Boris’s Covid rules are coming back to bite him

In normal circumstances, no one would care if staff in No. 10 held a Christmas party. But last year, Boris Johnson made parties illegal. Throughout most of December, London was under Tier 3 or 4 restrictions. Social gatherings were strictly forbidden and anyone who broke the rules was at risk of a £10,000 fine. The Prime Minister could have issued guidance and asked people to use their judgment. Instead, he criminalised non-compliance and sent the police after those who didn’t follow his rules.

This is why it matters very much if a party was held in Downing Street last December. Despite multiple denials from No. 10 that any such event took place, a leaked video clip has revealed aides joking about the alleged party four days later. It seems beyond all doubt now that cheese and wine were enjoyed in the company of others — which would have explicitly broken the rules. Still, No. 10 insists that ‘all rules were followed’: a claim the Metropolitan police have now announced they will investigate.

The PM stands accused not merely of hypocrisy but of lying. It wasn’t so long ago that the latter offence would swiftly have ended a minister’s career — there are echoes of John Profumo’s ‘there was no impropriety whatsoever’ in Johnson’s attempts to shove aside questions. But even if things do not progress to that conclusion, the revelation that his staff were engaged in any kind of revelry while the rest of the country was forbidden from even seeing family will rightly generate huge anger among those who obeyed Covid restrictions to the letter.

Almost 2,000 people have been prosecuted in Westminster magistrates’ court alone for breaking lockdown rules or quarantine. Those who organised get-togethers were fined thousands of pounds.