Boris Johnson gave a speech at a leaving event revealed by Sue Gray to have been held in Downing Street just over a week into the third national lockdown, according to a new report.
In her damning update into the Partygate scandal, the top civil servant said that the gathering at No 10 on 14 January last year was among a dozen events now being investigated by the Metropolitan Police. Both The Telegraph and The Guardian reported on Tuesday night that the prime minister was in attendance.
The former also claimed that Mr Johnson was witnessed heading up to his Downing Street flat on the night of 13 November, when a gathering also under police investigation allegedly took place following the exit of his former chief aide-turned-nemesis Dominic Cummings.
As he faced a battering – including from his own benches – in the Commons on Monday, Mr Johnson said he would not say whether he had been in attendance at his flat that night as a result of the ongoing police investigation, a line repeated by Downing Street when asked about the fresh claims on Tuesday evening.
It came after a tenth Tory MP publicly called on the PM to resign, and Downing Street backed down after coming under pressure over plans to keep secret any fine imposed on Johnson as a result of the parties row, after opposition parties warned of a potential “cover up”.
