UK Police Service has launched an inquiry into “a number of events” at Johnson’s Downing Street office and other government buildings because they met the force’s criteria for investigating the “most serious and flagrant” breaches of coronavirus rules, Commissioner Cressida Dick told a committee of the London Assembly, the capital’s local government council.
The “partygate” scandal threatens to derail U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s administration, after he attended some lockdown parties.
Johnson is facing calls to resign amid revelations that he or his staff attended a series of social events during periods of lockdown when most social gatherings were banned in England, forcing average citizens to miss weddings, funerals and birthdays as friends and relatives died alone in hospitals.
The gatherings are already being investigated by a senior civil servant whose report has been anxiously awaited by lawmakers and the public.
“As a result, firstly, of the information provided by the Cabinet Office inquiry team and, secondly, my officers’ own assessment, I can confirm that the Met is now investigating a number of events that took place at Downing Street and Whitehall in the last two years in relation to potential breaches of COVID-19 regulations,” Dick told the committee.
Even before the police investigation was announced, Johnson was fighting off new allegations of rule breaking aimed directly at him.
