PMQs: Boris’s anger over new partygate picture

The takeaway moment from today’s PMQs came not in the main exchanges between Boris Johnson and Sir Keir Starmer but later in the session. Labour MP Fabian Hamilton asked about a just-published photo of the Prime Minister with an open bottle of prosecco alongside staff wearing tinsel at a Downing Street Christmas quiz. At the time, social gatherings were banned under lockdown restrictions. One of the many holding lines of days past about this particular event was that it couldn’t be a party because there was no alcohol. This changed that.

Hamilton demanded that Johnson refer the party — which is not currently the subject of a police investigation — to the Metropolitan Police. Johnson told him that he was ‘completely in error’. But it changed the Prime Minister’s demeanour and the dynamic in the chamber. Johnson became more irritable, while Labour MPs opposite him theatrically handed around their phones to colleagues so they could see the picture (there is a less dramatic reason for this too, which is that like much of parliament, the reception and wifi in the chamber are barely functioning).