Breaking news Johnson fined over lockdown parties

[dutchman]

Sue Gray report ‘so damning Boris Johnson will have to quit’



A Whitehall report into lockdown-breaking parties in Downing Street is so damning that senior officials believe it could leave Boris Johnson with no choice but to resign as prime minister, The Times has been told.

The report by Sue Gray, a senior civil servant, is understood to be highly critical of Johnson both for attending some of the events and the culture in No 10 under his leadership.

The report has been put on hold until Scotland Yard has completed its own investigations, but a senior official familiar with its contents said the findings are “damning” for Johnson.

“Sue’s report is excoriating. It will make things incredibly difficult for the prime minister,” the official said. “There’s an immense amount of pressure on her — her report could be enough to end him. No official has ever been in a position like this before.”

Johnson attended at least six of the 12 events in Downing Street that are being investigated by the Metropolitan Police. He has already been fined for one, a celebration for his 56th birthday held in the Cabinet Room.

Police have started issuing fines for a second event attended by Johnson, a “bring your own booze” party in the Downing Street garden in May 2020. The event was organised by his principal private secretary at the time. Johnson went with his then-fiancée, Carrie Symonds, and more than 50 Downing Street staff. The prime minister has said he believed it was a work event and had attended only briefly. No 10 said that he had yet to be issued with a fine.

Gray’s interim report offered tacit criticism of Johnson, referring to “failures of leadership and judgment” by those in No 10 and the Cabinet Office. The full report is said to be more directly critical of the prime minister.

Johnson has insisted he will not quit and has suggested that the issue does not matter to voters. Oliver Dowden, chairman of the Conservative Party, said that Johnson had “plenty more fuel in the tank” and that there was a “strong case” for him staying in No 10. The prime minister will make a series of visits this week as part of the Conservative Party’s local election campaign. Some Tory MPs believe that he will face a confidence vote shortly after the elections on May 5 if bad results are followed by police issuing more fines.

[rebbonk]

Johnson is a deeply flawed character and was never fit to be PM. I was derided years ago for saying this on the Daily Mail site before they banned me, but I have been proven right.

The problem we now have is that not only will Johnson do anything to hang on to power, but he will also behave like the nasty spiteful child that he is. Unfortunately, that means that he might take actions that are not in our interests.

It really is time for the Tories to take action and remove him from office.

[rebbonk]

Yet again, 'the people' take action over what we all know was a cover up...

New Met Police legal action will get to the truth about the PM’s Partygate

We are, today, issuing formal proceedings against the Met Police for their apparent continued failure to properly investigate Boris Johnson’s attendance at three lockdown gatherings, in November and December 2020 and January 2021, and their refusal to answer our legitimate questions about how they reached this decision.

The public have a right to know what really went on inside the Partygate investigation. The Met’s actions have raised grave concerns about the deferential way in which they are policing those in power. It stands in stark contrast to how ordinary people were policed during lockdown.

It was only after we threatened to sue the Met in January 2022 that they agreed to investigate at all and the Prime Minister was eventually fined for attending a lockdown gathering in June 2020.

We’ve given the Met multiple opportunities to explain why he was reportedly not sent questionnaires regarding these three other gatherings, nor issued with fixed penalty notices for attending them, when a number of civil servants and officials who did received both.

On 15 June, we wrote to the Met, giving them a week to finally live up to their duty to be honest and upfront with the public.

Rather than work with us in a spirit of transparency, or address to the substantive issues raised in our case, their response focuses on our right to bring this action at all (known as ‘standing’). Yet even here, they haven’t properly explained themselves. We asked them who, if not us, would have standing and they refused to answer.

We strongly believe that Good Law Project and our co-claimant, former senior Met Officer Lord Paddick, have standing to represent the public interest in this matter. If we aren’t allowed to bring this claim, we don’t believe anyone else will be in a position to do so.

So now we’re forced to sue the Met for a second time.

Lord Paddick: “Members of the public will have seen Boris Johnson raising a glass at a party that he was apparently not even questioned about, and thought ‘If that had been me, I would have been fined.’ We are determined that the Prime Minister should be held to the same standard as the rest of us.”

From its failure to hold the Prime Minister and those around him to account for their lockdown breaches, to shocking reports of institutional misogyny, discrimination and sexual harassment, the public’s faith in the Met has been shaken to the core this year. This is their moment to finally begin repairing the damage their inaction has done.

Our challenge is grounded in a single, simple idea: for the law to have any meaning, it must apply equally to us all. The Met must explain their seeming lack of action in this matter. We won’t stop until the full story is uncovered.

The Met have until 22 July to respond. We will keep you updated.

Source: https://goodlawproject.org/news/new-legal-action-truth-partygate/