Closing summary
Here is a round-up of the day’s news stories from Westminster:
Boris Johnson has said he would “never have dreamed” of intentionally misleading the House of Commons over Downing Street gatherings as he published a defence dossier he hopes will exonerate him from claims he lied to parliament. The former prime minister admitted he misled the Commons by telling MPs that strict Covid rules and guidance had been followed in No 10 at all times – but he said his comments were made “in good faith”.
In his submission to the privileges committee Johnson says it remains “a mystery” to him why he was fined by the Met police for attending the birthday party/gathering in the cabinet room on 19 June but other people who were there were not. He says: “Some attendees did not receive fixed-penalty notices, so the police must have decided that they nevertheless had reasonable excuses for being there. What those excuses were, and why the police decided that I did not have one remains a mystery to me.”
Johnson has said he is “very much” looking forward to his appearance before MPs investigating whether he knowingly misled parliament over partygate. In a statement ahead of Wednesday’s hearing of the Commons privileges committee, the former prime minister said: “I look forward very much to the committee session tomorrow. I believe that the evidence conclusively shows that I did not knowingly or recklessly mislead parliament. The committee has produced not a shred of evidence to show that I have.”
On the eve of Johnson’s appearance before the Commons privilege committee, Labour confirmed its candidate to contest his Uxbridge and South Ruislip seat at the next parliamentary election. The Uxbridge and South Ruislip Constituency Labour party selected Danny Beales to go up against the former prime minister, who was re-selected as the Tory candidate for the seat.
The UK home secretary has been accused of being “dangerously complacent” in tackling the major failings within the police service highlighted in the damning Casey review and urged to suspend immediately all officers being investigated for domestic violence and sexual assault claims. The shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, told the Commons that Suella Braverman’s response to the 300-page report into the culture within the Metropolitan police was a continuation of the “hands-off” approach at the Home Office that Louise Casey has criticised.
Keir Starmer has said that the Metropolitan police chief, Sir Mark Rowley, must act “further and faster” to deliver the change needed as a result of the Casey review While he had confidence in the head of Scotland Yard, the Labour leader criticised the government’s “hands off approach” to delivering police reform and committed a Labour government under his leadership to introducing mandatory national rules for police forces on vetting. It was “extraordinary” that this was not already in place, he added, especially after the examples of violence against women from police officers.
Rishi Sunak is set to push his revamped Northern Ireland protocol through the Commons despite hardline Conservative Brexiters rejecting the plan as an unacceptable failure that does not deliver any of its stated claims. The verdict of the European Research Group (ERG), which followed a similar rejection by the Democratic Unionist party on Monday, means Sunak is likely to face a Tory rebellion over the revised post-Brexit trade arrangements in Northern Ireland on Wednesday, although it appears unlikely to be significant.
The government will bring forward changes to its levelling up bill aimed at tackling problems with Airbnbs and other short-term lets, Michael Gove has said. Speaking in the budget debate, the levelling up secretary said ministers will make changes aimed at restricting “the way that homes can be turned into Airbnbs”, as he acknowledged a problem with holiday lets preventing younger workers from living and finding a job near to home.
The DUP will not resume power sharing at Stormont yet because it is not willing to “roll over” until its demands for changes to the Northern Ireland protocol are met, Sammy Wilson said this morning. The DUP MP was speaking on Good Morning Ulster in response to a question from Colum Eastwood, the SDLP leader, who asked Wilson when the DUP would lift its boycott of the power-sharing executive. Without the DUP it cannot function, and the DUP has been refusing to participate for more than a year because of its opposition to the protocol.
That’s it from me, Tom Ambrose, and indeed the UK politics live blog for today. Thanks for following along. Goodnight.
Keir Starmer has said that the Metropolitan police chief, Sir Mark Rowley, must act “further and faster” to deliver the change needed as a result of the Casey review
While he had confidence in the head of Scotland Yard, the Labour leader criticised the government’s “hands off approach” to delivering police reform and committed a Labour government under his leadership to introducing mandatory national rules for police forces on vetting.
It was “extraordinary” that this was not already in place, he added, especially after the examples of violence against women from police officers.
Starmer said the “biggest danger” after Louise Casey’s damning review, which found the force institutionally racist, misogynist and homophobic, is that it “becomes just another report rather than the beginning of real, lasting change”.
The review, commissioned following Sarah Everard’s murder, warned there may be more officers like killer Wayne Couzens and serial rapist David Carrick.
The 52 pages of Boris Johnson’s Partygate defence dossier drip with insights into the way he and senior No 10 figures tried to deal with and contain what became a spiralling scandal that engulfed his premiership.
Although the string of law-breaking parties during the pandemic first came to light 16 months ago, there are plenty of new revelations about the gatherings, conversations with key witnesses and briefings to both the press and parliament.
This is what we learned from what was hyped by Johnson’s team as a “bombshell” dossier.
Updated
On the eve of Boris Johnson’s appearance before the Commons privilege committee, Labour confirmed its candidate to contest his Uxbridge and South Ruislip seat at the next parliamentary election.
The Uxbridge and South Ruislip Constituency Labour party selected Danny Beales to go up against the former prime minister, who was re-selected as the Tory candidate for the seat.
David Williams, chair of Uxbridge and South Ruislip Constituency Labour party said in a statement:
Boris Johnson resigned as prime minister when dozens of his ministers and MPs refused to work with him. Our community deserves better.
