26 minutes ago
Image source: Cabinet Office
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Boris Johnson has been fined for attending a birthday celebration in the Cabinet Room in 2020
Boris Johnson is set to step down as MP with immediate effect after receiving the Partygate report.
This report by the MP’s Privileges Committee looked into whether he had misled Parliament about parties at Downing Street breaking lockdown.
Mr Johnson accused the Commons Inquiry of trying to “push me out”.
In a statement, he said: “You have still not produced the slightest evidence that I knowingly or recklessly misled the House of Commons.”
In a statement presented to the committee in March, Mr Johnson admitted to misleading Parliament but denied doing so on purpose.
He admitted social distancing at Downing Street gatherings during the Covid lockdowns had not been “perfect”.
But he said these are “essential” work events which he believes are allowed.
He insisted that the guidelines – as he understood them – were always followed.
In his statement following his resignation on Friday night, the former prime minister said: “I have not lied and I believe the committee knows it in their heart.”
“You know very well that when I spoke in the House of Commons I said what I honestly believed was true and what I should say, like any other minister,” he said.
Mr Johnson said he corrected the recording as quickly as possible and said committee members “know that”.
He denounced the committee as “kangaroo court” and claimed that its “goal from the start was to find me guilty regardless of the facts.”
It said in its statement: “It is very sad to be leaving Parliament – at least for the time being – but most of all I am confused and appalled that I have been exited from Parliament in an anti-democratic manner by a committee chaired and led by Harriet Harman can be forced into office.” Such an outrageous bias.”
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