The party is over in London. An investigation published Monday found that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s office broke their own Covid lockdown rules.
In the very height of the 2020 pandemic, the government banned Brits from meeting with more than one person at a time, and it could only be outdoors.
But the British government completely failed to abide by its own rules. Not once, not twice, but at least 16 times. It puts Johnson into the hot seat and weakens his grip on power.
The first rule break came in May 2020, during the first wave of the pandemic, and at the height of lockdown rules. Over a dozen 10 Downing Street staffers as well as the Prime Minister chucked the rules out the window and attended a social gathering in the prime minister’s garden.
The 12-page report found that there were at least 16 parties with government workers that took place during a lockdown. It included a BYOB backyard party, as well as a birthday party for Johnson himself.
The highly anticipated report said that the lockdown parties were a “serious failure” of the standards of public office and that they were “difficult to justify.” The report, written by senior civil servant Sue Gray, said that many of the gatherings in question represented a serious failure by the government to not only observe the high standards expected of government leadership, but also the standards that were expected of the entire British population during the pandemic.
Johnson has been fighting to save his leadership from the party scandal. He eventually commissioned the report after there was widespread backlash and fury over the numerous parties, while the rest of the country sat under strict restrictions.
Johnson has apologized, but it may be too little too late. The political opposition has called for him to step down. And even his own party, the Tories, don’t seem to have his back.
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