Memories of December’s past. Boris Johnson & All Yesterday’s Parties.
Boris Johnson is at the COVID Inquiry this week
The Tories are currently reliably 20% behind Labour in opinion polls. They have not been ahead since December 2021. This week marks the anniversary media expose of Boris Johnson’s December 2020 Christmas parties which under then lockdown laws were almost certainly illegal
Boris Johnson when he was the elected leader of a political party didn’t really seem that interested in doing the job. By contrast he was and no doubt is a great enthusiast for another kind of party-the one involving champagne and nibbles (tbh sausage rolls and crisps don’t cut it). Sonia Purnell’s biography of Johnson, Just Boris, has numerous accounts of parties he has attended. A lot were thrown by his erstwhile employers the Spectator and the Telegraph. When he was married to Marina Wheeler and lived in Islington he was also, according to Purnell, a frequent attender at dinner parties.
When he was elected London Mayor in 2008 he threw his own parties(paid for by the taxpayer obviously) and in that year The Tatler described him as ‘party viagra’.
Johnson did not deny that a Christmas party was held at Downing St in December 2020, the one that started off the whole parties investigation. The Daily Mirror published a picture of the Christmas Quiz which took place via Zoom on 15th December 2020 which clearly shows an open bottle of champagne. No problem with that except in the context of the times when COVID laws banned social mixing in London. It clearly was not really a work event either but a social quiz.
Johnson’s evasions about all this eventually led to his resignation as an MP
What though of pre-restrictions 2019? Johnson had just won an Election and was celebrating.
According to the perhaps not totally reliable source of Tom Bower (Boris Johnson, the Gambler) on Friday December 13th 2019 after returning to Downing St from Buckingham Palace where he had seen the Queen, Johnson headed to Brown’s hotel off Piccadilly. The hotel is owned by Brexiteer Rocco Forte and a celebration party was being held.
One party however was not enough for Johnson. He then went to Evgeny Lebedev’s ‘traditional’ Xmas party which was in his house overlooking Regents Park. Unlimited caviar and champagne were available. In 2020 Johnson made Lebedev a Peer..
One wonders what Johnson has planned for Christmas 2023. We can be sure he won’t be paying
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