Labour will offer Danny Beales, who can restore trust in political leadership and send a clear message that we do not want a Conservative MP.
He added:
Danny Beales has never been investigated for breach of the principles relating to public life established by Lord Nolan.
Lord Nolan was asked to report to the then Conservative prime minister, John Major, after multiple allegations of sleaze amongst Conservative MPs.
Updated
Johnson says he is 'very much' looking forward to committee session tomorrow
Boris Johnson has said he is “very much” looking forward to his appearance before MPs investigating whether he knowingly misled parliament over partygate.
In a statement ahead of Wednesday’s hearing of the Commons privileges committee, the former prime minister said:
I look forward very much to the committee session tomorrow.
I believe that the evidence conclusively shows that I did not knowingly or recklessly mislead parliament.
The committee has produced not a shred of evidence to show that I have.
Updated
Suella Braverman and Yvette Cooper clash over the Home Office’s response to Louise Casey’s report revealing Met police failings.
Here are three articles on Boris Johnson that are well worth reading.
Marina Hyde in the Guardian says … well, it’s as damning as you would expect. Here’s an extract.
That hotly defensive defence dossier has now been published, and the overwhelming feeling is … stop whining and wanging on and weaselling out. You were the actual prime minister – man up. Johnson has lied so much and for so long and in such varied arenas that he presumably doesn’t even know he’s doing it any more. In many ways, the true disappointment is that his lawyer, David Pannick, has not advised him to go with a plea of diminished responsibility.
Paul Brand at ITV News, who broke some of the key Partygate stories, says Johnson has not said enough to counter claims he should have realised rules were being broken. He says:
So, if [Johnson] thinks it was necessary for staff to get together in No 10 - and he insists he was told all the way through that no rules were ever broken - why might MPs on the Committee still believe there is scope here for him to be deliberately misleading them?
Because ...
Mr Johnson has a pair of fully-functioning eyes.
What the Committee argues is that it is simply not credible for him to have attended events and not realised that they were contrary to the rules at the time, given what he saw before him.
Robert Peston at ITV News says what counts are not the facts, but the judgment the committee will make about how Johnson behaved. He says:
The tension between Boris Johnson and the privileges committee is not about the facts. Most of these are not contested. It is about something fundamental to the nature of government, namely leadership and responsibility.
Johnson did not challenge the lawfulness and propriety of the parties he attended, at the time he attended them. So much is clear, but is irrelevant to the committee’s investigation.
What is relevant is whether alarm bells should have rung for him as and when the Mirror and ITV started disclosing the scale of the partygoing culture in Downing Street, partygoing that shocked millions of British people because it was so different from how they felt compelled to behave during the pandemic by Mr Johnson himself.
Was Mr Johnson as head of the government right to accept the minimising statements of his colleagues and officials, who had their own reputations to protect and who were paid to put the best gloss on the activities of Mr Johnson and his ministers?
That is all from me for tonight. My colleague Tom Ambrose is taking over now.
Updated
Adam Wagner, the barrister and specialist in lockdown law, has got an excellent thread on Twitter on the potential problems facing Boris Johnson at the privileges committee tomorrow. It starts here.
Here is one of his points.
Just reading Boris Johnson's evidence - I'm not going to summarise all of it (there is a lot in there). It's well-drafted as you would expect, but on a careful reasons there are some obvious dangers for Johnson (thread) https://t.co/9LYfNPF7V1
— Adam Wagner (@AdamWagner1) March 21, 2023
Problems for him:
— Adam Wagner (@AdamWagner1) March 21, 2023
1. He admits statement went beyond what he had been briefed by Jack Doyle about the 18th December Christmas gathering
Jack Doyle, who had attended, said it was "within the Rules" - not the guidance. pic.twitter.com/yMjLIqA9Ly
(I do see the irony of Johnson floundering on the difference between rules and guidance - a huge problem with govt Covid policy which many pointed out from the start - also this statement is wrong, guidance was often *stricter* than the regulations) pic.twitter.com/owrtTuzNPX
— Adam Wagner (@AdamWagner1) March 21, 2023
3rd problem - Martin Reynolds, his Principle Private Secretary, told Johnson on 8.12.21 it was not "realistic" to argue all guidance had been followed at all times.
— Adam Wagner (@AdamWagner1) March 21, 2023
Problem for him is why not then correct earlier misstatement that all guidance had been followed pic.twitter.com/6xg1gtf40q
Wagner is referring to his passage in Johnson’s statement. Johnson said:
In his statement, [Martin Reynolds, Johnson’s principal private secretary] recalls a conversation with me prior to PMQs on 8 December 2021 when he “questioned whether it was realistic to argue that all guidance had been followed at all times, given the nature of the working environment in No 10” and that I “agreed to delete the reference to guidance”. I do not recall this conversation, but it is consistent with what I have said above.
And here is Wagner’s conclusion.
I think it's possible Johnson will be damned *or* saved by the confusion between law and guidance. If the Privileges Committee can do what most were incapable of during the pandemic and keep a clear view of the difference, he will be damned. If not, he will be saved.
— Adam Wagner (@AdamWagner1) March 21, 2023
Updated
A small cohort of Boris Johnson super-loyalists has been tweeting in support of him following the publication of his evidence to the privileges committee today. Here are comments from five of of them, all Tory MPs.
