• Login
  • Register
The Daily Sceptic
No Result
View All Result
  • Articles
  • About
  • Archive
    • ARCHIVE
    • NEWS ROUND-UPS
  • Podcasts
  • Newsletter
  • Premium
  • Donate
  • Log In
The Daily Sceptic
No Result
View All Result

Partygate Shows Number 10 Didn’t Believe its Own Covid Hype, Says Former Supreme Court Judge

by Will Jones
29 May 2022 3:47 PM

Former Supreme Court Justice Jonathan Sumption in the Telegraph has weighed in on Partygate to say it exposes both the moral deficiencies of Boris Johnson and that those writing the lockdown rules clearly didn’t believe their own hype.

Partygate is not about parties. It never has been. It is about personal integrity and standards in public life. The Prime Minister can put the parties, the booze, the vomiting and all the rest of it behind him. What he cannot put behind him is the sort of person that he is.

Three points stand out from this grubby saga.

First, the Prime Minister personally decided to criminalise almost all social contact, and then behaved as if this did not apply to him or those around him. It really does not matter whether he thought that his parties were allowed by the regulations. Their rationale was that unnecessary human contact was so dangerous that it must be forbidden by law. He cannot have believed a word of it himself. Otherwise, he would surely not have exposed himself or his staff to this supposedly mortal danger, whether it was technically permitted by the regulations or not. He made his own risk assessment, while denying the rest of us the right to make ours.

Secondly, the Prime Minister has persistently tried to hide behind his subordinates. No one told him, he has said, that this kind of behaviour was not on. It speaks volumes about his moral values that he needed to be told.

This sort of special pleading is a cowardly reversal of ordinary lines of responsibility. Junior staff took their lead from him. They assumed, as Sue Gray points out, that if he was there it must be OK. More senior staff  had their doubts. But their only concern was that it would look bad if it got out (“a comms risk”). At the time they congratulated themselves that they had “got away with it.” Sue Gray goes out of her way to point out that their attitudes were not typical of the rest of Whitehall. We are entitled to ask what was different about Downing Street. The answer is that its occupants knew that the Prime Minister would share their instincts. Under a more exacting boss, they would have feared for their jobs.

The third point he makes is that Boris Johnson plainly misled Parliament in claiming not to have known about the parties, and that at a time of international crisis it is “more than ever important that we should be led by people of transparent stature and integrity, whom we can implicitly trust”.

Worth reading in full.

Tags: Boris JohnsonHypocrisyLockdownsLord Jonathan SumptionPartygateUkraine

Donate

We depend on your donations to keep this site going. Please give what you can.

Donate Today

Comment on this Article

You’ll need to set up an account to comment if you don’t already have one. We ask for a minimum donation of £5 if you'd like to make a comment or post in our Forums.

Sign Up
Previous Post

Young People Forced to Wait Till Next Year to Book a Driving Test

Next Post

NHS Website Quietly Changes its Monkeypox Guidance to Add a Requirement To Isolate

Subscribe
Login
Notify of
Please log in to comment

To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.

Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.

107 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

NEWSLETTER

View today’s newsletter

To receive our latest news in the form of a daily email, enter your details here:

DONATE

PODCAST

Special Episode of the Sceptic: Charles Cornish-Dale on Testosterone Decline, How the Modern World Is Making Us Sick and How to Save the West

by Richard Eldred
11 July 2025
2

LISTED ARTICLES

  • Most Read
  • Most Commented
  • Editor’s Picks

News Round-Up

14 July 2025
by Richard Eldred

Simple FOI Requests for Data Said to Back Non-existent Temperature Stations Refused on “Vexatious” Grounds by UK Met Office

14 July 2025
by Chris Morrison

What’s the Truth About POTS?

14 July 2025
by Jane Walkington

Met Office Climate Report More Scare Story Than Science

14 July 2025
by Paul Homewood

Welcome to the Land of the Free… Until You Express an Opinion

14 July 2025
by Mike Fairclough

Simple FOI Requests for Data Said to Back Non-existent Temperature Stations Refused on “Vexatious” Grounds by UK Met Office

31

Welcome to the Land of the Free… Until You Express an Opinion

15

Farmers Turfed off Prime Land As Net Zero Gold Rush Grips Landowners

32

What’s the Truth About POTS?

13

Tim Davie “Must Go” After Damning BBC Gaza Report

11

Friedrich Merz is the Most Incompetent Chancellor Germany Has Ever Seen

14 July 2025
by Eugyppius

What’s the Truth About POTS?

14 July 2025
by Jane Walkington

Met Office Climate Report More Scare Story Than Science

14 July 2025
by Paul Homewood

Raw Egg Nationalist: “Reproduction May Become Impossible”

13 July 2025
by Laurie Wastell

German Greens Demand Price Controls on Ice Cream Because Their Own Policies Have Made it Unaffordable

13 July 2025
by Tilak Doshi

POSTS BY DATE

May 2022
M T W T F S S
 1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
23242526272829
3031  
« Apr   Jun »

SOCIAL LINKS

Free Speech Union

NEWSLETTER

View today’s newsletter

To receive our latest news in the form of a daily email, enter your details here:

POSTS BY DATE

May 2022
M T W T F S S
 1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
23242526272829
3031  
« Apr   Jun »

DONATE

LISTED ARTICLES

  • Most Read
  • Most Commented
  • Editor’s Picks

News Round-Up

14 July 2025
by Richard Eldred

Simple FOI Requests for Data Said to Back Non-existent Temperature Stations Refused on “Vexatious” Grounds by UK Met Office

14 July 2025
by Chris Morrison

What’s the Truth About POTS?

14 July 2025
by Jane Walkington

Met Office Climate Report More Scare Story Than Science

14 July 2025
by Paul Homewood

Welcome to the Land of the Free… Until You Express an Opinion

14 July 2025
by Mike Fairclough

Simple FOI Requests for Data Said to Back Non-existent Temperature Stations Refused on “Vexatious” Grounds by UK Met Office

31

Welcome to the Land of the Free… Until You Express an Opinion

15

Farmers Turfed off Prime Land As Net Zero Gold Rush Grips Landowners

32

What’s the Truth About POTS?

13

Tim Davie “Must Go” After Damning BBC Gaza Report

11

Friedrich Merz is the Most Incompetent Chancellor Germany Has Ever Seen

14 July 2025
by Eugyppius

What’s the Truth About POTS?

14 July 2025
by Jane Walkington

Met Office Climate Report More Scare Story Than Science

14 July 2025
by Paul Homewood

Raw Egg Nationalist: “Reproduction May Become Impossible”

13 July 2025
by Laurie Wastell

German Greens Demand Price Controls on Ice Cream Because Their Own Policies Have Made it Unaffordable

13 July 2025
by Tilak Doshi

SOCIAL LINKS

Free Speech Union
  • Home
  • About us
  • Donate
  • Privacy Policy

Facebook

  • X

Instagram

RSS

Subscribe to our newsletter

© Skeptics Ltd.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password? Sign Up

Create New Account!

Fill the forms below to register

All fields are required. Log In

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Articles
  • About
  • Archive
    • ARCHIVE
    • NEWS ROUND-UPS
  • Podcasts
  • Newsletter
  • Premium
  • Donate
  • Log In

© Skeptics Ltd.

wpDiscuz
You are going to send email to

Move Comment