the country after Merkel’s near-record time in office.Scholz will need the support of at least 369 lawmakers in the 736-seat lower house of parliament to be elected as chancellor. The coalition partners have 416 seats between them, so he should be assured of a comfortable majority.“We are venturing a new departure, one that takes up the major challenges of this decade and well beyond that,” Scholz said Tuesday, adding that if they succeed, “that is a mandate to be re-elected together at the next election.”The new government aims to step up efforts against climate change, expanding the use of renewable energy and bringing Germany s exit from coal-fired power forward from 2038, “ideally” to 2030. It also wants to do more to modernize the country, including improving its notoriously poor cellphone and internet networks. It also plans more liberal social policies, including legalizing the sale of cannabis for recreational purposes and easing the path to German citizenship, while pledging greater efforts to deport immigrants who don’t win asylum. The coalition partners want to cut the voting age in national elections from 18 to 16.There will be an increase in the minimum wage to 12 euros ($13.50) per hour from the current 9.60 euros, which Scholz has said “means a wage increase for 10 million.” And the coalition also aims to get 400,000 new apartments per year built in an effort to curb rising rental prices.Scholz has signaled continuity in foreign policy, saying the government will stand up for a strong European Union and nurture the trans-Atlantic alliance.The alliance brings both opportunities and risks for all the participants, perhaps most of all the Greens. After 16 years in opposition, they will have to prove that they can achieve their overarching aim of cutting greenhouse gas emissions in a three-way alliance with partners who may have other priorities.Green co-leader Robert Habeck will be Scholz’s vice chancellor, heading a revamped economy and climate ministry. The government’s No. 3 official will be Christian Lindner, the finance minister and leader of the Free Democrats, who insisted that the coalition reject tax hikes and looser curbs on running up debt.The incoming government is portraying itself as a departure in both style and substance from the “grand coalitions” of Germany’s traditional big parties that Merkel led for all but four years of her tenure, with the Social Democrats as junior partners. In those tense alliances, the partners sometimes seemed preoccupied mostly with blocking each other’s plans. Merkel’s final term saw frequent infighting, some of it within her own center-right Union bloc, until the pandemic hit. She departs with a legacy defined largely by her acclaimed handling of a series of crises, rather than any grand visions for Germany.Scholz told his party last weekend that “it was difficult” governing with Merkel’s bloc, which his Social Democrats narrowly beat in Germany’s September election. He criticized the bloc’s “this-far-and-no-further conservatism.”The agreement to form a coalition government between three parties that had significant differences before the election was reached relatively quickly and in unexpected harmony.“If the good cooperation that worked while we were forming the government continues to work, it will be a very, very good time for the tasks that lie ahead of us,” Scholz said. He acknowledged that dealing with the pandemic “will demand all our strength and energy.”German federal and state leaders last week announced tough new restrictions that largely target unvaccinated people. In a longer-term move, parliament will consider a general vaccine mandate. Germany has seen daily COVID-19 infections rise to record levels this fall, though they may now be stabilizing, and hospitals are feeling the strain. The country has seen over 103,000 COVID-19 deaths in the pandemic so far.Merkel has said she won’t seek another political role after shepherding Germany through a turbulent era. The 67-year-old hasn’t disclosed any future plans, but said earlier this year that she will take time to read and sleep, “and then let’s see where I show up.”___Follow AP’s coverage of Germany’s transition to a new government at https://apnews.com/hub/germany-election.___Follow all AP stories on climate change issues at https://apnews.com/hub/Climate. More

Former journalist Allegra Stratton is to be the face of the government’s new daily press conferences. If Boris Johnson’s new regime goes to plan, she’ll become a familiar face across the nation. But just who is she?Stratton made her name in Westminster as a political correspondent at The Guardian, before moving to become political editor of the BBC’s Newsnight programme, with a further stint at ITV News.She clearly comes with bucketloads of broadcast experience – a must for what’s likely to be a difficult job.Just as crucially, Stratton has already proven her loyalty to the Conservative government. In April she left journalism to do public relations for the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, as his strategic communications director. He may be nonplussed at having to find a replacement after just six months.The Guardian may not be the most obvious former employer for a Tory government spokesperson, but Stratton has long moved in Conservative circles. She is married to James Forsyth, the political editor of The Spectator magazine – which the prime minister famously used to edit.Her connections to the Tory establishment don’t end there: her current boss Rishi Sunak was the best man at the pair’s wedding.Stratton’s