From Nadine Dorries
⬇️ @BorisJohnson did not knowingly mislead Parliament. https://t.co/cmOgNKTATl
— Rt Hon Nadine Dorries MP (@NadineDorries) March 21, 2023
From Andrea Jenkyns
The evidence submitted by @BorisJohnson shows clearly that his case is compelling, clear and strong. His evidence session tomorrow will prove this further.
— Andrea Jenkyns MP 🇬🇧 (@andreajenkyns) March 21, 2023
I hope to see him fully exonerated and to put an end to this kangaroo court.https://t.co/LdXHOZo6Q5
From Sir James Duddridge
I have now read the Boris submission. It supports his assertion he did not intentionally mislead the House. For God’s sake can we now get back to reducing inflation, cutting the deficit and growing the economy.
— Sir James Duddridge KCMG MP (@JamesDuddridge) March 21, 2023
From Scott Benton
.@BorisJohnson has maintained throughout that he did not intentionally mislead the House and that he made statements in good faith with the information provided to him at the time. Despite a lengthy investigation there is no evidence which suggests otherwise.
— Scott Benton MP 🇬🇧🏴 🍊 (@ScottBentonMP) March 21, 2023
This circus has gone on for long enough. Boris is no longer PM and the country are sick and tired of this soap opera. It’s time to move on.
— Scott Benton MP 🇬🇧🏴 🍊 (@ScottBentonMP) March 21, 2023
From Brendan Clarke-Smith
Written submission confirms what we all already knew. @BorisJohnson did not intentionally mislead the House, he made statements in good faith with the information provided to him and he then later corrected the record as any Minister would also do in similar circumstances. 1/2
— Brendan Clarke-Smith MP (@Bren4Bassetlaw) March 21, 2023
This should now exonerate him. So far, after 10 months, not a single piece of evidence has been produced to prove otherwise. The process is unjust, unprecedented and could set a dangerous precedent for all MPs 2/2
— Brendan Clarke-Smith MP (@Bren4Bassetlaw) March 21, 2023
No 10 declines to call Met police institutionally racist, sexist and homophobic, saying action more important than terminology
In her review published today, Louise Casey says: “I make a finding of institutional racism, sexism and homophobia in the Met.”
But the government has declined to endorse the term “institutional racist”, a term first used in the Macpherson report 24 years ago, as a description of the force.
Sir Mark Rowley, the commissioner of the Met, said this morning that while he accepted that these problems in the Met were systemic, and not just the fault of bad individuals, he did not like using the term “institutionally racist” because it meant different things to different people.
In the Commons Suella Braverman, the home secretary, said she did not find the term helpful either. And this afternoon Downing Street declined to label the Met as institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic.
The PM’s spokesperson told journalists:
There’s clearly significant instances of racism, misogyny, and homophobia listed out in the report, which are shocking to the public.
We think the most important thing is action that is taken as a result of this important work, rather than focusing on terminology.
Updated
Gove says levelling up bill will include restrictions on homes being used as Airbnbs in rural beauty spots
The government will bring forward changes to its levelling up bill aimed at tackling problems with Airbnbs and other short-term lets, Michael Gove has said.
Speaking in the budget debate, the levelling up secretary said ministers will make changes aimed at restricting “the way that homes can be turned into Airbnbs”, as he acknowledged a problem with holiday lets preventing younger workers from living and finding a job near to home.
As PA Media reports, Gove was responding to a question from the Lib Dem MP Tim Farron, who drew attention to the problems caused by large numbers of holiday lets and Airbnbs in his Lake District constituency.
Gove said:
Of course we want to have a labour market that works, and of course we want to have a tourism sector that works.
But there is a problem in the private rented sector, particularly in beautiful parts of our country like those which he represents, where we do have homes which are turned into Airbnbs and into holiday lets in a way that actually impedes the capacity of young workers to find a place where they can stay in the locale that they love and contribute to the economy of which they wish to be part.
We will be bringing forward some planning changes to the levelling up and regeneration bill which are intended to ensure that we have restrictions over the way that homes can be turned into Airbnbs.
The bill has completed its passage through the Commons, but is still going through the Lords, where it can be amended.
Updated
This is from Henry Zeffman at the Times, pointing out that Boris Johnson and his team seem to have revised their view on the reliability of the Sue Gray report from three weeks ago.
Earlier this month lots of Johnson allies said privileges probe was discredited because it relied on Sue Gray's report. Actually it was barely referenced in their interim report, whereas Johnson's defence prays it in aid repeatedly (29 times). So... is she discredited or not?
— Henry Zeffman (@hzeffman) March 21, 2023
Johnson rejects claim it should have been 'obvious' to him Covid rules were not being followed at No 10
This is what Boris Johnson says in response to the claim from the privileges committee in its report earlier this month that it should have been obvious to him that the Covid rules at been broken at No 10 events. He says:
If it was “obvious” to me that the rules and guidance were not being followed, it would have also been “obvious” to the dozens of others who also attended those gatherings. Many of those individuals wished me ill and would have no hesitation in seeking to bring me down me if I sought to conceal or “cover-up” the truth from the house. If someone had known or believed that the rules or guidance had been broken (because it was “obvious”), you would expect that there would have been contemporaneous documents recording this, including emails or WhatsApp messages: some discussion, or some post-mortem. There is absolutely nothing.
