Tories will oust Boris Johnson if he tries to dodge ‘partygate’ blame

Conservative MPs could force PM out within weeks after furious reaction to Downing Street gatherings

Tory MPs will be ready in sufficient numbers to force Boris Johnson out of Downing Street within weeks if he tries to dodge responsibility for rule-breaking parties at No 10, the Observer has been told.

While most Conservative MPs say they are waiting for a report into so-called “partygate” by the senior civil servant Sue Gray before deciding the prime minister’s fate, large numbers admit privately that their minds are effectively made up and that they are merely observing “due process”.

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Boris Johnson must resign in national interest, says Keir Starmer

Labour leader increases pressure on PM as more Tory politicians join calls for him to quit

Keir Starmer has ramped up the pressure on Boris Johnson as the prime minister fights to save his job, arguing that it is in the “national interest” that he steps down as he is “unable to lead”.

In a speech to the Fabian Society conference, the Labour leader accused the Conservatives of running the NHS into the ground because they are “too preoccupied defending his rule breaking”. Stressing that “waiting times were the shortest on record” when Labour left government 12 years ago, he said: “Rather than concentrating on getting through the pandemic and bringing down waiting lists, this self-indulgent Tory party is instead having a fight about a leader who they should have known from the start is not fit for office.”

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No 10 apologises to Queen over parties on eve of Prince Philip funeral

Boris Johnson’s spokesperson says ‘it’s deeply regrettable that this took place at a time of national mourning’

Downing Street was forced to issue an unprecedented public apology to the Queen on Friday over parties held in No 10 on the eve of her husband’s funeral, amid mounting fury from grassroots Tories.

Conservative MPs will hold crisis talks over the weekend about how to respond to allegations of a party culture in Westminster while the rest of the country was in lockdown.

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How No 10’s alleged parties took place as UK Covid death toll rose – interactive

A timeline of alleged lockdown parties and UK deaths, what Covid rules were in place at the time and what Boris Johnson said

The UK government and the Conservative party have been rocked by a series of claims about staff parties held in Downing Street and elsewhere in Whitehall. Some have argued the “partygate” scandal could ultimately topple the prime minister.

With more than 175,000 Covid deaths to date, the Guardian plots the UK death toll against dates on which the staff parties are alleged to have occurred, as well as previous controversies involving alleged breaches of lockdown rules and Johnson’s recent comments on the 2020 gatherings.

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Covid live: Poland advisers quit over concerns government not following science; Netherlands to lift some curbs

More than two thirds of Poland’s Covid-19 medical advisory body resigns; restrictions in the Netherlands will be eased from Saturday

South Korea will extend tougher social distancing rules for three more weeks amid concerns over a looming Omicron wave ahead of the Lunar New Year holidays, officials said on Friday.

The curbs were restored a month ago just six weeks after being eased under a “living with Covid-19” scheme, as record-breaking numbers of new cases and critically ill patients threatened to saturate the country’s medical system.

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Renewed calls for PM to resign over parties on eve of Philip funeral

Queen followed Covid rules at husband’s funeral, sitting alone in face mask away from rest of family

Further allegations of Downing Street parties taking place on the eve of the Duke of Edinburgh’s socially distanced funeral have been met with widespread anger across the political spectrum, bookending a turbulent week for Boris Johnson, who is facing renewed calls to resign.

Prince Philip’s funeral took place in the private chapel at Windsor Castle on Saturday 17 April, the day after two leaving dos were reportedly held at No 10 at a time when such mixing was banned. The Queen, in mourning black, wearing a face mask and sitting alone to maintain social distancing, became one of the defining images of the national lockdown.

Covid restrictions had a substantial impact on the proceedings, with the guest list trimmed from 800 to 30.

The Queen attended the funeral wearing a face mask and socially distanced from the rest of her family, who were seated in their respective household bubbles, at the service in St George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle.

Those in the funeral procession were required to put on face masks before entering the chapel.

Bottles of hand sanitiser featured alongside the traditional dressing of floral arrangements and family wreaths.

Original plans for military processions through London or Windsor were scrapped, with the royal family asking the public not to gather at the castle or other royal residences.

The choir was also limited to four singers, while the few guests were banned from singing in line with Covid regulations.

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Intoxicating, insidery and infuriating: everything I learned about Dominic Cummings from his £10-a-month blog

Since he left Downing Street, Boris Johnson’s former adviser has been setting out his worldview – and settling scores – on his Substack. Could it help us understand the most notorious man in British politics?

