The significance of today’s announcement by the Met Police that 20 individuals who unlawfully attended parties in Downing Street and the Cabinet Office will be fined is that it confirms the Prime Minister misled the House of Commons on 8 December.
On that date he told Sir Keir Starmer, Labour’s leader:
What we don’t know, of course, is whether the Prime Minister knowingly misled the House of Commons
‘I have been repeatedly assured that the rules were not broken. I repeat that I have been repeatedly assured since these allegations emerged that there was no party and that no Covid rules were broken.’
We now know there were lots of parties, and the Covid-19 rules that banned them at the time – drafted by the government on the orders of Boris Johnson – were breached.
What we don’t know, of course, is whether the Prime Minister knowingly misled the House of Commons. If he knew he was lying, that would mean that under the prevailing conventions he would have to resign.
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