Many constituents have contacted me about the shameful reports of No10 parties and breaching lockdown rules while the nation was locked down and generally abiding by the severe but necessary restrictions on our daily lives.
They are rightly incredibly angry. I share your anger and outrage. I understand the pain many of you in Cardiff North still carry as you followed the rules when your loved ones fell ill, often meaning they tragically passed away alone. And while people across the country continued to make huge sacrifices, sometimes never seeing their loved ones again, the Prime Minister and Downing Street staff broke the rules repeatedly and had several parties.
They’ve lied to us. They’ve laughed at us. They’ve joked about covering it up. This deceit is unforgivable and the British public have had enough. Today the Prime Minister was forced to admit what we already knew. His forced apology and denial he knew he attended a party are nothing short of insulting to all those who suffered unimaginable loss and loneliness.
As my constituent put it, the Prime Minister hasn’t been caught cheating his way to the front of the tuck shop queue at Eton. These breaches are serious and this recklessness costs lives. And yet he’s been in hiding for days, failing to answer basic questions to which we deserve truthful answers.
It is disappointing that the report compiled by Sue Gray is incomplete and still doesn’t give a full account of what happened. However even in its reduced and redacted form, it reveals the scale of rule breaking and the breath taking arrogance of those people who make the rules not feeling an obligation to abide by them.
We are now waiting for the police investigation to be completed into the many parties that we now know took place. I will be pressing for full details of this investigation, and Sue Gray’s report, to be published, and with my colleagues in Parliament demand that Boris Johnson finally accepts some responsibility for his actions and stands down from the position he has so woefully disgraced. He cannot keep avoiding responsibility and the Tory MPs who have declined to take the necessary steps to force him to go must now also accept their culpability in endorsing his continuance as Prime Minister.
The Prime Minister and his government may think that the rules don’t apply to them, but the Labour Party will continue to hold them to account. This is a message to the Prime Minister on behalf of Cardiff North. We cannot go on with a Prime Minister who is socially distanced from the truth and treats us all with contempt. Your position is no longer tenable. Your party is full of liars and con-artists and you’re the biggest of them all.