[ad_1]
Boris Johnson, the previous prime minister of Britain, has once more been referred to the police by a authorities workplace to evaluate claims that he might have additional violated coronavirus rules, the Cupboard Workplace stated in an announcement on Tuesday.
Mr. Johnson, who’s presently visiting Texas to foyer for Republican assist for Ukraine, was fined final 12 months whereas nonetheless in workplace for breaking Covid guidelines in 2020, one among a collection of scandals throughout his tumultuous time period that ultimately led to his resignation final summer season.
He had confronted a barrage of criticism over gatherings held at his residence and authorities workplaces throughout strict coronavirus lockdowns, which his authorities applied in 2020 and 2021 whereas the nation was struggling via the worst of the pandemic.
The scandal quickly got here to be often called “partygate.” An investigation into various the gatherings discovered that members of his employees had held events that violated pandemic restrictions, and the police fined Mr. Johnson this spring for having damaged lockdown guidelines at Downing Avenue.
At a parliamentary listening to in March over whether or not he lied to lawmakers about lockdown-busting events, Mr. Johnson denied being untruthful however struggled to justify a few of the deceptive statements he made. Parliament has not but issued a report on the matter.
However The Occasions of London has reported that the newest referral to the police is linked to new allegations about his conduct in Downing Avenue in addition to a number of visits to the prime minister’s nation residence, Chequers, that got here to gentle throughout preparations for a public inquiry into the pandemic.
Britain’s Cupboard Workplace didn’t make clear the precise circumstances however stated in an announcement on Tuesday that it had referred the small print of a possible breach “to the related authorities and it’s now a matter for them.”
London’s Metropolitan Police and the Thames Valley Police, which oversee the world together with the prime minister’s nation home, have each had the case referred to them to analyze.
The Metropolitan Police stated they have been assessing data that they had acquired from the Cupboard Workplace final week that “pertains to potential breaches of the Well being Safety Laws between June 2020 and Could 2021 at Downing Avenue.”
A spokesman for Mr. Johnson instructed the BBC that the previous prime minister denied any wrongdoing. However the newest allegations have already drawn swift condemnation from his political opponents and from the relations of those that died of the coronavirus, a lot of whom had lengthy been vital of Mr. Johnson’s method to the pandemic.
Covid-19 Bereaved Households for Justice, a gaggle that represents those that died from the coronavirus and that goals to carry public officers concerned within the nation’s response to account, stated the brand new revelations “make a grim mockery of Boris Johnson’s claims that he didn’t break his personal lockdown guidelines.”
“His legacy is one among mendacity, full contempt for the bizarre individuals he was supposed to guard, and above all presiding over the deaths of almost 200k individuals,” the organization said in a statement posted to Twitter. “If he had any respect he’s quietly step again from public life and replicate on the ache and struggling he has inflicted.”
[ad_2]
Source link
