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Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister, told the Commons that Britain was prepared to send troops to protect Nato allies in Europe if Russia invaded Ukraine. The Foreign Office named Yevhen Murayev, a former Ukrainian MP, as a candidate that President Vladimir Putin of Russia was plotting to install in Ukraine. About half the staff at the British embassy in Kiev would come home. The Queen took a helicopter from Windsor Castle to Sandringham, where she is expected to stay for the 70th anniversary of her accession on 6 February.
The Metropolitan Police began an investigation, led by deputy assistant commissioner Jane Connors, into ‘a number of events that took place at Downing Street and Whitehall in the last two years in relation to potential breaches of Covid-19 regulations’. Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Leader of the House, said that there should be a general election if Johnson was ousted as Prime Minister. William Wragg, aged 34, a vice-chair of the 1922 Committee, told a Metropolitan Police detective that Tory MPs who sought a no-confidence vote in the Prime Minister had received threats from whips to ‘withdraw investments’ from their constituencies. Nusrat Ghani, aged 49, a vice-chair of the 1922 Committee, said that when she was sacked as a minister in 2020 she was told by a whip that ‘Muslimness was raised as an issue’ before the reshuffle. The chief whip, Mark Spencer, said he was the whip referred to, but the accusations were ‘completely false and defamatory’. Five days after quoting the words of Leo Amery and Oliver Cromwell, ‘In the name of God, go’, David Davis said that he had not written to the chairman of the 1922 Committee calling for a vote of confidence on Johnson’s leadership.
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