Thread by @GeorgePeretzQC

Good reminder that (shades of Watergate and many other career-ending scandals) the issue of whether Johnson deliberately misled the HoC in the cover-up is at the heart of the matter.

https://twitter.com/alexanderhorne1/status/1492475755464437766

I’d add that I cannot see how this particular claim on 1/12/21 - given his already admitted participation in and hence knowledge of some of the “gatherings” (the key concept) - could have been anything other than deliberately misleading.

As Alexander says, the constitutional position when Ministers deliberately mislead the HoC is quite clear. They have to resign.

And that isn’t a technical nicety: just as rules against deliberately misleading a court are fundamental to our justice system, so the rule that Ministers do not deliberately mislead Parliament is fundamental to Parliament’s (and so our) ability to hold the executive to account.

I’d add, though, that the fact that the law doesn’t prescribe any particular consequences to MPs for a criminal breach resulting in a fixed-penalty notice doesn’t remove the *political* seriousness of a finding of such a breach.

Johnson was (rightly) among those who urged us to take these rules far more seriously than (say) parking rules. To make immense sacrifices in keeping to the rules so as to protect everyone else against a deadly disease.

Sue Gray put the point well.

It is true that the *law* would not require Johnson to resign either for lying to Parliament or for breaching Covid rules. No court would or could hear such a claim.

But our constitution is, as we are often told, a political as much as a legal one.

Those who regard that as one of its great virtues - probably most Tory MPs - also have to accept the high responsibility that comes with that. In particular, that they have a duty firmly to enforce the political standards on which our constitution depends.

Also, on the often-heard claim that a Covid regulation fixed-penalty notice is like a parking fine: as Adam points out, that is (in law) false.

https://twitter.com/AdamWagner1/status/1489178581884358657