That “absolutely nothing” is not correct. There is evidence. For example, the Sue Gray report includes email quotes including Lee Cain, then director of communications, saying a party in the No 10 garden on 20 May 2020 would be “somewhat of a comms risk in the current environment” and Martin Reynolds, the principal private secretary who organised the event, saying afterwards “we seem to have got away with it”. And then there was the video of Allegra Stratton joking about a No 10 lockdown-busting party at a lobby briefing rehearsal. And the privileges committee report published earlier this month included further contemporaneous evidence, including one official saying on WhatsApp they were “worried about leaks of PM having a piss up and to be fair I don’t think it’s unwarranted” and another from Jack Doyle, communications director at the time, saying: “I’m struggling to come up with a way this one is in the rules in my head.”
Later in his statement Johnson accepts that the privileges committee did find WhatsApp messages showing advisers were concerned about the rules being broken. But he goes on:
There are two short points in response to that point. The first is that, insofar as there were any concerns, none of those were communicated to me. These are internal messages between advisers. There is no suggestion at all that these concerns were passed on to me. Second, and in any event, the messages are from 25 January 2022, some two months after I made my statements to the House of Commons.
Updated
Boris Johnson’s submission to the Commons privileges committee includes quotes from No 10 officials, either given to Sue Gray as part of her Partygate inquiry or to the committee as part of its inquiry, that have not been published before. They are included because Johnson says they corroborate his view that the vast majority of people in No 10 believed Covid rules were being followed.
One official said:
It was the genuine belief at that time that Covid rules had been followed at all times.
Another official said:
I think my understanding would be it would be in compliance with regs and guidance and I think we have mentioned this before the nature of the work of the task force is that we were often at the office late and at weekends.
And another said:
At no point at the time did I consider the leaving presentation or subsequent discussion with colleagues to be law or rule-breaking, nor would I have described it as a party. If I had thought that I would never have attended. This may be in part because the colleagues gathered were the same colleagues that I worked alongside, in person, for long hours every day in those same rooms for work.
Updated
Starmer says Labour would impose 'radical change' on Met and introduce national standards for all forces
Keir Starmer is holding a press conference about the Louise Casey report about the Metropolitan police. He says the Met needs “radical change”, in line with what happened in Northern Ireland when the Royal Ulster Constabulary was replaced by the Police Service of Northern Ireland.
Starmer was a human rights adviser to the new PSNI at the time, and he says he knows what is required for change on this scale to happen. There has to be proper leadership, “iron will” and the weeding out of those people who refuse to change, or who are reforming too slowly.
I know how serious a job it is to make that sort of deep cultural change to an institution. It requires extraordinary leadership, iron will to make real change. It means to be ruthless of weeding out those who will not change or are changing too slowly …
Above all, it means changing the police from a force to a service with public service values.
He accuses the government of adopting a “hands off” approach to the police for more than a decade.
Labour would impose national standards on all police forces, covering topics including vetting, training and disciplinary procedures, he says.
Updated
Johnson says it remains 'mystery' to him why he was fined for birthday event in cabinet room, but others there weren't
In his submission to the privileges committee Boris Johnson says it remains “a mystery” to him why he was fined by the Met police for attending the birthday party/gathering in the cabinet room on 19 June but other people who were there were not. He says:
Some attendees did not receive fixed penalty notices, so the police must have decided that they nevertheless had reasonable excuses for being there. What those excuses were, and why the police decided that I did not have one remains a mystery to me.
Alexander Horne, a former parliamentary laywer, has written an article for the Spectator assessing Boris Johnson’s submission to the privileges committee, and his prospects when he gives evidence tomorrow. He says some of Johnson’s arguments about the process being unfair are “hyperbolic”.
What do we learn from the 52-page dossier? Well, Johnson accepts that he misled parliament. His main contention seems to be that this was not deliberate and that he ‘could not have predicted the subsequent revelations that came to light following the investigations by Sue Gray and the Metropolitan Police’.
Johnson and his advisers have also made some punchy arguments about the committee’s processes, focusing on a number of procedural issues. Johnson argues that the committee’s proceedings go beyond their remit and that it is potentially biased, complaining about the ‘partisan tone and content’ of the interim report.
None of this seems hugely convincing and, based on my two decades working as a senior parliamentary lawyer, I would suggest that some of Johnson’s defences are simply hyperbolic.
Looking ahead to the hearing tomorrow, Horne says Johnson’s failure to correct the record quickly is a particular vulnerability.
The challenge that Johnson will face tomorrow is that, as well as the four separate occasions that the committee has suggested that he may have misled the house (whether inadvertently, ‘recklessly or deliberately’), it has also highlighted the fact that the former prime minister ‘did not use the well-established procedures of the house to correct something that is wrong at the earliest opportunity’. This is contrary to the 1997 Resolution of the House on ministerial accountability to parliament. If Johnson is unable to rebut this interim conclusion, then such a finding could well amount to a contempt of parliament in its own right. His initial attempt, in the submission, where he argues he could not say anything while investigations by the police and Sue Gray were ongoing, appears fairly weak.
But Horne says he would be surprised if the committee were to recommend a suspension of 10 days or more (the threshold for triggering a recall petition).
Even if the committee finds that Johnson has committed a contempt, the type of sanctions that it can recommend include anything from requiring him to apologise to the house, to proposing a suspension of ten days or more which could, in theory, lead to a recall petition and a possible by-election in his constituency of Uxbridge and South Ruislip. Given that its recommendation must be approved by the House of Commons, I would be surprised if the committee opted for the nuclear option unless it had very cogent evidence that Johnson had deliberately misled the House on these matters.
