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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has not yet received the results of the investigation into possible breaches of the Covid-19 confinement rules during various social gatherings in Downing Street, including Johnson’s birthday party in 2020. During his weekly session in the House of Commons, Johnson, pressured by the opposition, refused to resign until the conclusions of the police investigation are known.
Boris Johnson does not intend to resign from his post until the results of the internal report and the police investigation carried out into the multiple social gatherings that supposedly took place in Downing Street while the English suffered the first confinements due to the pandemic are made public. of Covid-19.
During his weekly appearance before Parliament on Wednesday, January 26, the British Prime Minister rejected opposition calls for him to resign. However, he accepted a rule that ministers must lose their jobs if they have intentionally misled Parliament.
For his part, Johnson’s spokesman reported that they have not yet received the report of the investigation, led by senior official Sue Gray.
According to the BBC, Gray’s report is essentially complete, but it has not yet been sent to the prime minister and MPs will likely have to wait until Thursday, or even longer, to see the results of the inquiry.
Gray’s report will detail, without perhaps attributing responsibility, what happened at government headquarters during the lockdowns.
For now, several meetings are known that took place at the government headquarters and the prime minister’s house, such as two meetings on May 15 and 20, which Johnson defends were for work reasons. Also, on June 19, 2020, up to 30 employees could have attended Boris Johnson’s birthday party.
The opposition attacks Johnson in Parliament
Boris Johnson was tense and defensive during Wednesday’s session in Parliament, when he refused to resign while awaiting the conclusions of Gray’s report.
It was the Labor leader, Keir Starmer, who asked Johnson if he planned to leave his post, since it has been shown that celebrations were organized at his residence in Downing Street and in the official office, thus violating the restrictions due to the pandemic. in 2020.
The Prime Minister’s response was a resounding “No” and, full of fury, he accused Starmer of being “opportunistic” and trying to force him to answer on a matter that “he cannot talk about yet”.
In addition to this, the opposition leader told Johnson that he put the United Kingdom in a “shameful” situation, after the London Metropolitan Police confirmed on Tuesday that it will investigate meetings in Downing Street that may have violated the regulations.
To trigger a challenge to Johnson’s leadership, 54 of the 359 Conservative MPs in Parliament must write letters of censure to the chairman of the Conservative Party’s 1922 Committee. The number of cards sent is kept secret until the threshold of 54 is reached.
The public have had enough.
Labor will build a new Britain out of the pandemic that gives families, businesses and pensioners the security, prosperity and respect they deserve. pic.twitter.com/5WR89JR8a2
— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) January 26, 2022
Once the results of the police investigation are known, the “Tories” could organize an internal confidence vote against Johnson, who would be forced to resign as leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister if he lost it and would be replaced by a candidate arising from a internal choice.
From now on, some names are beginning to be mentioned that would take over Johnson’s position if he were to be overthrown: Economy Minister Rishi Sunak and Foreign Secretary Liz Truss.
When Truss was asked about claims that Johnson and his staff had thrown a party in Downing Street while the rest of the English were barred from even saying goodbye in person to relatives who had died of coronavirus, the official said some of the reports were worrying. “Clearly there has to be a change in culture,” the minister told the BBC. “We need to get the results of the report, we need to see the results and fix the problems that are there.”
With Reuters, EFE and local media