London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Thursday, Oct 09, 2025

Partygate may prove to be scandal that will not go away for Boris Johnson

Partygate may prove to be scandal that will not go away for Boris Johnson

Analysis: Scotland Yard issuing fixed-penalty notices will only revive doubts in PM’s leadership among Tory backbenchers
It was an electrifying development that has given renewed hope to some Tory rebels hoping to oust the prime minister.

After all the bluff and bluster from Boris Johnson, the Metropolitan police announcement of 20 fixed-penalty notices for people over Downing Street parties is concrete confirmation that the authorities believe the rules were broken during lockdown.

Barely four months ago, the prime minister insisted this was not the case, telling MPs after details of one party were revealed by the Mirror: “What I can tell the right hon and learned gentleman is that all guidance was followed completely in No 10.”

Since then, many more parties have come to light, and Johnson has been forced to apologise for them.

Despite this, No 10 is clearly hoping to ride out the remainder of the scandal by refusing to accept that any wrongdoing took place.

The Ukraine war, allowing the prime minister to play the role of statesman abroad, has given his premiership new momentum, which he and his aides are desperate to hang on to.

Johnson’s operation is also hiding behind a veil of privacy by saying they will refuse to name the 20 people who are to receive penalties for partying on the Downing Street estate.

Tory MPs opposed to Johnson’s leadership, however, do not believe this position will hold, suggesting No 10 has learned nothing from previous sleaze scandals where denial, cover-up and stonewalling gave way to a late-stage U-turn.

They think the prime minister will have to come clean if senior figures in his government have been issued with penalties and take responsibility for creating the culture in which this was allowed to take place.

Already on Tuesday, Downing Street was forced to say it would in fact reveal if Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, receives a fine.

In addition, if Johnson himself is personally issued with a penalty in the coming days or weeks, No 10 has accepted that it will have to reveal this significant fact.

If this critical moment comes to pass, there are still dozens of Tories who believe Johnson should take the honourable step of resigning.

Even loyalists such as Robert Buckland, a former lord chancellor sacked by the prime minister last year, highlighted on Tuesday that the prime minister is not above the law. “I think any head of government who has been found to have infringed the law has got some explaining to do,” he said.

Behind closed doors, there are many Tory MPs who still believe – perhaps through wishful thinking – that this will be the tipping point of his premiership, despite the global uncertainties over the Russian invasion.

Moreover, when all the fixed-penalty notices have been issued and the Met investigation is over, Johnson will still have to get through the publication of Sue Gray’s full report, which will go into more detail about alleged wrongdoing at each of the various parties.

Some Tory MPs have come back onboard with the government, such as Andrew Bridgen, who previously submitted a letter of no confidence but on Tuesday urged colleagues to “get behind” the prime minister.

However, there are other signs that Johnson’s government remains weak and divided, with Partygate having seriously undermined his authority – perhaps permanently.

The whips were unable to stop a revolt of Tory backbenchers over the release of intelligence advice about Evgeny Lebedev’s peerage, despite the government clearly arguing the release would be a breach of protocol.

The combination of the lockdown parties and the Owen Paterson sleaze scandal has left the Conservative rank and file in parliament unable to trust their leadership to make the right judgments on the issue of standards. And on this occasion, they refused to vote to block the publication of the peerage advice.

It is an ominous sign for Johnson if he can no longer command his party – with a majority of 80 – to troop through the voting lobbies for him.

The rebels may well not get the requisite 54 letters required for a confidence vote, and even if they do, Johnson may win the subsequent vote on whether he should stay on, particularly as Rishi Sunak’s badly received spring statement last week leaves them short of a convincing successor.

But the fact remains that trust in Johnson’s leadership remains low, even on his own side, and that leads to the conditions in which a prime minister loses control of his own party, finding it very difficult to govern.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
×