Updated
Braverman accused of ‘dangerous’ complacency in tackling police failings
Suella Braverman, the home secretary, has been accused of being “dangerously complacent” in tackling the major failings within the police service highlighted in the damning Casey review and urged to immediately suspend all officers being investigated for domestic violence and sexual assault claims. My colleague Jamie Grierson has the story here.
Dominic Cummings, who was Boris Johnson’s chief adviser until he was forced out in November 2020 and who later ran a single-handed social media campaign to remove Johnson from office, says he will publish commentary on Johnson’s oral evidence to the privileges committee tomorrow.
In a post on his Substack account today, Cummings says he thinks that, even if Johnson emerges from the inquiry unscathed, the chances of his returning to No 10 are lower than people think. He says:
Unless Sunak gets fed up and walks away, he can use the vast trove of material in PET [propriety and ethics team] (the part of the Cabinet Office that deals with scandals) to smash the Trolley [Johnson] up. Much remains unpublished. And remember that useless Lord Geidt didn’t even bother investigating all sorts (he didn’t interview key people who actually knew what was going on). So if Sunak’s team is crashing, there’ll be people in No10 who’ll think ‘we may be doomed but we’ll finish the trolley off’. And spads who’d relish it will be helped by officials who don’t want the trolley smashing around again as they prepare for Starmer.
Updated
The Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice campaign says Boris Johnson should resign as an MP. In a Twitter thread starting here, it claims that he lied when he said that he had done everything to protect people during the pandemic, and it says this was “far worse” than what he said about Partygate.
It’s obvious that Boris Johnson deliberately misled Parliament and should resign as an MP.
— Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice UK (@CovidJusticeUK) March 21, 2023
Far worse though is the lies he deliberately told to bereaved families, after failing to protect our loved ones.
His claim that he did so in “good faith” is sickening. https://t.co/Sl8o1gO9gC
'Is there way we could get truth about this party out?' - Johnson says WhatsApp message shows he opposed Partygate cover-up
One of the new messages revealed in the Boris Johnson document today is a WhatsApp message that he sent to Jack Doyle, his communications director, in which he said: “Is there a way we could get the truth about this party out there?" Johnson says that when he used the word “party”, he was doing so because that was what the media were calling it, not because that was what it was. He says
Further support can be found in the contemporaneous WhatsApp messages involving me, which are in the committee’s possession. On 10 December 2021, I sent a message to Jack Doyle, stating: “Is there a way we could get the truth about this party out there”. I trusted the assurances that Jack Doyle and others had given me, so I wanted the “truth” as they had explained it and as I honestly believed it, to be published. I used “party” as shorthand because that it how it was being referred to in the media.
A fair-minded reader might say this argument has some force. A more cynical reader might say, if your “bombshell” evidence to show that you weren’t aware of parties is an email containing the word “party”, then you might be in some difficulty.
Updated
Hardline Tory MPs reject Sunak’s Northern Ireland Brexit plan
Turning away from Boris Johnson for a moment, the European Research Group (ERG) of hardline Brexiter Conservative MPs has rejected Rishi Sunak’s revised plan for trading arrangements in Northern Ireland, saying it would keep EU law as “supreme”. My colleague Peter Walker has the story here.
In his submission Boris Johnson reveals that, in what he told MPs about Partygate, he relied to a considerable extent on what he was told by Jack Doyle, his director of communications. But in paragraph 86, perhaps inadvertently, Johnson includes a line that could be taken as implying that there were others working in No 10 who were perhaps more reliable.
Writing about his reaction after ITV News broadcast a clip of Allegra Stratton, his press secretary, joking about a No 10 party at a private briefing rehearsal, he says:
I had not previously seen this video. It caused me immediate concern. On the evening of 7 December 2021, I received a WhatsApp message from Jack Doyle stating: “I think you can say ‘I’ve been assured there was no party and no rules were broken’”. Later that evening, I rang James Slack, who I regard as a man of great integrity, and who was in the building on the evening of 18 December 2020 (and had been with me in the Covid O Zoom meeting before I went up to my flat). I asked him to describe what happened at the event. His account was consistent with that of Jack Doyle. He confirmed to me that the rules were followed.
Here is Lewis Goodall from the News Agents podcast on what Boris Johnson said about the “most unsocially distanced” party/gathering. (See 1.07pm.)
Johnson repeatedly shifts the blame to others who were at the events. What this doesn’t account for (and note he doesn’t definitively deny that he said it was ‘the most unsocially distanced gathering in the UK right now’) is why as PM he didn’t break the events up. pic.twitter.com/ZLogUKAbs3
— Lewis Goodall (@lewis_goodall) March 21, 2023
Johnson does not deny joking about No 10 event being 'most unsocially distanced gathering in UK right now'
One of the most damaging pieces of evidence in the report published by the privileges committee earlier this month was the claim that when Boris Johnson attended the leaving party for Lee Cain on 13 November 2020, he joked about it being “the most unsocially distanced gathering in the UK right now”.
This was in written evidence from a No 10 official. In January ITV quoted a No 10 source telling almost exactly the same story, although in the ITV version the source says Johnson said this must be “the most unsocially distanced party” in the UK.
In his statement today Johnson does not deny saying the “gathering” version of that quote (he claims he cannot remember saying it), and he says the same witness quoted by the committee also said in their statement that Johnson was drinking water and “the most sensible person there”.
