Boris Johnson: Opposition call for further sanctions against disgraced former PM

The former Prime Minister wrote a furious riposte to the findings, but has already resigned rather than face his sanctions.

Boris Johnson was last night facing the end of his political career after a damning privileges committee report that recommended not only a 90-day suspension but essentially banning him from parliament.

After a 14-month investigation, a cross-party group of MPs found he committed ‘repeated contempts’ of Parliament, and recommended that he should not receive the pass granting access to Parliament.

The former Prime Minister had quit the Commons on Friday night after seeing the findings, prompting him to cry conspiracy and label the committee a “kangaroo court”.

Boris Johnson is seen on his morning run on June 15

Not going quietly, Mr Johnson launched a concerted verbal attack on the findings, albeit one that was loudly refuted by numerous Tory MPs, not least due to the privileges committee being predominantly conservatives.

Just 40 weeks ago, Mr Johnson was Prime Minister and enjoyed a big majority. He is now out the Government, out the Commons, and leaving in disgrace.

The report found Mr Johnson had committed “repeated contempts” of Parliament, while deliberately and misleading the House over partygate. The former Prime Minister had claimed to have no knowledge of events, insisted the rules were followed, and refused to explain himself until the Sue Gray report was published.

The MPs had provisionally agreed a suspension long enough to potentially trigger a by-election in Mr Johnson’s Uxbridge and South Ruislip constituency before he resigned in protest at the findings.

It was last orders for Boris Johnson as the committee recommended banning him from having a pass.

But they said he committed further contempts by undermining the democratic processes of the Commons and being “complicit in the campaign of abuse and attempted intimidation of the committee”.

On top of the five ways in which they said he misled the House, they found his denials were “so disingenuous” they were deliberate attempts to mislead MPs as they hit out at the “frequency with which he closed his mind to the truth”.

They also concluded he committed a “very serious contempt” by breaching confidentiality requirements in his resignation statement by criticising the committee’s provisional findings.

The committee said its provisional findings were that Mr Johnson deliberately misled the House and should be suspended for a period longer than 10 sitting days.

But following his resignation statement and criticism of the committee, the MPs said that “if Mr Johnson were still a Member he should be suspended from the service of the House for 90 days for repeated contempts and for seeking to undermine the parliamentary process”.

While most in Westminster were surprised by the severity of the findings, opposition parties demanded they go further still. The SNP Westminster leader Stephen Flynn called for the removing of the taxpayer-funded allowance he gets as a former Prime Minister, scrapping his honours list, and recouping the legal fees he charged to the public purse.This was echoed by the Liberal Democrats, who also called for Mr Sunak to strip Mr Johnson of his ex-Prime Minister allowance. Former Prime Ministers are entitled to claim up to £115,000 a year to fund office costs for life.

Scottish affairs spokesperson Christine Jardine MP added: “This report should be the final nail in the coffin for Boris Johnson’s political career and the Scottish Conservatives who endorsed and defended him.”

Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner urged Mr Johnson to “grow up”, comparing him to a “pound shop Donald Trump”.

She added: “I think the Privileges Committee report is pretty damning. It's serious. Boris Johnson is not only a law breaker but a liar, and he is not fit for public office.

“Actually a decent public servant would have done the honourable thing and would have had a little bit of humility, and would have apologised to the British public for what they put them through.”

The committee had considered whether it should have recommended expelling Mr Johnson from the Commons.

During discussion of the report’s final findings, the SNP’s Allan Dorans and Labour’s Yvonne Fovargue backed the stronger sanction.

But the amendment was opposed by the Conservative members: Sir Charles Walker, Andy Carter, Alberto Costa and Sir Bernard Jenkin, whom Mr Johnson has urged to resign from the committee over his own alleged rule-breach.

Mr Johnson meanwhile went down swinging, calling the findings a “deranged conclusion”, and accusing the Tory-majority group of MPs he has repeatedly sought to disparage of lying.

He called the committee led by Labour veteran Harriet Harman “beneath contempt” and claimed its 14-month investigation had delivered “what is intended to be the final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination”.

Mr Johnson went through the committee’s findings one by one, repeating his lines of defence, including that he believed farewell events held during lockdown restrictions “were reasonably necessary for work purposes”.

“For the committee now to say that all such events – ‘thank yous’ and birthdays – were intrinsically illegal is ludicrous,” he wrote.

He also once again tore into Sir Bernard, who he has already urged to resign following a report that the MP went to a drinks party in Parliament while Covid restrictions were in place in 2020.

“The hypocrisy is rank. Like Harriet Harman, he should have recused himself from the inquiry, since he is plainly conflicted.”

Mr Johnson took particular offence at the panel’s findings about his knowledge of a Christmas cheese and wine gathering in December 2020.

“Perhaps the craziest assertion of all is the committee’s Mystic Meg claim that I saw the December 18 event with my own eyes,” he said.

His ally Nigel Adams also stepped down and his arch-supporter Nadine Dorries has announced she will go too, though her demands for answers about why she was denied a peerage before she formally quits as an MP look set to prolong the by-election struggle for the Prime Minister.