Boris Johnson would face 90-day suspension if he were still MP, says privileges committee – UK politics live

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The Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group says Boris Johnson should never be allowed to stand for public office again. Its spokesperson David Garfinkel said in a statement:

This is another grim reminder that whilst families like mine were saying goodbye to our loved ones over Zoom, the same prime minister that failed us so badly in the first place was breaking his own rules so he could have a party and a laugh.

Johnson has shown no remorse. Instead he lied to our faces when he told us that he’d done ‘all he could’ to protect our loved ones.

He lied again when he said the rules hadn’t been broken in Number 10, and he’s lied ever since when he’s denied it again and again.

It’s an utter tragedy that Johnson was in charge when the pandemic struck and he should never be allowed to stand for any form of public office again.

His fall from grace must serve as a lesson to other politicians to act with honesty and to serve the public as a whole – that is the only positive that can come from this.

Twenty per cent of people think Boris Johnson did not get a fair hearing from the privileges committee, a YouGov poll suggests. Almost half of voters think he did get a fair hearing, and the rest don’t know.

Among Conservative supporters, 40% think he did not get a fair hearing, the poll suggests.

The poll also suggests that the notional 90-day suspension proposed by the committee is seen as not harsh enough by three time as many people (45%) as the number seeing it as too harsh (15%).

In an interim report published in March, the Commons privileges committee said that its inquiry would focus on whether Boris Johnson misled parliament over Partygate and, if so, whether “that was inadvertent, reckless or intentional”.

After Johnson gave evidence in person, it was obvious that the committee would conclude, at the very least, that Johnson misled MPs by being reckless. But it was much less clear whether it would conclude he did so intentionally, because to prove someone lied, it is necessary to know what they were thinking, and whether they knew they were saying something untrue. Dominic Cummings (see 7.47am) and others have said Johnson does not really distinguish between truth and lies anyway. Donald Trump is much the same.

But the committee has concluded that Johnson deliberately misled MPs. Here are some of the arguments it makes to defend this conclusion in its report today.

Johnson must have known his interpretation of what was allowed under the Covid guidelines was false, the committee says. In paragraph 117 on page 36, it says:

We think it highly unlikely on the balance of probabilities that Mr Johnson, in the light of his cumulative direct personal experience of these events, and his familiarity with the rules and guidance as their most prominent public promoter, could have genuinely believed at the time of his statements to the house that the rules or guidance were being complied with. We think it just as unlikely he could have continued to believe this at the time of his evidence to our committee. We conclude that when he told the house and this committee that the rules and guidance were being complied with, his own knowledge was such that he deliberately misled the house and this committee.

Johnson’s is now misrepresenting the significance of what he said in the Commons, the committee says. In paragraphs 181, 182 and 183, starting on page 52, it says:

The problem with Mr Johnson’s attempts to portray his assertions to the house [that the rules were followed in No 10] as narrow in scope is that this interpretation is directly at odds with the overall impression members of the house, the media and the public received at the time from Mr Johnson’s responses at PMQs …

The impression the house would have taken and, we conclude, would have been intended to take, from Mr Johnson’s repeated references to assurances was that those assurances had been overarching and comprehensive, and to be given great weight. In fact, as we have seen, the only assurances that we can be certain were given to Mr Johnson were arrived at in haste based on a press “line to take”, were not subject to investigation before either session of PMQs, and did not emanate from senior permanent civil servants or government lawyers but from two media advisers and were based only on their personal recollections. Although Mr Johnson claimed several times to have been given the assurances “repeatedly”, in evidence to us he scaled down that claim by arguing that by “repeatedly” he had meant “on more than one occasion” (so possibly only twice).

Mr Johnson’s attempt in his evidence to us to claim that his assertions at PMQs were narrow in scope amounts to ex post facto justification and was clearly not the message he intended to convey at the time. As an ex post facto justification, it is false.

