Boris Johnson has admitted attending a gathering in the Downing Street garden during the first lockdown and apologised to the nation while arguing it was a work event and “technically” broke no rules.
The Labour leader, Keir Starmer, rejected Johnson’s version of events and called on the prime minister to resign. “The only question is: will the British public kick him out, will his party kick him out, or will he do the decent thing and resign?” Starmer said.
Starmer castigated the prime minister as “a man without shame” and someone who the public believed to be a liar, saying Johnson was trying to wriggle out of responsibility.
In a much-anticipated and carefully worded statement just before prime minister’s questions, Johnson acknowledged mass public anger after an email emerged inviting about 100 No 10 staff to a socially distanced “bring your own booze” event on 20 May 2020 to enjoy the sunny weather.
“Mr Speaker, I want to apologise,” he told a packed Commons. “I know that millions of people across this country have made extraordinary sacrifices over the last 18 months. I know the anguish that they have been through, unable to mourn their relatives, unable to live their lives as they want or to do the things they love.”
He said: “I know the rage they feel with me, and with the government I lead, when they think that in Downing Street itself the rules were not being properly followed by the people who make the rules.”
Johnson said that on the evening concerned he joined the event for about 25 minutes from around 6pm, saying that, with the No 10 garden being used as “an extension of the office” amid lockdown, he believed it was a work event.
“With hindsight I should have sent everyone back inside,” he said, arguing that the event “could be said, technically, to fall within the guidance” of the time.
Johnson said he accepted many would disagree, adding: “To them, and to this house, I offer my heartfelt apology.”
He said it was important that Sue Gray, the senior civil servant investigating the gathering and series of other allegedly lockdown-breaching events in No 10 and elsewhere in government, be allowed to complete her report.
At Wednesday’s briefing for lobby journalists, the prime minister’s press secretary, Rosie Bate-Williams, declined to answer basic factual questions about the 20 May party, including when and how Johnson found out about it, and whether his wife was present.
Instead, Bate-Williams repeatedly said: “On all of the matters around the specific details, that will be for the independent review to determine.”
She said Johnson had not seen the email from his principal private secretary, Martin Reynolds, inviting colleagues to “socially distanced drinks”. But she declined to repeat the prime minister’s previous public assurances that he acted within Covid guidance, saying she did not want to “pre-empt” the findings of Gray’s review.
Asked whether Johnson would resign if Gray found he had broken Covid rules, Bate-Williams said: “That is a hypothetical question on the basis of the findings, so I’m not going to get into that.”
In the exchanges after the statement in the Commons, Starmer ridiculed Johnson’s version of events, calling it “the pathetic spectacle of a man who has run out of road”.
Starmer said Johnson’s defence, “that he didn’t realise he was at a party, is so ridiculous that it’s actually offensive to the British public”. Starmer added: “He’s finally been forced to admit what everyone knew, that when the whole country was locked down he was hosting boozing parties in Downing Street. Is he now going to do the decent thing and resign?”
Accusing Johnson of being “contemptuous of the British public”, Starmer asked why he did not stand down for breaking or mocking rules when others, such as the former health secretary Matt Hancock and ex-No 10 press secretary Allegra Stratton, had done so.
Attending the event was a clear breach of lockdown rules, Starmer said, adding that in assuring the Commons he had no knowledge of such things Johnson had broken the ministerial code, seen as a reason to resign.
Johnson had pretended to be “sickened and furious” when evidence emerged of parties, Starmer said, adding: “Now it turns out he was at the parties all along. Can’t the prime minister see why the British public think he’s lying through his teeth?”
In response to the barrage, Johnson eschewed his usual combative style at PMQs to repeatedly apologise, saying: “I accept that we should have done things differently on that evening.”
But he also urged Starmer to wait for Gray’s inquiry, and used his final answer to talk up his government’s record in tackling Covid.
