Robert Peston Robert Peston

An omen of oblivion for Boris from a Tory MP

The Prime Minister revealed on Tuesday, during an interview with broadcasters, his testimony to Sue Gray, who he gave the mandate to investigate potentially unlawful parties held during lockdown at 10 Downing Street.

‘This is what I said to the inquiry,’ he confirmed. So what is his ‘this’?

His main claim – which his own MPs tell me is plain weird – is that he didn’t do anything wrong in going to what in normal English would be called ‘a party’ on the evening of 20 May 2020 because ‘nobody told me and nobody said this was something that was against the rules’.

When he talked about the party, he talked about stepping out into ‘that garden’ – never ‘my’ garden. It sounded so odd.

The point is – and I feel foolish even saying this to you, because it is so obvious – everybody in the country knew parties were banned at the time. And since Boris Johnson was the main author of the rules designed to shield us from Covid-19, he more than anyone else should have known parties were not just discouraged, but illegal.

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Robert Peston
Written by
Robert Peston
Robert Peston is Political Editor of ITV News and host of the weekly political discussion show Peston. His articles originally appeared on his ITV News blog.

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