Johnson was so reckless as to whether the truth was being told that this amounted to being deliberately misleading, the committee says. In paragraph 201 on page 59, it says:

His personal knowledge of breaches of the rules and guidance, combined with his repeated failures pro-actively to investigate and seek authoritative assurances as to compliance issues, amount to a deliberate closing of his mind or at least reckless behaviour. We find it highly unlikely that Mr Johnson having given any reflection to these matters could himself have believed the assertions he made to the house at the time when he was making them, still less that he could continue to believe them to this day. Someone who is repeatedly reckless and continues to deny that which is patent is a person whose conduct is sufficient to demonstrate intent. Many aspects of Mr Johnson’s defence are not credible: taken together, they form sufficient basis for a conclusion that he intended to mislead.

It is generally assumed that there will be a division on Monday after MPs debate a motion to approve the privileges committee report. Reports like this normally go through on the nod, but some Conservative MPs have already said or indicated they are going to vote against. (See 1.44pm.) At the end of a debate, the speaker calls a vote by acclamation (“all those in favour, say aye”), and all it takes is one or two MPs to shout “no” loudly enough for a division to be called.

But, in an interview with Radio 4’s the World at One, Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Boris Johnson supporter and former business secretary, suggested that a division may not in fact take place. Any vote would be a “formality”, he said, because “a small number of Tory Boris haters” would vote with the opposition. But he also said: “It may not come to a vote.”

Given the pressure on Tory MPs to vote against the report (see 11.32am), it would be surprising if the Johnsonites did not force a vote.

And yet, any division might just show how few supporters Johnson has in the parliamentary party. Most Tory MPs would probably choose not to vote at all, but the motion would get through with opposition backing. Just as Johnson decided to walk way from the privileges committee process last week, his supporters could decide to boycott the Commons vote on the supposed grounds it was “unfair”.

And it would suit the Tory whips for no division to take place, because that would prevent endless rows breaking out in Conservative associations over whether MPs voted for or against.

The debate is the main business scheduled for Monday. But on Mondays the Commons does not start sitting until 2.30pm, and any debate would not start until 3.30pm at the earliest. From the government’s point of view, the less attention it gets the better, and so it would not be surprising if some lengthy and dull ministerial statements gets scheduled for Monday, and perhaps some urgent questions too, pushing the start of the debate back by a couple of hours or so.

The byelections in Uxbridge and South Ruislip, Boris Johnson’s constituency, and in Selby and Ainsty, Nigel Adams’s constituency, will take place on Thursday 20 July, the Telegraph’s Christopher Hope reports.

One of the oldest cliches about Boris Johnson is that it is never safe to rule out his making a comeback. The polling firm Savanta has published the results of a snap poll today that suggests, following the publication of the privileges commtitee’s report, almost half of voters think his political career is over. But 40% of people do not agree, the poll suggests. And more than half of people who voted Tory in 2019 don’t think his career is over, according to the survey.

The Commons privileges committee report makes it clear that it is being particularly harsh towards Boris Johnson because of the way he responded to its inquiry. In a list of five reasons justifying the proposed 90-day suspension, if he had remained an MP, only one relates to what he orginally told MPs about Partygate, three relate to his response to the investigation, and one relates to what he told the committee when he gave evidence to it. (See 9.18am.)

The committee says that attacks on its integrity amount to contempt of parliament, and that Johnson is an offender in this regard. It says:

[Johnson] stated that the committee had “forced him out […] anti-democratically”. This attack on a committee carrying out its remit from the democratically elected house itself amounts to an attack on our democratic institutions. We consider that these statements are completely unacceptable. In our view this conduct, together with the egregious breach of confidentiality, is a serious further contempt.

The committee criticises Johnson for, among other things, calling it a “kangaroo court”. It does not criticise other MPs who have used similar language, but it says it is going to address this matter in a further report. In paragraph 14 it says:

From the outset of this inquiry there has been a sustained attempt, seemingly coordinated, to undermine the committee’s credibility and, more worryingly, that of those members serving on it. The committee is concerned that if these behaviours go unchallenged, it will be impossible for the house to establish such a committee to conduct sensitive and important inquiries in the future. The house must have a committee to defend its rights and privileges, and it must protect members of the house doing that duty from formal or informal attack or undermining designed to deter and prevent them from doing that duty. We will be making a special report separately to the house dealing with these matters.

