Boris Johnson tonight heaped praise on “outstanding” Allegra Stratton after she resigned for laughing with colleagues about a Downing Street Christmas party.
The £125,000-a-year aide gave a tearful statement outside her house after the “furious" PM announced an investigation but denied all responsibility himself.
The former Press Secretary - who later worked as COP26 spokeswoman - said: “I will regret those remarks for the rest of my days and I offer my profound apologies to all of you at home for them."
But tonight Mr Johnson said “I’m very very sorry to lose her,” adding: “I wish her all the very best and we will certainly miss her here in government”.
The Prime Minister dodged questions from the Mirror’s Pippa Crerar - who broke the story - about a second event on November 27.
At that event, sources told the Mirror he attended and gave a leaving speech for an aide.
When our political editor suggested it was a “breach of the rules by any reasonable legal analysis”, the PM vigorously shook his head.
And he dodged speaking about claims of a third party on November 13 in the Downing Street flat, after earlier saying it did not happen.
Mr Johnson claimed Cabinet Secretary Simon Case could probe the November 27 event as well as the December 18 Christmas party.
The PM said: “He may wish to look at other things, that’s a matter frankly for him.”
Yet hours earlier, Mr Johnson’s official spokesman repeatedly said Simon Case would only examine the events of December 18 and nothing else.
Ms Stratton quit after a recording emerged of a rehearsal on December 22 for daily TV media briefings - which she would have fronted.
Ed Oldfield, adviser to the PM, said: “I’ve just seen reports on Twitter that there was a Downing Street Christmas party on Friday night, do you recognise those reports?”
“I went home”, replied Ms Stratton, who appeared to crease up laughing before telling colleagues "hold on".
She laughed and said “what’s the answer?" before her colleagues stepped in to help her.
“It wasn’t a party, it was cheese and wine”, offered one.
Saying it was a “sad day for” Ms Stratton, the PM said: “I make no excuses for the frivolity with which the subject was handed in that rehearsal that people saw in that clip.
"There can be no excuse for it. I can totally understand how infuriating it was.
"But I want to say that Allegra has been a fine colleague, has achieved a great deal in her time in Government, and was a particularly effective spokesman for Cop26 - she coined the coal, cars, cash, trees agenda and helped to marshal and rally the world behind the agreement.
"If you'll forgive me, I wanted to say that because it is a sad day for her, as well as an infuriating event for many people around the country."
On claims of other parties Mr Johnson told the Mirror’s Pippa Crerar: “This is a massive department of state and there are people working flat out the whole time on all sorts of issues and they work extremely hard.
“According to very very well respected civil servants and advisors that I’ve talked to about what happened in the events that you describe, no rules were broken.
“I’ve asked Simon Case to look at the December 18 event, I’m sure he’ll be considering all sorts of things.
“But as far as I’m concerned all the evidence I can see is that people in this building have stayed within the rules.
“If that turns out not to be the case and people wish to bring allegations to my attention or to the police or whoever then of course there will be proper sanctions.”
