The ST article is: Boris Johnson has cleared so many hurdles, but he may yet come a cropper, with the sub title, The war has given the prime minister some breathing space but with local elections approaching, he isn’t out of the woods yet
The Times says there are concerns that Johnson was pictured drinking at the handful of events he was present at. Several photographs have emerged from the Sue Gray inquiry, but insiders believe the worst are yet to surface. Listen to this:
"A source who has seen a picture from a party during lockdown said: 'It was in Downing Street, people around the table, and there was loads of alcohol. If you put that picture on the front pages, I think a lot of people, MPs, who have priced a lot of stuff in will not have priced that in, because it looks like a massive piss-up'.”
The fine he received last week shows how low the Met have set the bar. It was the mildest infringement of the lockdown laws (I won't talk about 'rules' because it seems to play down the seriousness of it all) that took place and yet he was still fined. Downing Street is braced for much worse to emerge.
Keep your eye on Friday 13 November 2020. It was the day his communications chief Lee Cain left and according to the report it began as the usual Friday night 'wash-up' drinks before staff left for the weekend. One source said “This wasn’t a leaving drinks,” — until the prime minister arrived.
Johnson entered and said he wanted to say a few words for Lee Cain and, "started pouring drinks for people and drinking himself. He toasted him.” A photographer is said to have been present throughout and is thought to have captured pictures of Johnson. Downing Street source hasn't disputed the description of the event but denied that Johnson had organised it although it sounds as if he had..
To make matters worse, the PM then returned to his flat above No 11 afterwards, where a second 'gathering' involving his wife and her friends is alleged to have taken place that evening.
So, there were two 'gatherings' on the same night, both breaking lockdown rules and with Johnson himself at the very heart of them, if not the main organiser.
Does anyone seriously think all this went off with the prime minister blissfully unaware of breaking the law, being dragged reluctantly into two separate parties? You can bet he was the centre of attention and by the following morning he had a serious hangover, a sore throat and a mouth like the bottom of a birdcage. We have all been there - but not during the pandemic when it was a criminal offence.
The article goes on:
"Members of the press team downstairs are said to have heard Abba music blaring from the flat. But his presence at the earlier event would be particularly problematic for Johnson because it places him front and centre of a social event in No 10.
"They also argue that it is impossible to reconcile Johnson’s presence at the event and his drinking with staff with his statements in the House of Commons.
“'It’s evidence that he didn’t accidentally mislead the House, he deliberately misled the House,' said one insider. 'The PM was drinking himself and attending the Friday night wash-up drinks, something he said he never knew existed'.”
To understand the mind of the Eton educated idiot you have to read the paragraph that claims Johnson is "furious with former aides who he believes advised him badly." He never takes responsibility for anything. He has an epic sense of entitlement and even when breaking his own laws, the ones he was annunciating on national television at regular intervals, he blames others.
When something he does is unconventional or against civil service advice - his supporters often point to him easing lockdown laws as an example (we shall see what the Covid inquiry makes of that) - he is quick to take the credit, if there is any to be had. If not and things turn out badly, as they have on partygate, it is always because of the advice he was given.
Someone close to him says, “He was assured there was no party and no rules had been broken by people who were not in a position to give him that assurance. Those people are no longer in the building.”
As far as I know we have still not been told who those people, the one who gave him his 'assurance' were. I hope he is forced to tell us because those involved can then give their side of the story. In any case is the leader of a G7 country so naïve and other worldly that he can't tell if he was at a gathering or not? Is he so gullible as to accept assurances he was not at a party when he himself was getting rat-arsed with a gang of others, laughing and joking and even wearing party hats in one image and with other photographs showing tables groaning under the weight of wine and spirits?
Come on!
I think by the time Sue Gray's report comes out he will be gone. If not, he will go soon after because it will I am sure lay out all the facts, perhaps with official pictures proving incontrovertible evidence that the prime minister of the United Kingdom is a liar.
He cannot survive.
