In answer to my own question on Tuesday, it looks like the piglet still has some grease left, at least enough to get him to the privileges committee report into whether or not he misled MPs about Downing Street parties or the two upcoming by-elections on 23 June. I confess after Sue Gray’s report was published and I skim read it, it was clear the language was a bit too anodyne and there was no silver bullet. He is never going to resign no matter what.
The Guardian has the best front page this morning summarising the most sensational elements from her report:
As far as I remember Gray's main conclusion was the same as her interim report in January, namely:
"The events that I investigated were attended by leaders in government. Many of these events should not have been allowed to happen. It is also the case that some of the more junior civil servants believed that their involvement in some of these events was permitted given the attendance of senior leaders. The senior leadership at the centre, both political and official, must bear responsibility for this culture."
With every previous prime minister this would have been enough to sink them without trace. If Ms Gray thought it would do for Johnson she is bound to be disappointed.
He did accept responsibility - in the way he has always 'accepted responsibility', in other words without any consequences whatsoever.
I didn’t watch the press conference since I can hardly bear to look at him or listen to his voice. He is such a practiced liar, the fibs slip off his tongue so smoothly that, as someone said on the Panorama programme on Tuesday, if he was to take a lie-detector test after telling a whopper, the needle wouldn’t flicker. He would pass with ease because he doesn’t even realise he is lying.
His defence seems to be that all the gatherings except his birthday party were ‘work events.’ Somebody on Twitter said if that was true why did he ever deny they took place? I assume he would maintain they were all work events until he left when they suddenly became raucous drunken parties.
From clips I have seen on the news Johnson looked quite relaxed at the press conference, even cocksure. He looked like one of those men you sometimes see who have murdered their own wife and weep crocodile tears in an emotional appeal for information about her disappearance.
He didn’t seem to have a care in the world but you know he's as guilty as they come. The FT described him as ‘unbowed’ but he is certainly badly damaged. Considering what must be thought of as the most coruscating on the record criticism ever of a sitting prime minister by a civil servant it was quite a feat.
His reception later at the 1922 committee was not universally welcomed however:
Critical Tory MP at 1922 on PM’s address:“Saying sorry at 1922 & then reducing everything to a joke. Tractors & farmers, drinking at work and something about the Second World War. Everything is a joke & some laugh along. Making us all the clowns in his circus.”— Paul Brand (@PaulBrandITV) May 25, 2022
He isn't remorseful in any way. It was notable that the MP for York outer, Julian Sturdy, later released a statement calling on Johnson to go. He has previously supported him so I assume he has sent a letter to Sir Graham Brady.
Sue Gray’s report is not even complete. We know there were other parties, more or less regular ones on Friday “nailed into the diary” and others like one on 17 November 2020 which The Mirror revealed a few days ago. She even admits she learned of some gatherings that are in the sixteen she investigated not from Downing Street staff but from the media. They were not in the least open with her about everything that went on. It has been a whitewash and everybody knows it.
Senior people definitely knew they were breaking the rules. A WhatsApp message from Johnson’s private secretary Martin Reynolds to a special adviser referring to the 20 May Bring Your Own Booze event said:
“Best of luck. A complete non story but better than them focusing on our drinks (which we seem to have got away with).”
Johnson’s theatrical performance in the commons was terrible to watch. He was supposed to be contrite but he couldn’t help himself and he ‘admitted’ that everybody else was at fault while he personally did nothing wrong. He even called on Starmer to resign and insultingly called him 'Sir Beer Korma', a name he has no doubt spent hours thinking up:
This is what Johnson said:
"He [Starmer] could have shown some common sense, and recognised that when people are working very hard together, day in day out, it can be difficult to draw the boundary between work and socialising. And yet, after months of his frankly sanctimonious obsession, the great gaseous zeppelin of his pomposity has been permanently and irretrievably punctured by the revelation that—he did not mention this— he is himself under investigation by the police.
“I am not going to mince my words. I have got to say this. Sir Beer Korma is currently failing to hold himself to the same high standards that he demanded of me. It is true. He called for me to resign when the investigation began. Why is he in his place? Why— (interruption). The right hon. and learned Gentleman should at least be consistent, and hold himself to the same standards. He is still there, and so is the deputy Leader of the Opposition.”
If you really want to see the depths to which we have sunk, have a look at this exchange which took place YESTERDAY in Downing Street between an unnamed journalist and the PM’s official spokesman, presumably in a press briefing:
How Boris Johnson’s spokespeople answered questions today about whether the Prime Minister broke Covid rules by having parties in Downing Street during lockdown. pic.twitter.com/5nknYjs5hO
— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) December 1, 2021
The spokesman was still claiming there was no Christmas parties at all and he said 'all rules were followed at all times' like an automaton - eleven times! We know from Gray’s report, without any doubts whatsoever, that rules were virtually never followed at all.
Journalists have been unable to rely on anything coming out of the PM’s mouth for years but now they can't rely on his press office either.
I see reports of off-the-record comments by plenty of Tory MPs who apparently defend the PM in public but privately are in despair. This is the nub of the problem. Instead of Johnson bending to the needs of the great office of state he has bent it to his own narcissistic personality. None of what he does is intended to improve the lot of the average man or woman in the street, it is all about his own career and personal advancement.
I still think there is plenty more to come. The Good Law Project have served a pre-action letter on the Met questioning their decision not to investigate three gatherings, plus I expect more revelations from disgruntled staff who very clearly want him out.
He may have wriggled free for now but his inevitable fall from grace will be even more precipitous when it comes.