The committee does not say it will be naming other offenders in this regard, and proposing sanctions. But that might be an option for the committee.

Jacob Rees-Mogg, the former business secretary, is one of the most prominent MPs who has denigrated the committee in this way. Although his language today has been more moderate, in the past he has described the committee as a kangaroo court, and on the day it took evidence from Johnson he posted a joke tweet making the same point.

Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, says that Boris Johnson is a liar, and that Rishi Sunak should call an early general election.

At Holyrood Humza Yousaf accused Boris Johnson of “betraying the people of the UK” during first minister’s questions.

During questions about delays to road improvements across the Highlands, Yousaf accused Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross of trying to “dodge” the scandal. Yousaf said Johnson was “not just lying to the House of Commons, but betraying the people of this country and of the UK”. He went on:

When they couldn’t visit a loved one, when they couldn’t attend funerals of loved ones, Boris Johnson was breaking the rules and having parties in Number 10.

Yousaf said that Ross “backed Boris Johnson to the very hilt” and later called on the Scottish Conservatives to apologise for backing Johnson and for all their MPs to vote for the report when it’s brought to the Commons.

Speaking to media after FMQs, Ross said the report was “significant” and “very thorough”. Ross was one of the first senior Tories to call for Johnson to quit in the wake of the revelations, but later revised his position after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

He said he would support the committee’s recommendations and called on fellow MPs to accept that the committee was doing the job asked of them. He said:

Not everyone will agree with the outcome of their deliberations but it was the parliament as a whole who asked for this.

Any MP found to have deliberately misled parliament is guilty of a grave incident and for a former prime minister that is even worse.

Ross also described Johnson’s behaviour in presiding over parties while people were dying and unable to visit sick relatives as “unforgivable”.

The privileges committee’s findings on Boris Johnson “is in danger of making the House of Commons look foolish”, the former business secretary Jacob Rees Mogg has said.

In an interview with GB News, the Johnson ultra-loyalist slammed the inquiry’s report, which he said contained “no real sanction”, while its recommendation that Johnson be suspended for 90 days was “merely trying to make a point”.

Rees-Mogg said the report had failed to address Johnson’s allegations that “most of the members of the committee” had already expressed deeply prejudiced remarks about the former prime minister’s guilt before they had seen the evidence and they should have recused themselves. He said:

Chris Bryant behaved absolutely properly and recused himself [from the committee’s investigation] because he had prejudged it. Harriet Harman did not and the problem with that is that the chairman of committees is extremely influential and important.

The first draft that goes to the committee to vote on is prepared by the chairman of the committee and that level of power or authority of influence is one that needs to be exercised by somebody who has not judged the case before the committee. And I think this is a fundamental flaw, which undermines all the work of the committee.

I think if you look back over the history of parliament, parliament sometimes makes great mistakes when it tries to stand on its dignity. I think that this report is in danger of making the House of Commons look foolish.

Rees-Mogg was referring to some tweets posted by Harman in April 2022, including one in which she commented, seemingly approvingly, on an Alastair Campbell tweet saying Johnson and other ministers lied repeatedly about Partygate.

Another question from a reader.

I note that in the minutes it was a 2-4 split on whether the committee would recommend Boris Johnson be expelled from the house. If that had gone the other way, would that be the harshest sanction placed on an MP in modern times?

It depends how you define modern. The last MP expelled from the Commons was Garry Allighan, a Labour MP who was expelled in 1947 because he had sold information about private Labour meetings to journalists, and then lied about it, and blamed others, when investigated by the privileges committee.

Boris Johnson’s supporters in the parliamentary Conservative party have been speaking out against the privileges committee’s report. They are a minority in parliament – a very small minority now, it appears – but they have not gone quiet. Here are some of their comments.

