Senior civil servant Sue Gray has said she has been 'limited' in what she can put in her report due to the Met Police conducting their own investigation into gatherings at Downing Street at a time of lockdown restrictions in England.
In paragraph 14 of the report published today, Ms Gray said she had to make minimal reference to the gatherings on the dates the Met are looking into it.
She wrote: "As a result of the Metropolitan Police’s investigations, and so as not to prejudice the police investigative process, they have told me that it would only be appropriate to make minimal reference to the gatherings on the dates they are investigating.
"Unfortunately, this necessarily means that I am extremely limited in what I can say about those events and it is not possible at present to provide a meaningful report setting out and analysing the extensive factual information I have been able to gather."
ITV journalist Mark Austin tweeted: "Sue Gray in paragraph 14 of her own report : …“ it is not possible at present to provide a meaningful report”…That’s it really."
While Rowena at @JustRowena said: "Paragraph 14 could be the whole report."
Police are investigating 12 gatherings that Ms Gray had looked at as part of her inquiry, the senior civil servant’s report suggests.
Despite the restrictions on what she could report, Ms Gray’s report criticised “failures of leadership and judgment” by parts of No 10 and the Cabinet Office.
It said: “Against the backdrop of the pandemic, when the Government was asking citizens to accept far-reaching restrictions on their lives, some of the behaviour surrounding these gatherings is difficult to justify.
“At least some of the gatherings in question represent a serious failure to observe not just the high standards expected of those working at the heart of Government but also of the standards expected of the entire British population at the time.
“At times it seems there was too little thought given to what was happening across the country in considering the appropriateness of some of these gatherings, the risks they presented to public health and how they might appear to the public.
“There were failures of leadership and judgment by different parts of No 10 and the Cabinet Office at different times. Some of the events should not have been allowed to take place. Other events should not have been allowed to develop as they did.”