Who is the most interesting writer about politics in Britain today? No question, it’s Dominic Cummings. The Substack blog he started in June last year is not cheap – £10 a month for an erratic and irregular output via email – but it’s worth it. Whenever and whatever he does post, you can be sure it will contain plenty of extraordinary ideas, unexpected insights and eye-popping indiscretions. Cummings appears to have little or no filter on his thoughts, with the result that his writing offers as clear a view into the dark heart of contemporary politics as is available anywhere. He has no time for any of the usual pieties. What you get is a voracious intellect – Cummings is interested in everything from 19th-century German history to quantum physics – coupled with a tireless curiosity about anything that lies outside the conventional wisdom. It’s a revelation.

As Boris Johnson’s former right-hand man – and the architect of Brexit and the Tories’ 2019 election landslide – Cummings is nothing if not divisive. Since Johnson fired him in late 2020, Cummings has turned on the prime minister and made it his mission to force him out of office. If your enemy’s enemy is your friend, this makes it hard for many of Cummings’ former critics to know what to think of him now.

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Covid live: Germany recommends boosters for 12-17-year-olds; Hungary offers fourth jab and cuts quarantine

Germany one of first countries in the world to recommend boosters for teenagers; Hungary to make fourth Covid jab available to people who ask for it

Daily coronavirus cases in Japan have exceeded 13,000 for the first time in more than four months, as the country confronts a sixth wave of infections driven by the Omicron variant.

It reported 13,244 new cases on Wednesday, including 2,198 in Tokyo and 1,711 in Osaka. The number of new infections in the Japanese capital was more than double that recorded the previous day and a fivefold increase from the same day the previous week.

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Boris Johnson unlikely to be seen in public for a week, says Downing St

Period stuck inside No 10 comes at arguably fortuitous time for PM facing intense scrutiny over ‘partygate’

Boris Johnson is unlikely to be seen in public for the next week after a member of his immediate family tested positive for Covid, Downing Street has said.

While self-isolation for contacts of coronavirus cases is no longer mandatory, Johnson’s spokesman said the prime minister would heed guidance to limit outside contacts as much as possible for seven days after the test.

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Boris Johnson does not believe he broke Covid rules at party, says minister

Northern Ireland secretary Brandon Lewis defends PM as he pulls out of public engagement in Lancashire

The Northern Ireland secretary, Brandon Lewis, has insisted the prime minister was “very, very sincere” when he apologised for attending an alcohol-fuelled gathering in the Downing Street garden, but did not believe he had broken the rules.

Boris Johnson told MPs on Wednesday he thought he was at a “work event” when he dropped into what his own principal private secretary had called “socially distanced drinks”.

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‘Disgrace’: what the papers said as Boris Johnson faces calls to resign

Amid the derision, supportive papers try to rally around the PM but report that ‘ambitious’ Rishi Sunak is waiting in the wings

The newspaper front pages have piled the pressure on Boris Johnson as the prime minister fights for his political life over the scandal of the “bring your own booze” lockdown-era party at Downing Street.

The Mirror’s banner headline on Thursday is “Disgrace”, set below a picture of Johnson giving his humiliating apology to the Commons for “not realising” the event in the back garden of 10 Downing Street on 20 May 2020 was a party.

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Senior backbench MP joins Scottish Tory leader in calling for Johnson to resign over No 10 lockdown party – live

William Wragg says Boris Johnson is damaging reputation of party as Douglas Ross calls for him to stand down after prime minister admits attending party

Another journalist who is very well plugged in to the thinking of Tory MPs is the Conservative Home editor Paul Goodman, a former MP himself. In what might be a rather ominous development for Johnson, Goodman devotes his main ConHome article this morning to discussing the process by which the Conservative party might go about replacing him (although he does not describe Johnson’s resignation as inevitable).

Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has said Boris Johnson should resign. He told BBC Breakfast:

Boris Johnson is now incapable of leading our country through this public health crisis - I actually think he is a threat to the health of the nation, because no-one will do anything he says because he has now shown to have been deceitful, so Boris Johnson must now resign ...

He said to parliament and to the country before Christmas when he was apologising that he didn’t know about the parties, and now we know he was at at least one of those parties.

