Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the crisis surrounding Boris Johnson is just how long it has taken to happen. Almost by definition, any party to which 100 people are invited is not a secret event. And that “almost” can be dispensed with if the invitees work in politics. Yet for more than 18 months, the public was ignorant of the prime minister’s attendance at the infamous No 10 social gathering on 20 May 2020 – and indeed of the gathering itself.
The journalist who first wrote about Downing Street parties during lockdown, the Daily Mirror’s political editor, Pippa Crerar, initially heard about them almost a year earlier. She said it took 11 months to stand up the story, though the Mirror may also have been waiting for an opportune moment. With Johnson under pressure after the Owen Paterson fiasco, that moment duly arrived.
