Boris Johnson brushes off Tory revolt over
Dominic Cummings
PM also refuses to allow top scientific advisers to
talk about chief aide at daily No 10 briefing
Rowena
Mason and Vikram Dodd
Thu 28 May
2020 21.19 BSTLast modified on Thu 28 May 2020 23.55 BST
Boris
Johnson has brushed aside a growing revolt of almost 100 of his own MPs and
defied ongoing calls for Dominic Cummings to be sacked, despite a police
investigation that failed to exonerate him for a potential breach of lockdown.
The prime
minister was again besieged by questions about his chief adviser as the crisis
overshadowed his decision to cautiously ease the lockdown in England, which
will require millions of citizens to abide by the letter and spirit of new
guidelines.
Johnson
said the matter was closed after Durham police concluded Cummings may have
broken lockdown rules but decided they would take no action against him.
The prime
minister also blocked journalists from asking his top scientific advisers, Prof
Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance, about their expert opinion on the matter.
Cummings’
actions remained in the spotlight for a sixth day, however, after the police concluded
that his family trip to Barnard Castle, a Teeside beauty spot, may have been in
breach of “stay at home” guidance and would have led officers to tell him to
turn around had he been stopped.
A police
examination of the facts surrounding Cummings’ time in the north-east, 260
miles from his London home, has concluded that no further action will be taken.
The force said it would not issue fines retrospectively.
Cummings
has denied any wrongdoing following a joint investigation by the Guardian and
the Daily Mirror, and has received Johnson’s full backing since the details
were published last weekend.
Deep
discontent among Tory MPs has grown over the course of the week, however, in
response to public anger. Ninety-nine have either called for Cummings to be
sacked, demanded an apology or otherwise criticised his conduct.
The figures
suggest nearing half of the party’s backbenchers are unhappy with Cummings’
actions, while the vast majority of the “payroll vote” – government ministers,
whips, parliamentary private secretaries and those in party positions – are
supportive of Johnson’s position or silent on it.
Tory MPs to
break their silence most recently include Karen Bradley, a former culture
secretary under Theresa May, who said she was not convinced by his explanation.
“I can well
understand that any parent wants to protect their child, and have enormous
sympathy with acting to do that. But so much of the account goes beyond that
simple human instinct and suggests that there were breaches of the rules to
avoid some of the hardships that many have endured,” she said.
“Mr Cummings is, in my view, causing significant
damage to the work that the government are doing to get us through the
pandemic. I hope that he will recognise this and consider his position.”
Karen Bradley
Two former
work and pensions secretaries also weighed in. Esther McVey, like Cummings an
ardent Brexiter, said she would have resigned her position had she been in the
same situation, and Stephen Crabb said Cummings was “wrong to arrogantly brush
away the allegations when they first appeared”.
“He just
made matters worse. People have got every right to ask what on earth he was
doing in Durham and Barnard Castle during lockdown. I would have preferred to
see the cabinet secretary do a proper inquiry into the allegations and for
Cummings to step aside to allow that to happen,” he said.
Johnson
avoided any mention of his chief adviser’s name during the daily No 10 press
briefing. He also twice prevented questions from journalists who wanted to know
whether Whitty, the chief medical officer for England, and Vallance, the chief
scientific adviser, believed Cummings had stuck to the rules.
He
interjected to say he wanted to protect the two scientists “from what I think
would be an unfair and unnecessary attempt to ask any political questions”. On
a third time of asking, Whitty and Vallance said they did not want to get
involved in politics.
Whitty
said: “The desire to not get pulled into politics is far stronger on the part
of Sir Patrick and me than it is in the prime minister.” Vallance added: “I’m a
civil servant, I’m politically neutral, I don’t want to get involved in
politics at all.”
Their
silence on the matter will fuel suspicions that they are not willing to back up
the prime minister’s assertions that he believes Cummings did not break the
lockdown rules.
There have
been questions over the absence of the UK’s two most senior experts from the
daily press conference since news broke of Cummings’ trip from London to Durham
while his wife was showing possible coronavirus symptoms.
Whitty and
Vallance were due to appear at Monday’s press conference but were replaced at
the last minute by Prof Pauline Doyle, an expert from Public Health England.
The deputy
chief medical officer, Jenny Harries, previously answered questions about
Cummings actions. “If you’re symptomatic, you stay at home, take yourself out
of society as quickly as you can and stay there, unless there’s extreme risk to
life,” she said.
Cummings
said in his statement on Monday that he suspected he and his wife may have
contracted coronavirus, but that neither of them had classic symptoms before
they travelled to Durham to seek childcare if needed.