[No. 10 official] has given evidence to the committee that, at this event, I said “this is probably the most unsocially distanced gathering in the UK right now”. This comment has been publicised widely, in light of its selective inclusion by the committee in the fourth report at §26. What the committee failed to record in the fourth report was the next line of [No. 10 official]’s statement: “he had a glass of water in his hand, made a short speech and then went up to his flat. He was the most sensible person there to be honest”.
That does not seem a compelling argument; saying that Johnson was partying less than anyone else is not the same as saying there was no party.
In the next paragraph, Johnson also says he did not think the guidance mandated “full social distancing” at all times anyway. He says:
I do not remember saying the words quoted by [No. 10 official] – and it seems unlikely given that it was, as [No. 10 official] says, a small and impromptu event. But I might well have made observations in speeches about social distancing, and whether it was being perfectly observed. That does not mean that I thought the guidance was contravened. As I have already explained, I did not believe that the guidance required full social distancing at all times provided you did what you could overall, and put additional mitigations in place where social distancing was not possible.
Updated
Johnson explains why he accepted claim No 10 press office Christmas drinks event, with food and presents, was not 'party'
This is what Boris Johnson says about accepting the assurance that the Christmas drinks event organised by this press office on 18 December 2020, involving wine and presents, was not actually a party.
I asked Jack Doyle [his communications director] about the event, which he confirmed he had attended. He explained to me that the media team held a regular Friday evening team meeting, where they would discuss what had occurred during the week, and have a drink. As this was the last Friday of the year, there was also cheese and a Secret Santa. He reminded me that this had been a “nightmare” evening, as the country was about to go back into lockdown at a time when I was desperate to protect Christmas. He informed me that to call it a party was a great exaggeration. I asked him: “Was it within the rules?”. He told me: “It was within the rules.”
I had no basis to disbelieve Jack’s account of the event. The assurances provided by Jack Doyle must also be understood within the context within which we were working. The staff at No 10 regularly were working around the clock. On 18 December 2020 the media department were working late into the night on the difficult messages we would be giving to the public: in particular, that we were going to have to go back into lockdown and, in many cases, families would be unable to spend Christmas together. They were also preparing for both a deal and no deal Brexit. It is in this context that I understood that members of the press office, who were gathered for work purposes in No. 10 leading the government’s response to Covid-19, had wine and cheese and exchanged gifts at their desk. This did not sound to me like a breach of the rules or the guidance, let alone a party. Based on the information with which I was provided, this sounded like it was firmly within the work exception, and consistent with the guidance. Drinking wine or exchanging gifts at work and whilst working did not, in my view, turn an otherwise lawful workplace gathering into an unlawful one.
The privileges committee, in its report earlier this month, said it should have been “obvious” to Johnson that rules had been broken. This passage is useful because it contains plenty of detail to suggest that a PM other than Johnson might have come to a different conclusion, and perhaps interrogated his communications director more aggressively.
At the hearing tomorrow Johnson may be asked why he accepted Jack Doyle’s claim the event was within rules so readily.
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Boris Johnson’s team believe it may have been misleading for the privileges committee to say that his dossier contains “no new documentary evidence”. (See 12.10pm.) Although it does not contain material not previously seen by the committee, it does contain evidence that has not been published until today, they point out.
Johnson claims earlier privileges committee report criticising him was 'highly partisan' and 'selective'
In his submission Boris Johnson says the report published by the committee earlier this month, which said it should have been obvious to him that rules had been broken, was “highly partisan”. He says:
It is important to record my disappointment at the highly partisan tone and content of the fourth report. The fourth report appears to record findings of fact (see eg “The evidence strongly suggests that breaches of guidance would have been obvious to Mr Johnson at the time he was at the gatherings”), despite the fact that the committee has not yet heard any evidence from me.
The fourth report is also extremely selective in the evidence cited. The fourth report fails to refer to the fact that, despite a “rigorous and thorough” investigation, the committee did not identify a single document which suggested that I was informed or warned by anyone that any event at No. 10 was contrary to the rules or guidance; it fails to refer to the fact that a significant number of witnesses gave evidence that I had in fact received assurances that the rules were complied with at No 10; and it fails to refer to the fact that the view of many other officials working at No 10 was that the rules and guidance were being complied with.
The committee is chaired by Labour’s Harriet Harman, but she is one of only two Labour MPs on it. There is also an SNP member. But the other four members are Conservatives, meaning they are in the majority.
Yesterday, in some of the reports about what Boris Johnson would say in his submission, it was claimed that he would argue that the inquiry was biased because of tweets posted in the past by its chair, the Labour MP Harriet Harman. But the submission published today does not seem to contain this material. Either the briefing was wrong, or else a last minute decision may have been taken not to “attack the referee”.
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Commons privileges committee says Johnson's submission contains 'no new documentary evidence'
The Commons privileges committee has put out a statement about the publication of Boris Johnson’s evidence. Here are the main points.
The committee says Johnson’s submission “contains no new documentary evidence”.
The committee says it could not publish Johnson’s evidence yesterday because the document contained errors. Yesterday afternoon some of his allies suggested to journalists that the committee was deliberately holding it back to weaken his case. But the committee says:
The committee initially received the written evidence from Mr Johnson on Monday afternoon at 2.32pm in unredacted form. The evidence submitted had a number of errors and typos, and, a final corrected version was not submitted to the privileges committee until 8.02am this morning. Redactions have been made in the published version to protect the identity of some witnesses, in consultation with Mr Johnson, particularly junior-ranking civil servants.
Editors who worked with Johnson as a journalist will tell you that his copy never arrived on time.
