Displaying items by tag: Boris Johnson

Penny Mordaunt, a UK cabinet minister, has revealed that her WhatsApp conversations with former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, relating to Covid, were mysteriously deleted from her phone. She provided this information in her evidence to the Covid inquiry, and mentioned that the former chief of staff at No 10, Dan Rosenfield, did not respond to 14 requests for a meeting to discuss the missing communications. This adds pressure on Johnson, who previously informed the inquiry that around 5,000 messages from his old phone, covering January to June 2020, could not be accessed. His lawyers suggested an automatic factory reset of the phone might be the cause. Mordaunt expressed willingness to have her phone examined by the inquiry if it would help. Johnson himself speculated at the inquiry that the disappearance might be due to the WhatsApp app malfunctioning and automatically erasing messages. He claimed that he had not removed any messages and had provided all relevant information to the inquiry.

During this week's Covid inquiry, former prime minister Boris Johnson faced intense scrutiny over his government's handling of the pandemic. Johnson expressed sorrow for the 'loss and suffering' caused by Covid, but bereaved families dismissed his apology, asserting that 'the dead won't hear your apologies’. Johnson acknowledged the government's mistakes and claimed personal responsibility for decisions made, while admitting they were 'oblivious' to the virus's severity early on. Key moments from the inquiry included Johnson's admission of government errors, his reliance on advisers over SAGE meeting notes, and his contemplation of sacking health secretary Matt Hancock. He also faced allegations of asking why the economy was being damaged for those 'who will die anyway soon' and overseeing a 'toxic' culture in Downing Street that hindered the pandemic response. The inquiry, chaired by Baroness Heather Hallet, was marked by protests and interruptions from Covid victims' representatives. Johnson's two-day testimony is part of a larger investigation into UK decision-making and governance during the pandemic, focusing on the government's delayed reaction and alleged mismanagement.

As another scandal hits the Tory party, its MPs are even more gloomy about how the Prime Minister can project the government as honest and professional. MPs endorsed a report saying that Boris Johnson lied over Partygate. But 225 of Boris’s former Conservative MP colleagues were absent, including Rishi Sunak who has not said if he agrees or disagrees with the report’s findings. See Eight months into Boris’s leadership, he faced Covid. Eight months into Rishi’s leadership, he struggles to distance himself from the Conservative chaos and deliver a government of ‘integrity, professionalism and accountability’ as he promised in October. A former cabinet minister said, ‘We can’t sell a vision to the public if Rishi doesn’t have one himself. He needs to think big, be creative, and articulate a dream the public will want to live by.’ Pray for Rishi Sunak to have heaven's wisdom in the current crisis.

Boris Johnson has attacked Rishi Sunak’s post-Brexit deal with the EU to resolve the Northern Ireland Protocol row, claiming that it doesn’t take back control from Brussels. The former PM is urging Sunak to consider using his bill to unilaterally override the protocol if it ‘doesn’t work’. He added, ‘I will find it very difficult to vote for something like this because I believe we should have done things differently no matter how much plaster came off the Brussels ceiling. We have got to hope it works.’ Boris said he understood why people want to move on from Brexit rows and accept the deal: ‘I get that.’ Meanwhile, the European Research Group said it could take two weeks for the Brexiteer group to carry out its own ‘legal audit’ of the deal. Mr Sunak wants to give the DUP and Tory Eurosceptics space and time to consider the deal before holding the commons vote.

Moments before he went into Downing Street for the first time as prime minister, Rishi Sunak said ‘this government will have integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level.’ Three months later, he confronts issues challenging these promises. No PM wants a reputation for harbouring fixed penalty notices gathered whilst in office but being fined for not wearing a seatbelt was his second offence after his one as chancellor during the pandemic. The deputy prime minister has reportedly had 24+ civil servants make complaints against him. Nadhim Zahawi, the Conservative Party Chairman, is determined to stay in post despite many unanswered questions over a £5m fine that was paid over a tax dispute while he was chancellor and that the prime minister knew about the whole thing.

On 25 May Sue Gray’s report on the behaviour of' Downing Street staff during lockdown was published. The senior civil servant, who described how staff partied while the rest of the country was in lockdown, said many events 'should not have been allowed', and that the PM and his officials 'must bear responsibility for this culture'. Warnings about parties breaking Covid rules were ignored, the report says. Boris Johnson told MPs he took 'full responsibility for everything that took place on my watch'. He said he had been 'humbled by the whole experience' and had learned lessons.' Sue Gray said she learned of multiple examples of 'unacceptable' treatment of security and cleaning staff during her partygate investigation. Mr Johnson’s remarks are also being scrutinised by the Commons privileges committee, which must decide whether he knowingly misled Parliament, particularly when he categorically denied knowledge of rule-breaking parties. If he is found to have knowingly misled parliament, he would be in breach of the ministerial code and would in theory be expected to resign.

Ireland’s foreign minister, Simon Coveney, has warned Boris Johnson against any move to change the Northern Ireland protocol. He said, ‘What we can’t do is accept that the British government would act unilaterally, they would pass legislation to effectively breach international law, to set aside elements of a treaty that this prime minister designed and put in place. That would cause more problems than it would solve.’  Foreign minister Liz Truss, announcing a new law to change the post-Brexit trade deal for Northern Ireland, insisted it would be legal under international law. She said the proposed legislation would make changes to the deal - rather than scrapping it - to resolve ‘the grave situation in Northern Ireland’. But in response, the EU said it would ‘need to respond with all measures at its disposal’ if the UK went ahead with the legislation. Pray that all decisions will be according to God’s plans.

Boris Johnson has said the British embassy in Kyiv will open its doors again, after its closure shortly before Russia's invasion. He also said it was sadly a ‘realistic possibility’ when asked if he agreed with intelligence that the Russian bombardment could continue to the end of next year, ending with Russian victory. He said, ‘Putin has a huge army with a very difficult political position because he has made a catastrophic blunder. His only option, really, is to continue to use his appalling, grinding approach driven by artillery, trying to grind the Ukrainians down. No matter what military superiority he may be able to bring to bear in the next few months, he will not be able to conquer the spirit of the Ukrainian people.’

Addressing MPs after Easter and for the first time since being fined for breaking Covid laws, Boris Johnson apologised for his ‘mistake’ 35 times. He said he had not realised he was breaking the rules but he accepted the police's decisions. MPs want to vote on a Labour plan for a Commons committee to investigate his past comments about Whitehall gatherings, but ministers now want the vote to wait until probes by the police and Sue Gray have finished. A delay in this decision will not remove the threat of a censure motion - which allows MPs to criticise government policy, an individual minister, or the government as a whole. Any MP can table one, and it only takes a simple majority to pass. If it passes, it would not force Johnson to do anything but would put him under far greater political pressure. See also

Russia's invasion of Ukraine is a ‘catastrophe for our continent’, said Boris Johnson. He chaired an emergency Cobra meeting on 24 February and gave a televised statement after Russian forces launched an assault on Ukraine, crossing its borders and bombing military targets near big cities. He outlined new sanctions against Russia in the Commons and said on Twitter that he would also speak to his fellow G7 leaders. He called for an urgent meeting of all NATO leaders as soon as possible. In a phone call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, Mr Johnson vowed the West ‘would not stand by as Putin waged his campaign against the Ukrainian people’ and tweeted earlier, ‘Putin has chosen a path of bloodshed and destruction by launching this unprovoked attack on Ukraine.’ Foreign secretary Liz Truss has demanded that the Russian ambassador explain Russia's ‘illegal, unprovoked invasion of Ukraine’.