Labour also
kept the pressure on Johnson. Keir Starmer, the party leader, said it was
“extraordinary that the prime minister stopped the scientists being able to
answer a question put to them by journalists”.
Answering
questions on a virtual Q&A with voters, Starmer said this reflected badly
on Johnson: “The government has been saying for weeks on end, this is about
transparency, it’s about answering whatever questions you’ve got. And then on
the question people want to hear an answer on, he stops them answering. It’s
the wrong thing to do.
“I don’t
think he’s going to have impressed anybody with that tonight. I don’t think
he’s impressed anybody over the past week.”
Cummings’
actions and No 10’s defence of them had stirred something “personal and
emotional” in the public, Starmer said. “Lots of people are beating themselves
up because they’re not doing something for somebody they love, and that’s why
when they saw Cummings apparently saying ‘that’s your rule, but I don’t
necessarily have to follow it,’ it really struck not a party political chord
but something deep in everybody.”
Nicola
Sturgeon, the first minister of Scotland and SNP leader, said she wanted to
move on from talking about Cummings, but also made clear she thought he “should
no longer be in post”.
“That is a
matter for the prime minister,” she said. “But I think if the prime minister is
putting the integrity and trust in the vital public health message that he is
seeking to communicate and all of us are seeking to communicate first then he
will take action that means Dominic Cummings does not continue to distract from
that.”
A No 10
spokesperson said: “The police have made clear they are taking no action
against Mr Cummings over his self-isolation and that going to Durham did not
breach the regulations. The prime minister has said he believes Mr Cummings
behaved reasonably and legally given all the circumstances and he regards this
issue as closed.”
Tory anger at Dominic Cummings grows as 61 MPs
defy Boris Johnson
MPs break ranks to criticise PM’s chief of staff, with
44 calling for him to quit or be sacked
Rowena
Mason Deputy political editor
Wed 27 May
2020 23.15 BSTFirst published on Wed 27 May 2020 20.55 BST
More than
60 Conservative MPs have continued to defy Boris Johnson’s calls to “move on”
from the Dominic Cummings crisis as a senior minister broke ranks to accuse the
aide of inconsistencies in his account of his behaviour during lockdown.
The
intervention of Penny Mordaunt deepened the turmoil within government following
revelations by the Guardian and Daily Mirror that Cummings had travelled 260
miles to his family estate in Durham with his wife suffering coronavirus
symptoms.
The former chancellor
Sajid Javid also said the journey was not “necessary or justified” as the
number of backbenchers calling for Cummings to resign or be sacked grew to 44,
with a total of 61 Tory MPs weighing in to criticise him.
Two of
those condemning Cummings are government whips.
Mordaunt, a
former defence secretary who now holds the ministerial post of paymaster
general, said there were “inconsistencies” in Cummings’ account and apologised
for how recent days have “undermined key public health messages”.
In an email
sent to constituents, Mordaunt said Cummings’ continued position was a “matter
for the prime minister” but she could “fully understand how angry people are”
and believed there was no doubt he “took risks”.
Fury among
Conservative MPs has grown by the day, after an investigation that also
revealed how Cummings took his family on a 60-mile round trip to a beauty spot
in Barnard Castle, which he says was to test whether his eyesight was good
enough for him to drive back to London.
At an
appearance before the liaison committee of senior MPs, Johnson declined to
answer most questions about Cummings, saying repeatedly it was time to “move
on”.
But his
pleas fell flat as Javid, who stood down as chancellor after clashing with
Cummings, joined the list of those criticising the No 10 aide.
In a letter
to a constituent reported by the Bromsgrove Standard, Javid said: “I do not
believe Mr Cummings’ journey to County Durham to isolate on his family’s estate
was necessary or justified. I remain unconvinced his visit to Barnard Castle
could be considered reasonable.
“I was also
deeply concerned by his decision to return to Downing Street directly after
coming into contact with a family member who was ill, potentially with
coronavirus.”
Other
Tories who were unconvinced either by Johnson’s appearance before the liaison
committee or Cummings’ attempts to explain himself on Monday included the
former minister George Freeman.
Freeman, a
former Downing Street policy chief for Theresa May, said he thought Cummings
“had to go” after he received about 1,000 emails from constituents “expressing
outrage at the PM’s chief of staff breaking the lockdown and not apologising” .
He added:
“It’s clear that public anger at the betrayal of their trust and compliance now
risks a collapse of respect for [government] public health advice.”
One
backbencher, Giles Watling, tweeted: “I’ve been listening to the PM in the
liaison committee. I applaud him for sticking by his man, but I’m afraid Mr Cummings
should stand down. His continued presence at the heart of government at this
time is an unwanted distraction.”
