SENIOR UK Government officials reportedly spoke to Buckingham Palace about their concerns over Boris Johnson’s conduct at the height of the pandemic.
According to the BBC, officials even discussed suggesting the Queen raise the concerns with the then-prime minister during their private audiences.
Johnson was forced to stand down as Tory PM after a number of scandals, including boozy parties during the height of lockdown in Number 10.
The latest revelation came in an episode of Laura Kuenssberg: State of Chaos, a new documentary from the broadcaster exploring turmoil in Westminster and Whitehall over four years.
It has emerged that in May 2020, during the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, there were significant tensions between Johnson’s team in Downing Street and civil servants.
There were a number of clashes between Dominic Cummings (below), Johnson’s former chief of staff, and Mark Sedwill, the head of the Civil Service, who would quit his position.
Johnson’s conduct in government raised such concerns that senior officials took them to Buckingham Palace, in the hope that the Queen would raise them with Johnson during a private conversion.
The BBC reports that there were a number of phone calls and communications “over and above” routine communication between the Palace and Number 10.
Johnson "had to be reminded of the constitution,” a source said of the then-prime minister.
While another source described the relationship between Johnson’s team and the Civil Service “broke down”, describing the atmosphere in Downing Street at the time as “just toxic” and “utterly grim, and totally crazy”.
Former deputy cabinet secretary, Helen MacNamara, refused to discuss the calls to Buckingham Palace in the documentary.
"There were definitely times after the prime minister came back from his illness [he contracted Covid and required hospital treatment] when the kind of the perception amongst the political team at Number 10 about the failings of the system and the failings of the Civil Service and the failings of different institutions, it was just so extreme the way that they were articulating that, they were in absolutely kind of smash everything up, shut it all down, start again... we were systematically in real trouble," she said.
Buckingham Palace declined to comment.
