U.K. PM Boris Johnson refuses to resign over COVID lockdown parties

Boris Johnson rejected opposition calls to resign but accepted that a rule that ministers should lose their jobs if they had knowingly misled parliament applied to him.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday rejected opposition calls to resign for attending lockdown parties but accepted that a rule that ministers should lose their jobs if they had knowingly misled parliament applied to him.

Johnson, who in 2019 won the biggest Conservative majority in more than 30 years, is braced for the publication of an official investigation into claims that there were multiple boozy Downing Street parties during lockdowns. He told parliament no rules were broken.

It was not immediately clear when the results of that investigation by Cabinet Office official Sue Gray would be published, especially as police have opened their own investigation.

Asked by the opposition Labour Party Keir Starmer leader if the ministerial code, which says that ministers who had knowingly misled parliament should offer to resign, applied to him Johnson said: “Of course.”

“If he’d misled parliament, he must resign,” Starmer told parliament. “Will you now resign?”

“No,” Johnson replied.

He said he could not speak about investigations into the alleged parties. Johnson said his government was focused on driving economic growth and leading the Western response to the Ukraine crisis.

Johnson has given a variety of explanations about the parties: first he said no rules had been broken but then he apologized to the British people for the apparent hypocrisy of such gatherings.