The committee says further documents are being published tomorrow. It says:
Ahead of the oral evidence session on Wednesday, the committee will be publishing, again by agreement with Mr Johnson, a “core bundle” of documents to which the committee and Mr Johnson may refer in the course of the questioning. These documents will be published on the committee website at 9.00 am on Wednesday.
This may include statements from the No 10 officials who gave evidence to the committee, as well as emails or WhatsApp messages. The committee quoted some of this in its report earlier this month, but did not publish the statements in full.
The committee says it is confident its process is fair. It says:
Throughout this inquiry the committee has received and followed the advice of its legal adviser, former senior president of tribunals and Lord Justice of Appeal Rt Hon Sir Ernest Ryder, as well as the impartial clerks of the house. The committee remains confident in the fairness of its processes and in its compliance at all times with the rules and practice of the House of Commons.
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Johnson claims 'vast majority' of No 10 staff interviewed have not said they thought Covid rules broken
In its report earlier this month, summarising the case against Boris Johnson on the basis partly of No 10 internal messages that had not at that point been made public, the privileges committee said it should have been obvious to Boris Johnson that Covid rules were broken at No 10 events.
In response, Johnson says:
The committee appears to be mounting a case that, despite the absence of any evidence of warnings or advice, it should have been “obvious” to me that the rules and guidance were not being followed, because of the gatherings that I attended. It is important to be frank: this amounts to an allegation that I deliberately lied to parliament.
But it is also an allegation that extends to many others. If it was “obvious” to me that the rules and guidance were not being followed, it would have been equally obvious to dozens of others who also attended the gatherings I did. The vast majority of individuals who have given evidence to the committee and the Cabinet Office investigation have not indicated that they considered that their attendance at the events contravened the rules or the guidance.
The wording of this might be significant. “Have not indicated” they thought events broke the rules is not necessarily the same as “did not think” events broke the rules.
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Johnson: 'no evidence ... I intentionally or recklessly misled the house'
Boris Johnson claims there is no document showing that he was given “any warning or advice” than any No 10 event may have broken Covid rules. He says:
It is clear from that investigation that there is no evidence at all that supports an allegation that I intentionally or recklessly misled the house. The only exception is the assertions of the discredited Dominic Cummings, which are not supported by any documentation.
There is not a single document that indicates that I received any warning or advice that any event broke or may have broken the rules or guidance. In fact, the evidence before the committee demonstrates that those working at No 10 at the time shared my honest belief that the rules and guidance were being followed.
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Johnson accepts Commons was misled by his Partygate comments, but says they were made 'in good faith'
In his statement Boris Johnson does accept that the Commons was misled. He says:
I accept that the House of Commons was misled by my statements that the rules and guidance had been followed completely at No 10. But when the statements were made, they were made in good faith and on the basis of what I honestly knew and believed at the time.
This is not a surprise – it is obvious that MPs were misled – but it is probably helpful to have this on the record from Johnson.
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Commons privileges committee publishes Johnson's 52-page response to claims he misled MPs over Partygate
The Commons privileges committee has just published the submission it received from Boris Johnson setting out his response to claims that he deliberately misled MPs over Partygate and that what he said was a contempt of parliament. It’s here.
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Suella Braverman, the home secretary, will give a statement to MPs at 12.30pm about the Louise Casey review into the Metrolitan police.
You can read the full report here. And here is my colleague Vikram Dodd’s news story about it.
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Sammy Wilson says DUP not willing to 'roll over' and resume power sharing without its NI protocol demands being met
The DUP will not resume power sharing at Stormont yet because it is not willing to “roll over” until its demands for changes to the Northern Ireland protocol are met, Sammy Wilson said this morning.
The DUP MP was speaking on Good Morning Ulster in response to a question from Colum Eastwood, the SDLP leader, who asked Wilson when the DUP would lift its boycott of the power-sharing executive. Without the DUP it cannot function, and the DUP has been refusing to participate for more than a year because of its opposition to the protocol.
In response, Wilson said:
Colum, you may be prepared to roll over, to having powers taken away from the people who are elected to Stormont, we’re not.
At one stage the SDLP and Alliance and other parties, were saying we’ve got to have the full implementation of the protocol because there’s no other game in town.
We insisted that the protocol was not acceptable and that negotiation had to be undertaken to revise it and remove it. We got the negotiation, but we didn’t get the outcome so we have to continue the fight, and we will continue the fight.
The DUP is going to vote against the protocol tomorrow when MPs debate a statutory instrument (SI) implementing one part of it, the Stormont brake.
Eastwood said he could not understand why the DUP did not realise that “the deal is done” and that there is “there is no more negotiating to be done”.
But Eastwood also said the SDLP had yet to decide whether to vote in favour of the SI tomorrow, or to abstain.
Although the party has generally welcomed Windsor framework, the deal to revise the protocol, Eastwood said he thought the Stormont brake – the mechanism intended to enable Stormont to stop some new EU regulations applying in Northern Ireland – was a bad idea. “I think it muddies the water in terms of our investment proposition,” he said.
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Sunak says pensions pot tax cut about 'cutting waiting lists' and getting doctors to do extra shifts
And here are some other lines from Rishi Sunak’s BBC Breakfast interview.
Sunak refused to say whether he would sack Dominic Raab if the inquiry into his conduct finds he bullied officials. Asked about this, Sunak said:
I’m not going to pre-empt a process that hasn’t concluded.
