Partygate live: Boris Johnson tells MPs he is ‘appalled’ by behaviour at lockdown parties but defends his attendance
For weeks Johnson has been saying that he was looking forward to giving a full account of Partygate when he could, but his version today was hardly thorough, and he showed a marked refusal to elaborate when pressed for detail. For example, we still don’t know why his wife felt the need to play Abba music at loud volume at her “strategy meeting”.
He also provided what might turn out to be a less than robust defence to the claim that he lied when he told MPs the rules were followed in parliament at all times. He told MPs: It is clear from what Sue Gray has had to say that several of these gatherings then went on far longer than was necessary. They were clearly in breach of the rules and they clearly fell foul of the rules.
I have to tell the house - because the house will need to know this, and again this is not to mitigate or extenuate - but I had no knowledge of subsequent proceedings because I simply wasn’t there, and I have been as surprised and disappointed as anyone else in this house as the revelations unfolded.
But did he really not know that these sort of parties were going on late into the night in Downing Street? This is something the privileges committee will consider when it carries out its inquiry into claims he lied to MPs.
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