UK’s Johnson faces birthday party allegation as he fights for job | world news

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LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s Boris Johnson was battling to cement his post as prime minister on Monday after his office said his 2020 birthday was marked by a rally in Downing Street, adding fuel to an investigation into government parties during COVID-19 closures.

Johnson, who in 2019 won the biggest Tory majority in more than 30 years, faces a series of accusations that he and his staff party https://www.Reuters.com/world/uk/ lockdown-party-allegations-facing-uk-pm-johnson-2022-01-13 during worst pandemic in a century and racial discrimination claim https://www.Reuters.com/world/uk/uk-lawmaker -says-he-will-meet-police-on-government-blackmail-accusations-2022-01-22 in his party.

The new allegation comes just days before an official investigation by Cabinet Office chief Sue Gray into the lockdown parties is due out later this week.

ITV News said up to 30 people attended the June 2020 anniversary event, during the first COVID lockdown, at 10 Downing Street, his central London office and residence. Indoor social gatherings were banned at the time.

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The prime minister was reportedly given a cake as his wife led staff in a happy birthday chorus, he said.

Johnson’s office disputed it was a party, telling ITV: ‘A group of staff working at No 10 that day met briefly in the Cabinet Room after a meeting to wish the prime minister a happy birthday.”

“He was there less than 10 minutes,” he said.

ITV said there was another rally in Downing Street the day before his birthday. Johnson’s office said that was “totally untrue.”

Johnson gave various explanations for the parties’ previous allegations: First he said no rules had been broken, but then he apologized to the British people for the apparent hypocrisy of such gatherings.

Police officers guarding Downing Street were questioned by Gray and provided “extremely damning” evidence, the Telegraph newspaper reported, citing an unidentified source.

“Johnson has completely lost his authority,” Nick Timothy, who served as Downing Street chief of staff for Johnson’s Tory predecessor, Theresa May, wrote in the Telegraph.

“The collapse of Johnson’s authority is causing widespread political dysfunction and further danger to conservatives,” he said. “Johnson is no longer popular, he is no longer powerful.”

Johnson has denied an allegation that he was told a “bring your own booze” lockdown rally on May 20, 2020, which he believed was a business event, was inappropriate.

His former senior adviser Dominic Cummings – now a harsh critic – said on Monday he was responding in writing to Gray’s questions.

Toppling Johnson https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/how-uk-pm-johnson-could-be-ousted-by-unhappy-lawmakers-2022-01-19 would leave Britain in limbo for months just as the West grapples with the Ukraine crisis and the world’s fifth-largest economy grapples with a once-in-a-generation inflationary wave.

To trigger a leadership challenge https://www.Reuters.com/world/uk/first-rebellion-against-johnson-was-doomed-next-may-not-be-2022-01-21, 54 of 359 Tories Members of parliament must submit letters of censure.

The main rivals within the Conservative Party are Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak, 41, and Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, 46.

Johnson on Monday ordered an investigation into allegations of a lawmaker who said she was fired from a government cabinet post in part because her Muslim faith made her colleagues uncomfortable.

Nusrat Ghani, 49, who lost his job as junior transport minister in February 2020, told The Sunday Times that a ‘whip’ – a parliamentary discipline official – told him his ‘Muslimness’ had been raised like a problem. in his dismissal.

Chief Government Whip Mark Spencer said he was the person at the center of Ghani’s allegations. He said they were completely false and defamatory.

“I never used those words attributed to me,” he said.

Johnson met with Ghani to discuss the “extremely serious” allegations in July 2020, a spokesman for the Prime Minister’s Office said on Sunday.

Downing Street said when the allegations were first made, Johnson recommended that she make a formal complaint to Conservative campaign headquarters.

“She did not accept that offer,” Downing Street said.

Ghani’s allegation came after a fellow Tory said he would meet with police to discuss accusations that government whips tried to ‘blackmail’ lawmakers suspected of trying to force Johnson to leave office.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge and Paul Sandle; Editing by Kate Holton, Alex Richardson and Alison Williams)

Copyright 2022 Thomson Reuters.

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