Boris Johnson says he believed “implicitly” that he was following COVID rules after a committee of MPs said it would have been “obvious” they were being broken around him at Downing Street gatherings.
He also suggested that Sue Gray, who led an earlier civil service report into parties and has just been appointed Sir Keir Starmer’s chief of staff, had a “political axe to grind”.
Speaking following the committee of MPs’ initial 24-page report, Mr Johnson said there was “nothing to show, I myself the leader, was worried anything was against the rules”.
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“I believed what we were doing was within the conformity of the COVID regulations,” he said, before adding: “I believe implicitly that these events were within the rules.”
He continued: “There’s been no contempt here.”
The MPs’ report looks at whether Mr Johnson misled the House of Commons when responding to the partygate allegations.
Members of the cross-party Commons Privileges Committee launched their investigation into the former prime minister’s statements in April last year, after MPs voted for an investigation.
Mr Johnson had been called to give oral evidence to the committee in the week of 20 March.
The report said: “The evidence strongly suggests that breaches of guidance would have been obvious to Mr Johnson at the time he was at the gatherings.
“There is evidence that those who were advising Mr Johnson about what to say to the press and in the House were themselves struggling to contend that some gatherings were within the rules.”
Mr Johnson repeatedly denied COVID lockdown rules were broken at Number 10 when asked in the Commons.
The committee said it will consider why Mr Johnson told MPs no guidance had been broken “when he knew what the guidance was and was in attendance at gatherings where the guidance was breached”.
It will also look into “why he failed to tell the House about the gatherings at which he had been present”.
Misleading parliament could result in Mr Johnson being suspended from the Commons for 10 days, which could trigger a recall petition. If 10% of voters in his Uxbridge constituency sign a petition he could lose his job as an MP as a by-election would have to take place.