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‘The party’s over’: Keir Starmer derides Boris Johnson’s apology at PMQs – video

The Labour leader has said the prime minister's apology for attending what he claimed he thought was a 'work event' in the garden at No 10 in May 2020, when the country was in full lockdown, was 'offensive to the British public'. Keir Starmer called for Boris Johnson to 'do the decent thing' and resign before either his party or the public drove him out of office

UK politics: latest updates

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Furious Tories pile pressure on Boris Johnson over No 10 parties

Former ministers and MPs call on prime minister to fully address issue in Commons after latest revelation

Boris Johnson is facing intense pressure from senior Conservatives to publicly confess he attended a rule-breaking garden party in Downing Street, with the Scottish Tory leader suggesting the prime minister should resign if he broke Covid rules.

A string of Conservative MPs openly expressed anger and humiliation about the “bring your own booze” gathering for up to 40 people on 20 May 2020 after it emerged in a leaked email. Others called on him to come clean and apologise on Wednesday in the hope of stemming rising fury.

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Covid live: China locks down city of 5 million; enough vaccines for Canadians to get fourth dose, says Trudeau

China locks down city of Anyang, bringing total under stay-at-home orders to 20m; Canada will give eligible people a fourth dose ‘if necessary’

Five million residents in the central Chinese city of Anyang have started home confinement today in a new lockdown to curb the spread of Omicron variant, according to state media and as reported by Agence France-Presse.

Two Omicron cases were detected in the city in Henan province, prompting authorities to announce a lockdown late Monday, issuing a notice ordering residents not to leave their homes or drive cars on the roads, state news agency Xinhua reported.

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UK Covid live: party revelations show PM has done ‘incalculable damage’ to trust in health measures, Labour says

Latest updates: health minister Edward Argar says he can understand why people are ‘upset and angry’ about reports

The Conservative mayor for the West Midlands, Andy Street, whose mother died of Covid last year, has said news of a party at Downing Street during the first lockdown is “pretty incredible” and that he is “very hungry” to find out what happened.

Speaking to BBC Radio West Midlands, Street said he was shocked when he read the news. He said:

When I saw this I thought, I can’t really believe this, if I’m honest. It was May 2020, a time when we were all restricted. My idea of going out was to walk along the canal with one friend, frankly, and I’m sure there’s lots of people in the West Midlands who have their own recollections of what they were doing in May 2020. So yes, it is very difficult to believe.

What we don’t know is whether the prime minister was there. I obviously can’t possibly comment on that, but that’s why the inquiry has got to come.

And I’m sure that when the inquiry finds out the facts, then the conclusions and the consequences will be acted upon.

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Health minister admits public will be ‘angry’ over No 10 lockdown party

Ed Argar says he understands public anger after email unearthed inviting staff to drinks in the garden

A health minister has admitted the public will be “upset and angry” at revelations that a senior official invited more than 100 Downing Street staff to a “bring your own booze” party during the first lockdown.

In a tacit acknowledgment of the strength of feeling at the latest revelations, Ed Argar said he had personally not attended any parties and had been aware of the regulations, “not least because I was a health minister who’d helped draw them up”.

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Email shows Boris Johnson aide invited No 10 staff to lockdown ‘BYOB’ party

Police investigating reports that Martin Reynolds invited 100 employees and PM attended at time when social mixing was banned

Boris Johnson was accused on Monday night of an “utterly outrageous” breach of lockdown rules as a leaked email showed one of his top officials invited more than 100 Downing Street staff to a “bring your own booze” party during the first lockdown. The police are now investigating.

The prime minister is believed to have attended the No 10 garden party on 20 May 2020 along with Carrie Johnson, then his fiancee, after it was advertised by his principal private secretary, Martin Reynolds.

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20 May 2020: what was UK doing while No 10 aide organised a party?

At the time, there was no mixing indoors, non-essential shops were shut, and hospitality businesses remained closed

To many, May 2020 may feel like a lifetime ago, so much has happened in the last 20 months of the Covid-19 pandemic.

On 20 May 2020, when the prime minister’s private secretary was inviting colleagues to bring their own booze for socially distanced drinks in the No 10 garden to “make the most of this lovely weather”, the rest of the country was in a very different position.

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France to push for EU-wide UK migration treaty over Channel crossings

French government wants whole bloc to act despite warnings other member states have no appetite

France will press the EU to negotiate an asylum and migration treaty with the UK in an attempt to deter people from making the dangerous Channel crossing.

The French government, which last week took up the six-month rotating presidency of the EU council of ministers, wants the whole bloc to act, despite warnings that other member states have no appetite for a migration treaty with Britain.

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