People can judge me by my actions. In the past when there’s been issues like this, I’ve made sure that they were investigated properly.
I was the one who initiated this investigation. I was the one who appointed a leading independent KC to get to the bottom of it.
Sunak defended the government’s decision to remove the cap on the amount people can save tax-free in their pension pot. Labour says this is a tax cut for the richest 1%, but Sunak said this was about cutting waiting lists. He explained:
This is about cutting waiting lists.
We need our best doctors, our experienced doctors, we need them working, and they want to work, they want to help get the waiting lists down, they want to work longer hours, they don’t want to retire. And because of the pension regime, they were stopped from doing that, it was preventing them from doing that.
And I want to get the waiting list down and that’s why we’ve made the change that we’ve made, and it’s going to benefit everyone to get healthcare quicker.
The Office for Budget Responsibility said the change to pension rules would only increase employment by about 15,000. Other figures suggest the number of doctors incentivised to stay in work could just be in the hundreds. But Sunak insisted that thousands of doctors might be affected, and he said this was about encouraging them to work longer hours, as well as dissuading them from retiring. He said:
There’s thousands of doctors that leave the NHS every year; about two-thirds to three-quarters of them have said that they don’t provide extra hours.
It’s not just about whether they leave or stay; it’s about whether they’re doing the extra shifts, because that’s what’s going to help us get the backlog down.
He said that he considered “no illegal migration is acceptable” and confirmed he wanted to stop all small boats. Asked if that was his policy, he replied:
That’s what we’re trying to do. I don’t think anyone would sit here and say to you that they tolerate any illegal migration. Of course we don’t want to tolerate any illegal migration.
He claimed that Suella Braverman, the home secretary, has been misreported when it was claimed she said flights carrying asylum seekers to Rwanda would start in the summer. They will start when the court process is over, he said.
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Sunak fails to say if his daughters could trust Met in wake of shocking report
On BBC Breakfast this morning Rishi Sunak was primarily responding to the Louise Casey report about the Metropolitan police. As my colleague Jamie Grierson reports, he sidestepped a question about whether his daughters could trust the force.
Three out of five Tory members think privileges committee inquiry into Johnson unfair, survey suggests
If you want to know why Rishi Sunak refused to engage at all this morning with the question about whether the inquiry by the privileges committee into Boris Johnson is biased or unfair (see 9.18am), a survey of Tory party members by the ConservativeHome website this morning provides the answer. ConHome surveys are a reliable guide to membership opinion, and this one suggests a majority of members (59%) do think the inquiry is unfair, and a significant minority (25%) are committed Johnsonites who want him back as leader before the next election.
The survey also suggests 59% of members do not think Johnson deliberately misled MPs about Partygate, while 30% think he did.
In his write-up, Paul Goodman, the ConHome editor, says:
In sum, a majority of the panel believes he broke lockdown rules, but didn’t deliberately mislead the Commons over breaches in Number Ten; think the Privileges Committee inquiry into his conduct is unfair, and believe that he should be a Tory parliamentary candidate at the next election … but that he shouldn’t return as Conservative leader and Prime Minister (at least before then).
The way I read it, about a quarter of the panel are determined Johnson backers and under a fifth are dedicated Johnson critics – see the last two questions and answers.
As for your average respondent, my sense is that he or she regrets his departure from Downing Street, and feels the accusations against him over Covid and parties are unfair, but doesn’t want him back in Number Ten – for the moment, anyway.
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Rishi Sunak refuses to say if he views Partygate inquiry into Boris Johnson as ‘witch-hunt'
Good morning. Today we are expecting to see the dossier prepared by Boris Johnson intended to show the Commons privileges committee that he did not intentionally mislead MPs about Partygate. Readers with good memories – in fact, readers with any functioning memory at all – will recall that we said much the same yesterday morning. At some point today the forecast should finally come true.
Rishi Sunak has given an interview to BBC Breakfast this morning. He was primarily focusing on Louise Casey’s damning report about the Met, but he was also asked about Johnson. As well as confirming that Tory MPs will get a free vote if the privileges committee recommends sanctions that have to be approved by the Commons as a whole, Sunak also refused to say whether he thought Johnson was the victim of a witch-hunt.
Asked if he agreed with the Johnson supporters who have described the inquiry in those terms, Sunak replied:
That’s ultimately something for Boris Johnson and he’ll have the committee process to go through and that’s a matter for parliament. That’s not what I’m focused on.
Johnson’s diehard supporters continue to argue that the process is biased against him, and that he is being tried by a kangaroo court. They are minority in the parliamentary party, but they are vocal and passionate, and their allies in the media are powerful, mainly because they are the people running papers like the Daily Mail and the Daily Telegraph.
MPs like Jacob Rees-Mogg have continued to attack the committee even though Penny Mordaunt, the leader of the Commons, has warned them not to interfere with the committee’s work. She was more outspoken than Sunak, who this morning sounded anxious to avoid provoking the Johnsonites.
I will post more from his interview soon. Here is my colleague Jessica Elgot’s story.
Here is the agenda for the day.
Morning: Rishi Sunak chairs cabinet.
11.30am: The European Research Group, the caucus for hardline Tory Brexiter MPs, hold a press conference to announce its conclusions about the PM’s Northern Ireland protocol deal.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
3pm: Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, gives evidence to the Lords economic affairs committee.
I’ll try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
Alternatively, you can email me at andrew.sparrow@theguardian.com.
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