Source - Chopper - Daily Telegraph 15/06/23
Afternoon,
Well, no one expected that.
Boris Johnson faces having his parliamentary pass removed after being found to have “deliberately” misled MPs over partygate.
The House of Commons privileges committee also said in its long-awaited 30,000 word report that a 90-day Commons suspension would have been proposed if Johnson were still an MP.
Johnson hit back, accusing the committee of being a “kangaroo court” in a 1,700 word response, with its seven MPs accused of delivering the “final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination”.
Read the full blow-by-blow account of another extraordinary morning in Westminster at our live blog.
The reaction from moderate Tories, who are certainly no friends of Johnson, has been one of shock.
One said the 90-day ban was "a bit over the top". Another said it was "vindictive". But a third waved the report and said to me: "Slam dunk."
It is the second-longest ban in modern political history – only shorter than the six-month ban handed out to former Labour MP Keith Vaz for offering to buy cocaine for two male prostitutes.
It did not have to be like this. From the beginning, Johnson has completely cocked up his dealings with the privileges committee.
I was the only journalist sounding the alarm over what could happen this time last year. Number 10 did not listen.
Johnson could have whipped against the motion that set up the inquiry, which said he had probably misled the House in April last year. He didn't.
Johnson could have whipped his MPs to vote against the appointment of Harriet Harman in late June last year, two weeks after I revealed she had tweeted about the partygate controversy and suggested he had misled MPs. He didn't.
Johnson could have adopted a more conciliatory tone and admitted that he had "recklessly" but not "deliberately" misled Parliament in March this year. He didn't.
There is so much that Johnson could have done to ameliorate his situation; instead he just made matters worse.
Johnson's intemperate explosion on Friday night has just made matters worse.
A small positive for him is that the four Tory MPs on the committee voted against expelling him from the Commons, instead backing the 90-day ban, which is four times longer than they had planned before Johnson's attacks on it.
Now his former Tory MP colleagues are set to vote on Monday to accept the report. They will almost certainly do so by a wide margin, despite upset from some local party members and the risk of deselection in some seats.
And the committee itself is set to draw up another report which will set out its criticisms of other MPs who called it a "kangaroo court".
But it will fall short of naming names or recommending sanctions, I understand.
One senior Johnson ally told me: "The Special Report they are sending to the Speaker is the next battleground. It’s clearly where they are going after other critics."
There could also be unwelcome precedents for the Government.
The MP ally added: "A new precedent is being set for unknowingly misleading the House, which will now allow for any minister to be held in contempt for unknowingly misleading the House. They will use it immediately on Suella Braverman, for example, and possibly Steve Barclay."
Johnson went 'full-Trump' in his battle with Parliament today. And it was the day that MPs in the Commons said they had had enough. One committee member told me privately: "This is the only thing that stands between us and the mob."
The problem for them is that the 90-day ban is excessive. And that risks making Johnson into a martyr who will haunt the Tories for years. Johnson might be down – but he is certainly not out.
Cheerio
Chopper
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