Rishi Sunak: Boris Johnson ‘asked me to do something I wasn’t prepared to do’
Boris Johnson deliberately misled parliament over parties in Downing Street during the pandemic, the Privileges Committee is expected to say in its report on Wednesday.
The committee has rejected the former prime minister’s defence that senior officials advised him Covid rules and guidance had been followed in No 10, according to The Times.
One of Mr Johnson’s key aides at the time reportedly advised him to remove a claim from a statement to the Commons that “all guidance had been followed at all times” during Downing St functions.
Mr Johnson removed the line from his opening statement but repeated its assertion during a subsequent debate – something the committee reportedly views as evidence that MPs were deliberately misled.
One senior Tory told The Independent they expect the publication of the report to finish off any chances of a return to politics for Mr Johnson, who resigned as an MP on Friday.
But the former PM seems determined to fight, accusing the committee of “bias” and likening it to a “kangaroo court”, as he told the Express newspaper: “I’ll be back.”
