Boris Johnson spent the afternoon of Wednesday 22 March being questioned closely by a committee of Conservative and opposition MPs about a number of gatherings in Downing Street that took place while the UK was in lockdown because of the coronavirus pandemic. The events became known as the Partygate scandal.
What happened this week?
Johnson quit as prime minister of the UK on 7 July last year after a series of controversies – the biggest of which was Partygate. In truth, his premiership, which began with a thumping national general election win for his Conservative party in December 2019, had been dogged by mishaps.
But Partygate was probably the biggest of the lot. And on Wednesday, Johnson was questioned about it by a committee of his fellow members of parliament. His future lies in their hands.
So what was Partygate, exactly?
The story began with the Guardian’s political editor, Pippa Crerar. In October 2021, when she was working for a different British newspaper, the Daily Mirror, she got a tipoff. She was told by one of her sources that Covid rules had been broken in No 10 Downing Street – the home of the British prime minister. While the rest of the country had been abiding by lockdown rules to contain the coronavirus pandemic, some staff in Downing Street had been less observant. In fact, they had been gathering and drinking. Regularly.
As Crerar explained in a piece for the Guardian published earlier this week, it took a while before she felt confident enough to publish a story. Because, to begin with, she found what she was told hard to believe …
So how many parties were there?
The first story, published in December, 2021, alleged two illicit events had taken place. But as the media began digging, more were uncovered. Many, many more. A civil servant was asked to investigate – she looked at 15 events. And then the police in London got involved. By the end of their investigation, 83 people had been fined by detectives. Johnson was one of them.
The details of these “parties” caused outrage; an official report noted that several of the events were drunken and rowdy. At one leaving-do there was raucous karaoke, someone was sick and there was a fight. At a Christmas party, red wine was splattered on a wall.
All of this was going on when millions of Britons were observing strict lockdown rules. They weren’t going out. After all, Johnson, as prime minister, had implored them not to. He had urged people to abide by rules his government had devised. After Johnson was fined, there were calls for him to quit but he refused to stand down. But his problems were far from over.
“All guidance was followed completely in No 10” – but was it?
After the first story was published, Johnson went to the House of Commons, the democratically elected chamber that has 650 members of parliament (MPs), representing constituencies across the UK. Johnson denied any parties had taken place, and told MPs that “all guidance was followed completely in No 10”.
It was a line he stuck to on many occasions over the coming months. However, as time went on, that emphatic statement looked more and more implausible. As the scale of the misbehaving and lawbreaking became apparent, it became comically untrue.
Politicians can get away with a lot in the UK – but telling untruths to parliament is a line MPs dare not cross. There is a committee that looks at whether MPs have given misleading statements, and on Wednesday, it called Johnson before them.
Although Johnson has now admitted the statements he made at the time were wrong, the committee is looking at whether he made them “recklessly” – that is, he should have known they were nonsense. He was living in the house where most of the parties took place – he was photographed at some of them, and was fined by the police too. Could he really not have known what was happening under his own roof?
Johnson’s defence: “Hand on heart … I did not lie”
Johnson was bullish when he went before the committee. He said none of his staff had ever told him that rules were being broken – so, as far as he was concerned, he had told the truth. He criticised the questions he faced about the events he had personally attended as “complete nonsense”. He argued it would have been “utterly insane” for him to have misled parliament deliberately.
At the end of a three-and-a-half-hour session, he said the committee could only conclude he was right – and appeared to indicate that he wouldn’t accept any other verdict.
“I think that people will judge for themselves, on the basis of the evidence that you’ve produced, on the fairness of this committee. I have every confidence that you will show that you can be fair.”
What happens next?
Despite Johnson’s protestations, it was obvious from the questions he was asked, and the answers that he gave, and the body language in the room, that the former prime minister remains in deep trouble. His testimony was described as “flimsy” by one MP on the committee. Johnson, another MP suggested, had misinterpreted his own Covid guidance.
If the committee does decide Johnson deliberately misled the House of Commons, it could suspend him – a move that could trigger a “recall petition” – basically, Johnson would face a byelection in his constituency. The ignominy of such an official reprimand could sink Johnson’s political career – which has already taken a spectacular fall since the heady days of winning the national election three years ago.
The committee has not said when it will deliver its final report – it could be weeks or months.
How have people reacted to this latest twist in the saga?
Johnson’s allies in parliament insist their man has done nothing wrong – but these hardcore supporters seem to be fewer and fewer in number. He still has considerable support in Britain’s rightwing media – particularly The Telegraph and the Daily Mail.
But a lot of his colleagues in the Conservative party seem tired of the perpetual dramas that surround Johnson. And voters, who may in the past have been inclined to forgive the former prime minister his lackadaisical approach, also seem less forgiving now.
Certainly, if this show of hands is anything to go by. On Thursday night, a current affairs show on the BBC asked its audience if they believed Johnson’s evidence to the committee. Nobody did.
