A senior MP from Johnson’s conservative Tories on Thursday accused the government of putting pressure on parliamentarians from within its own ranks to prevent an internal party vote of no confidence. A spokesman for Johnson’s office said they had no evidence to support such allegations.
In recent days, several MPs have been intimidated by members of the government who are said to be seeking or are suspected of seeking a vote on the prime minister’s party leadership, said William Wragg, chairman of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee. In his view, it is even partly a question of extortion. Because there are threats to withdraw investments from the constituencies of the deputies, which would be financed from public funds. He advised reporting these incidents to the House of Commons and the Metropolitan Police.
A spokesman for Johnson’s office said he condemned any form of harassment. Recently there have been efforts in the Conservative Party to depose Johnson. However, the threshold for a no-confidence vote against Johnson has not yet been reached. Several Conservative MPs want to wait until an investigation into the alleged violations of Corona requirements is completed.
Here, too, the pressure on Johnson continued to mount. According to ITV, Johnson’s private secretary Martin Reynolds has received an email from a senior government official asking him to stop the controversial garden party at Downing Street on May 20, 2020. He heard that internal investigator Sue Gray found such an email. It warned Reynolds that the party was probably best left off, ITV political reporter and presenter Robert Peston tweeted on Thursday. Johnson’s former adviser, Dominic Cummings, recently said he and at least one other adviser emailed Reynolds in an attempt to shut down the party. You would have warned that Corona rules would be broken. Johnson, on the other hand, agreed.
Johnson recently apologized repeatedly for various celebrations and possible misjudgments – including with Queen Elizabeth. However, he insisted that he had not lied. Nobody informed him that the party violated corona requirements. He had assumed that it had been a work meeting.
The latest revelations have caused the approval ratings for Johnson, who has been ailing for weeks because of various scandals, and also for his party to collapse. According to a new survey by the opinion research institute Ipsos, 57 percent of Britons consider Johnson a bad prime minister. That is six percentage points more than in the previous week.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid admitted on Sky News on Thursday that Conservative MP David Davis’ sensational call for his resignation in the House of Commons on Wednesday had “damaged” Johnson. He campaigned to wait for the internal investigation into the “Partygate” affair about lockdown parties at the seat of government, the result of which is expected next week. Former Brexit Minister David Davis shouted at his party colleague Johnson on Wednesday: “In God’s name – go!” Javid acknowledged that if senior official Gray’s report found him wrong, Johnson would have to resign. The regulations are clear. “Obviously, if a cabinet member, starting with the prime minister, breaks the law, they should not continue to serve in the cabinet,” Javid said. “There is no exception to this rule.”
Source: Nachrichten