career has been one of a news reporter rather than a comment writer – so it’s hard to say for sure what her exact political opinions are. One clue however comes from her stint as political editor of Newsnight, when she provoked outrage with a report on the government’s proposed cuts to welfare benefits.The government line at the time was that benefits needed to be cut because unemployed people were living on benefit as a “lifestyle choice”. Stratton lined up an interviewee to illustrate the supposed problem, grilling an east London single mother who received help with her housing costs and portraying her as an unemployed burden. The report however failed to mention that the mother actually had a job, rather undermining the thrust of Stratton’s framing.To make matters worse, Private Eye magazine reported at the time that the future Tory spokesperson had dismissed several other interviewees offered by Tower Hamlets council, including a couple with four children who had lost their jobs and faced having to leave London. The magazine reported her as telling council officials: “You must have got people living on benefits as a lifestyle choice!” before adding: “People should think about whether they can afford kids before they have them!”The incident provoked an outcry and led to headlines like “How Newsnight humiliated single mother Shanene Thorpe”, and “How Newsnight demonised a single mother”, with The Independent’s own columnist Laurie Penny opining that “Shame has become our stick for beating the poor.” The programme issued an apology after 50,000 people signed a petition.The new televised press conferences Stratton will lead are to partly replace an untelevised but on-the-record briefing for Westminster journalists in parliament. The government sees the change as a way to communicate directly with the public, unmediated by the press – with one eye on the high-profile White House briefings of US presidents.Stratton, who was educated at the Latymer Upper School, a public school in Hammersmith, before attending Emmanuel College Cambridge, was widely considered an obvious frontrunner for the job. ’She’ll start the new role in the middle of one of the greatest peacetime crises since the Second World War, with a likely economic crisis about to unfold over the coming months and years. With politics as divisive as ever, and as the public face of this government, Stratton’s experience dealing with controversy will probably stand her in good stead.  More

Delays to cross-Channel trade are still worsening almost a year after Brexit checks came in, says a study also highlighting rising costs and key staff shunning the UK.No less than 79 per cent of firms trading with France reported hold-ups in the three months to September – crucially, 6 per cent more than in the second quarter of the year.The delays are also lengthening, with 42 per cent of businesses taking an additional two to three weeks to import goods compared to 28 per cent in the April-June period.Some 82 per cent of firms say logistic costs have risen for imports and 43 per cent for exports, the survey by the French Chamber of Great Britain found.And 30 per cent cut staff “directly as a result of Brexit” – some reporting problems in “attracting European talent to the UK”, following the divorce from the EU.Boris Johnson claimed they were just “teething problems” when traders hit trouble at the start of 2021, but the French Chamber has warned of “potentially serious supply chain issues” that threaten Christmas deliveries.“What this data reveals is that supply chain issues between France and the UK don’t seem to be getting any better since the start of the year,” said Marilise Saghbini, its director.“What we’re most concerned about are the reduced numbers of young people having access to career opportunities on both side of the Channel – youth mobility is a critical issue to get right as we build beyond Brexit in 2022.”The report was seized on by the UK Trade and Business Commission of cross-party MPs and industry groups, which urged the government to step in.It comes just weeks before the long-delayed introduction of post-Brexit border controls on imports to the UK, which it is feared will hit trade harder.Naomi Smith, chief executive of the Best for Britain group, which helped set up the Commission, said: “What the government once called teething problems have now become a chronic condition, as their failure to reduce barriers and streamline processes they created has made delays worse than when we first left the EU.”Tamara Cincik, chief executive of Fashion Roundtable, a member, said: “With new checks in a matter of weeks, and less than a quarter of small businesses ready, the government must step up support for small businesses, who will face even more costly red tape and administrative burden.”The report by the Chamber, which represents 400 companies that import from and export to France, is the latest evidence of the trading damage from leaving the single market and customs union.The Office for National Statistics found a 23.1 per cent plunge in goods trade between the UK and the EU in the first quarter of 2021, compared with the same period of 2018, while trade with other countries remained stable.The National Audit Office then found that cost UK exporters £17bn – while firms filled in an extraordinary 48 million customs declarations and 140,000 export health certificates in just 8 months.The French Chamber says total trade in goods and services between the UK and France fell from £74.2bn in the year to June 2020 to £64.1bn a year later. More