Boris Johnson was told that public outrage from Downing Street parties violating the blockade would lead to significant losses for conservatives in local elections next month, with the prime minister likely to receive additional police fines before election day.
Steve Baker, a prominent Tory MP, said voters repeatedly mentioned the Partygate scandal during the election campaign and that conservatives should be prepared to “reap the whirlwind” of standing next to Johnson.
The former Brexit minister, who called on Johnson to leave earlier this week, told the Daily Telegraph that it was clear the prime minister was not sincere in apologizing to parliament for violating the blocking rules, adding: “The problem is that the remorse did not last much longer than was necessary to get out of the director’s office. By the time we reached the Committee meeting in 1922 that evening, it was the usual festival of impudence and an orgy of adoration. It took me about 90 seconds to realize that he didn’t really regret it. “
He said cabinet members who wanted the prime minister to leave “sit there fat, dumb and happy and let me do the dirty work” instead of risking their careers by publicly trying to get Johnson out of office. The Guardian reports that lawmakers believe that allies of Tory MPs such as Penny Mordaunt and Jeremy Hunt are already preparing for candidacies for leadership.
Baker has represented Wycombe since 2010, but his place is now a key target for Labor, with current polls showing that Sir Keira Starmer’s party will win the constituency if tomorrow’s election.
“People lived under barbaric rules,” Baker said. “They were told that if they deviated one iota from the law, they would kill people. And they suffered for it … Meanwhile, in №10, where they had to obey both the letter and the spirit of the rules, they obviously broke both. ”
This comes after a report by ITV News said that notices of fixed penalties were sent by e-mail to employees who attended a bring-it-yourself drink event in the Downing Street Garden in May 2020, in a time when indoor and outdoor gatherings were banned.
Downing Street said Friday night that Johnson, who admitted to attending the garden party but insisted he “implicitly believes it was a business event”, had not been notified of the collection fine.
But since the prime minister has already been fined once for attending his own birthday event in June 2020, there is a risk that he will be fined again, alleging that police are investigating five other possible events, violating the rules he had attended.
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The metropolitan said he would not make public updates on the number of fines issued until the end of the local elections. However, Downing Street said it would still announce if the prime minister received additional fines before election day.
In addition to a police investigation and an investigation by senior government official Sue Gray, the prime minister will be the subject of a third investigation by the House of Commons Privileges Committee into the Partygate scandal. He will try to find out if he was aware of the alleged breaches of the rules before making his statements to lawmakers. An attempt to block this third investigation failed this week amid a backstage riot.
Faced with questions about the alleged countries during his last day in India on Friday, the prime minister said he would still be in power in the autumn, aiming to sign a trade agreement with New Delhi by October.
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