Nadine Dorries, the former culture secretary, says any MP who votes for the report is “fundamentally not a Conservative” and will be at risk of deselection.

This report has overreached and revealed it’s true pre determined intentions. It’s quite bizarre. Harman declared her position before it began. Jenkins, the most senior MP on committee attended an ACTUAL party. Any Conservative MP who would vote for this report is fundamentally not a Conservative and will be held to account by members and the public. Deselections may follow. It’s serious. MPs will now have to show this committee what real justice looks like and how it’s done.

And here are some more comments from Johnson allies.

From Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, the former business secretary:

I think [the committee] have come to conclusions that are not fully supported by the evidence. I think their fundamental judgment is wrong because I don’t think he deliberately misled parliament.

From Simon Clarke, the former levelling up secretary:

From Brendan Clarke-Smith:

From Paul Bristow:

From Mark Jenkinson

Here is a question from a reader.

Is the privileges committee unanimous in its findings? i.e. Did all the Tory MPs on the committee agree with the non-Tory? Is it a requirement that all MPs on a committee should agree with the final outcomes/opinions?

There are seven MPs on the committee and none of them have dissented from the report, and so in that sense it is unanimous. But, as the minutes reveal (on page 103 of the report), at a meeting on Tuesday, where the final version was agreed, the SNP MP Allan Dorans proposed an amendment to the final paragraph. Instead of it saying that if Johnson were still an MP they would be recommending a 90-day suspension, he wanted it to say that if Johnson were still an MP, they would be recommending his expulsion from the Commons. In a vote on the amendment, the Labour MP Yvonne Fovargue also backed the idea. But they were outvoted by the four Tories on the committee, Andy Carter, Alberto Costa, Sir Bernard Jenkin and Sir Charles Walker, who stuck with the 90-day proposals. Harriet Harman, the Labour chair, did not vote (which is normal practice for a committee chair, unless a vote is tied).

Downing Street has rejected call’s for Boris Johnson’s honours list to be rescinded in the light of the privileges committee’s report. Asked about this proposals, the PM’s spokesperson told journalists at the morning lobby briefing:

When it comes to honours, that’s a longstanding convention. The prime minister has abided by convention, that’s not going to change.

The spokesperson also said there were “no plans” either to force Johnson to repay the money spent by the government on his legal advice during the privileges inquiry (the Labour proposal – see 11am) or to remove his allowance as an ex-PM (the Lib Dem proposal – see 10.06am.)

On the allowance, the spokesperson said:

These arrangements are fairly longstanding – it’s not a personal salary or allowance, it’s the reimbursement of expenses for office and secretarial costs.

The Commons vote on the privileges committee report on Boris Johnson will take place on his birthday, Michael Savage from the Observer reports. He will be 59.

Downing Street won’t say whether Rishi Sunak will be in the Commons on Monday for the vote on the privileges committee report, John Stevens from the Mirror reports. He suspects Sunak might discover a diary appointment elsewhere.

Alongside its main report, the privileges committee has this morning published a short document with additional evidence and material, not previously published, that it relied upon when coming to its conclusions.

The new material includes this written submission from a No 10 official who explains how Covid guidance was regularly ignored in Downing Street in 2020. There was a culture of “not adhering to any rules”, they say.

Staff were even warned, before they went outside the front door, not to go outside in groups because outside No 10 they would be expected to observe social distancing.

The privileges committee report does not actually say that Boris Johnson “lied” to MPs. But it says he “deliberately misled” MPs (see 9.13am), which would match the definition of lying to most of us.

But Angela Rayner, Labour’s deputy leader, has used the term. She told the BBC:

Boris Johnson is not only a law breaker but he’s a liar …

He needs to apologise for what he’s put the public through – he won’t though because Boris Johnson never accepts responsibility for what he does.

Harry Cole, the political editor of the Sun, has also spoken to a “senior Tory” who thinks colleagues who vote for the privileges committee report risk being deselected.