'A coward and a rule-breaker': Boris faces opposition demands he QUIT

‘A coward and a rule-breaker’: Boris Johnson faces opposition demands that he QUIT as Sue Gray report reveals police are probing 12 Downing Street parties and savages booze culture under his leadership

• Six-page report reveals cops probing gathering in No11 flat on Nov 13, 2020
• Mr Johnson has previously told Commons there was no gathering on that date 
• Police also probing events he attended: in No10 garden and 56th birthday party

Demands for Boris Johnson to quit intensified today as Sue Gray’s long-awaited report revealed that he is personally being investigated by police.

The Prime Minister was also castigated by his political opponents for appearing to have lied to MPs from the despatch box about a gathering he attended.

Ms Gray’s six-page report today revealed Scotland Yard is probing a gathering that took place in his No11 flat on November 13, 2020, involving his now wife Carrie.

But Mr Johnson has previously told the Commons there was no gathering on that date. Lying in the House is generally seen as a breach of the ministerial code and a resigning matter.

A spokeswoman for Mrs Johnson told the Mail on Sunday only yesterday that it was ‘totally untrue to suggest Mrs Johnson held a party in the Downing Street flat’ on that day.

Police are also looking into gatherings in the Downing Street garden and his birthday party in 2020 in the Cabinet Room, both events he attended. 

After the report was released today, shadow foreign secretary David Lammy tweeted: ‘During this crisis, our country needed a leader more than at any time since the Second World War.

‘We didn’t get one. This report shows what we have known all along: The Prime Minister is a coward, a rule-breaker and needs to step down.’

And the Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said: ‘Everyone knows Boris Johnson broke the rules and lied to the country. It’s time Conservative MPs did their patriotic duty, listened to their constituents and stood up for decency by sacking Boris Johnson. He must go before he does our country any more harm.’

The Prime Minister also castigated by his political opponents for appearing to have lied to MPs from the Despatch Box about a gathering he attended.

Shadow foreign secretary David Lammy tweeted: ‘This report shows what we have known all along: The Prime Minister is a coward, a rule-breaker and needs to step down.’ Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey (right) said: ‘It’s time Conservative MPs did their patriotic duty, listened to their constituents and stood up for decency by sacking Boris Johnson’

SNP’s Blackford ejected from Commons debate

Ian Blackford was ejected from the Commons today after refusing to withdraw criticism of Boris Johnson.

The SNP Westminster leader said the Sue Gray’s report was a ‘farce’ with ‘no facts’.

During his speech, Mr Blackford was also repeatedly asked by Commons Speaker Lindsay Hoyle to withdraw the word ‘misled’, after accusing Prime Minister Boris Johnson of having ‘wilfully misled Parliament’.

But he refused to do so and was eventually marched out of the chamber by men with swords. 

Mr Blackford had told MPs: ‘So here we have it. The long-awaited Sue Gray report, what a farce. It was carefully engineered to be a fact-finding exercise, with no conclusions. Now we find it’s a fact-finding exercise with no facts.

‘So let’s talk facts. The Prime Minister has told the House that all guidance was completely followed, there was no party, Covid rules were followed and that ‘I believed it was a work event’.

‘Nobody, nobody believed it then. And nobody, nobody believes you now, Prime Minister. That is the crux – no ifs, no buts – he has wilfully misled Parliament.’

‘For months ministers hid behind Sue Gray, now they’re hiding behind Cressida Dick. Yet Boris Johnson is still refusing to give an honest answer to a simple question. The public suffered while Number 10 partied: they deserve the full truth instead of being left in the dark.’

The top civil servant’s findings have been released disclosing that police are now investigating eight bashed as potentially criminal lockdown breaches.

They include a gathering in the Cabinet Room for Mr Johnson’s 56th birthday in June 2020, and what has been described as a ‘victory party’ with Abba songs in the No11 flat after Dominic Cummings was ousted in November that year following a power struggle with Carrie Johnson.

A ‘bring your own booze’ party allegedly organised by Mr Johnson’s private secretary Martin Reynolds is also being looked at by Scotland Yard, as well as a raucous leaving do for senior aides on the eve of Prince Philip’s funeral.

And Cabinet Secretary Simon Case has been dragged into the furore as a drinks event in his office is also under the police microscope. He has insisted he did not attend.

In the document – which runs to just six pages plus annexes – Ms Gray said she is ‘extremely limited’ in what she could publish due to police requesting ‘minimal reference’ to incidents they are investigating.

And she made clear that she wants to release more information once Scotland Yard has completed its work – something No10 has so far refused to commit to.

Mr Johnson published the watered down ‘as received’ barely an hour before he makes a Commons statement at 3.30pm. He will then address a meeting of the Conservative parliamentary party in Downing Street at 6.30pm.

The Gray report warns that ‘excessive consumption of alcohol’ is not appropriate at the heart of government.

Her brutal conclusions state: ‘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.

‘The excessive consumption of alcohol is not appropriate in a professional workplace at any time. Steps must be taken to ensure that every Government Department has a clear and robust policy in place covering the consumption of alcohol in the workplace.

‘The use of the garden at No 10 Downing Street should be primarily for the Prime Minister and the private residents of No 10 and No 11 Downing Street. During the pandemic it was often used as an extension of the workplace as a more covid secure means of holding group meetings in a ventilated space. This was a sensible measure that staff appreciated, but the garden was also used for gatherings without clear authorisation or oversight. This was not appropriate. Any official access to the space, including for meetings, should be by invitation only and in a controlled environment.’

Rumours have been swirling at Westminster that key aides will have to fall on their swords, but Mr Johnson is said to feel ‘reassured’ that the threat of a successful coup against him by Tory backbenchers has receded.

Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner told Sky News: ‘I think that would be terrible for the Conservative Party and MPs to try and blame civil servants when it is the Prime Minister himself that has to take responsibility here.’

She said Tory MPs should not try to ‘prop up the Prime Minister when they know he’s broke the law, when they know he’s acted inappropriately’.

She added: ‘If they choose to try and defend that, then I think what actually will happen is it will have a devastating impact on the brand of Conservatives who have always prided themselves on upholding the British principles, upholding the law of the country, and I think it will start to erode the trust and frustrate Conservative voters.’

Booze culture and ‘difficult to justify’ behaviour in No10

Sue Gray set out her findings in seven sections of her 12-page report today.

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