Two
government whips, responsible for discipline in the party, also made critical
comments about Cummings to their constituents. Mike Freer, who is comptroller
of the household, said he “certainly would not have taken the actions Mr
Cummings did”, while Maria Caulfield, an assistant government whip and nurse
who returned to care for Covid-19 patients, told one of her constituents that Cummings
had done “untold damage to the spirit of the law”.
Mordaunt is
the second and most senior government minister to have criticised Cummings,
after Douglas Ross resigned as Scotland minister on Tuesday.
“Other
families have been faced with the same situation as Mr Cummings and chosen to
stay put,” she wrote to constituents in a letter seen by the Guardian.
“Despite Mr
Cummings’ statement [on Monday], I am personally still not clear of the facts.
There are some inconsistencies in his account of events and the reasons behind
it. I am not clear about when he would have been symptomatic and on what dates
he should have been in isolation. Or whether it was appropriate he drove home
at the time he did.
“There is
no doubt he took risks – refuelling at a petrol station is a risk to oneself
and to others, which presumably he did. I understand there may have been other
issues which would have made other options to care for his child in London
impossible.
“What is
clear is that the scenes of the last few days will have undermined key public
health messages. I deeply regret this and am very sorry for it.”
The former
defence secretary said people were “reasonable and sympathetic” about the
difficult choices facing families and highlighted that the public may not know
all the reasons why other courses of action were not open to him.
But she
added: “In all of this though is also our obligations to others too. It is
because of that shared responsibility and the public making those sacrifices
that we have reduced the infection rate. The rules and those obligations apply
to all of us. We cannot thank people enough for all they have done.
“Perhaps my
deepest regret in all of this is that it must be a distraction to efforts to
combat coronavirus and the many other issues the government is still having to
deal with. So much else has happened in the last few days, including a serious
incursion by China into India.”
Mordaunt
does not call for Cummings to resign in her letter, and it is understood she is
not demanding that he goes. Her letter was sent in her capacity as a
constituency MP, rather than as a government minister. But her comments are the
most critical to come from a senior member of Johnson’s team.
Late on
Wednesday the former home secretary Amber Rudd joined the dozens of
Conservatives calling on Cummings to go. The former MP told ITV’s Peston: “He
should quit because he’s making things worse. People have been great during the
lockdown. In a really difficult period, they have complied. And now they’re
confused and that makes them angry and I think that will have consequences.
“So when he
thinks, as any of us working in government must, ‘am I adding here, am I
helping?’ he can only conclude that his presence is making things worse at a
time when we’re already in a crisis.”
Johnson and
most of his cabinet ministers have stood behind Cummings, saying his actions
were legal and reasonable, and something that any father would do out of
concern for their child’s welfare.
Danny
Kruger, a former No 10 aide and new Conservative MP, raised the stakes in
Cummings’ defence by telling colleagues in a note that demands for his
resignation were tantamount to a vote of no confidence in the prime minister.
At the
liaison committee, Johnson said he had seen evidence proving some of the
allegations made against Cummings are false, but he refused to publish that
evidence or hand it over to the cabinet secretary. His chief adviser has
strenuously denied claims he returned to Durham on 19 April, in what would have
been another potential breach of the guidelines on travelling.
But Johnson
refused calls by the chair of the public accounts committee, Meg Hillier, to
release that evidence to the cabinet secretary, Mark Sedwill, or for it to be
published.
Johnson
said: “I think, actually, that it would not be doing my job if I were now to
shuffle this problem into the hands of officials who, as I think the public
would want, working flat out to deal with coronavirus.”
Johnson has
also sought to blame the media for misreporting of Cummings’ actions, despite
No 10 having weeks to respond to allegations against him. One senior cabinet
source told the Guardian that they disagreed with the prime minister’s attacks
on the media for pursuing the Cummings story, saying the press should not be
blamed for doing its job.
Attempting
to defuse public anger, Robert Jenrick, the communities secretary, said on
Tuesday that anyone could do the same as Cummings in similar circumstances,
even though his actions have provoked uproar, with polls suggesting that the
majority of people believe he should resign.
“If there
are no other options, if you don’t have ready access to childcare, then you can
do as Dominic Cummings chose to do,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
However,
Jenrick said it was not possible for any fines already issued to people for
driving to seek childcare to be reviewed, contrary to suggestions from Matt Hancock,
the health secretary, on Tuesday. “There isn’t going to be a formal review.
It’s for the police to decide whether to impose fines under the law,” Jenrick
said.
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