PM’s apology for attending Downing Street party during lockdown is revealing in several ways
I want to apologise. I know that millions of people across this country have made extraordinary sacrifices over the last 18 months.
“I know the anguish they have been through – unable to mourn their relatives, unable to live their lives as they want or to do the things they love.
For the second time in recent week, the prime minister has been forced to do the thing that no politician – and certainly no prime minister – ever wants to do: say sorry. Last December, he did exactly the same thing in an attempt to draw the sting from the disclosure of a video, in which his senior aide, Allegra Stratton was filmed joking with other officials about a party in the Downing Street media centre. This time, the allegations are more serious, and the jeopardy facing Johnson greater. It showed on his ashen face as he began delivering his statement to a packed and silent House of Commons.
“I know the rage they feel with me and with the government I lead when they think in Downing Street itself the rules are not being properly followed by the people who make the rules. And though I cannot anticipate the conclusions of the current inquiry, I have learned enough to know there were things we simply did not get right and I must take responsibility.
“No 10 is a big department with a garden as an extension of the office which has been in constant use because of the role of fresh air in stopping the virus.
“When I went into that garden just after six on May 20 2020, to thank groups of staff before going back into my office 25 minutes later to continue working, I believed implicitly that this was a work event.
