Partygate

• On 12th April 2022, Boris Johnson was issued with a fixed penalty notice by the Metropolitan Police, which was investigating claims that illegal parties were held at No.10 during the COVID-19 lockdowns of 2020 and 2021
• Johnson became the first serving prime minister to be sanctioned for breaking the law
• Opposition MPs accused Johnson of having lied about these gatherings, as he had previously said in the Commons that no parties had been held in No.10 and "no COVID rules were broken"
• On 21st April 2022, the Commons passed a motion, tabled by Labour leader Keir Starmer, that called for the Privileges Committee to investigate whether the Prime Minister's statements relating to the so-called 'partygate' scandal had misled the Commons, and, if so, whether this conduct amounted to a contempt
• The Committee of Privileges began its investigation in July, and quickly requested a range of written evidence from the Government and oral testimony from a number of witnesses, including Johnson, who appeared before the Committee on 22nd March 2023
• Johnson insisted that, whether or not lockdown rules were broken at No.10, he had genuinely believed that he was complying with them, and therefore did not 'knowingly mislead' the Commons
• Contempts the Committee found Johnson to have committed

  • Deliberately misleading the House
  • Deliberately misleading the Privileges Committee
  • Breaching confidence
  • Impugning the Committee and thereby undermining the democratic process of the House
  • Being complicit in the campaign of abuse and attempted intimidation of the Committee
• The Committee argued that Johnson's "denials and explanations were so disingenuous" that they were either "deliberate attempts to mislead" the House, or evidence of how frequently "he closed his mind to the truth"
• On 8th June 2023, the Committee shared its provisional conclusions with Johnson, "under conditions of strict confidentiality." However, the next day, Johnson released a public statement in which he criticised the inquiry, and revealed some of its provisional conclusions before the Committee's report could be finalised and sent to the Commons
• In the public statement Johnson released on 9th June, he accused the Committee of "egregious bias", and called its report a "political hit job" that is "riddled with inaccuracies and reeks of prejudice"
• The Committee argued that Johnson's attack on the Committee "constituted an attack on our democratic institutions" and was an "egregious contempt"
• At the hearing on 22nd March, Johnson expressed respect for the Committee, and distanced himself from criticisms, made by some in the media, and by some supportive MPs, that its investigation was a "witch hunt" and "kangaroo court". However, Johnson then used these exact terms in his 9th June statement.
• The UK's uncodified constitution is a predominantly political constitution, in which executive power is largely checked by unwritten, non-legal conventions that are enforced by elected representatives, and in which key constitutional questions are often treated as subjective, political matters, best settled by majority votes in Parliament
• This is in contrast with the codified, predominantly legal constitutions that are found in most other countries, in which constitutional debates are treated as more objective, legal matters, that are best answered by independent judges, and in which executive power is checked by a strong judiciary, enforcing the higher laws of the constitution
• All constitutions contain a combination of political and legal elements. For example, even though the US has a codified constitution, it has still developed a range of non-legal, political conventions, that fill in some of gaps left by this document. Likewise, in recent decades, landmark statutes like the Human Rights Act (1998), have introduced legal elements into the UK's constitution, by strengthening the Supreme Court's powers of judicial review
• Uncodified, political constitution

  Unwritten, non-legal conventions that are enforced by elected representatives, and in which key constitutional questions are often treated as subjective, political matters, best settled by majority votes in Parliament
• Codified, legal constitution


  Predominantly legal constitutions found in most other countries, in which constitutional debates are treated as more objective, legal matters, that are best answered by independent judges, and in which executive power is checked by a strong judiciary, enforcing the higher laws of the constitution
• All constitutions contain a combination of political and legal elements
• The US has a codified constitution, but has still developed a range of non-legal, political conventions, that fill in some of gaps left by this document
• In recent decades, landmark statutes like the Human Rights Act (1998), have introduced legal elements into the UK's constitution, by strengthening the Supreme Court's powers of judicial review
• UK's uncodified, political constitution


  • The executive branch is primarily checked by the legislature, rather than the judiciary
  • Backbenchers cannot be relied upon to enforce important constitutional limits and uphold the integrity of the political system
• Boris Johnson refused to resign after being fined for breaching lockdown rules


  The UK was experiencing "the most severe constitutional crisis involving a Prime Minister" in living memory
• The Ministerial Code, which states that Ministers who "knowingly mislead Parliament" are expected to resign, had been "shredded" by Boris Johnson
• With the courts unable to enforce constitutional conventions, it was left to Parliament to hold the government accountable
• UK constitution's fusion of powers

  • Over 150 MPs are ministers, parliamentary private secretaries and trade envoys who, under the convention of collective responsibility have to resign before opposing the Government
  • Backbench Conservatives were unlikely to want to undermine a leader who had delivered a landslide victory in 2019, and upon whom they depended for promotion
• On 6th June 2020, Johnson won a confidence vote, with 211 Conservative MPs (58.8%) voting for him, and 148 (41.2%) voting against
• When Parliament voted to refer the matter of 'partygate' to the Privileges Committee, it was not clear how its conservative-majority membership would vote, or how the Committee's final report would be received by the Conservative majority in the House of Commons
• Media reports originally suggested that the Committee was planning on recommending a suspension of 10 days or more, which would have been long enough to trigger a recall petition under the Recall of MPs Act (2015)
• The Committee changed its recommendations following Johnson's 9th June resignation statement, and instead recommended that he should not be granted a former Member's pass
• In a free vote, 118 Conservative MPs, including 15 ministers, voted for the Privileges Committee's report, while 225 Conservative MPs, including Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, abstained
• Supporters of the UK's political constitution

  • Johnson's resignation proves that the political checks imposed by Parliament can be just as effective, and arguably even more flexible and efficient, than the legal checks enforced by constitutional courts
• Following the 2019 General Election, some commentators debated whether Johnson could end up occupying No. 10 for over a decade, but less than three years later, Johnson has lost not only the keys to No. 10, but his seat in the Commons
• The partygate scandal gradually exhausted Johnson's political resources, with 72% of the public now holding an unfavourable view of the Prime Minister
• The Conservative's poor performance in the April 2022 local elections led many Conservative councillors, who largely blamed Johnson, to call for his resignation
• Johnson's declining political power reached a tipping point in July 2023, following the resignation of the Deputy Chief Whip, Chris Pincher, which prompted a wave of frontbench resignations
• The Institute for Government noted the "extraordinary significance" of the Privileges Committee inquiry for upholding "the principle that ministers must tell the truth to parliament"
• When Johnson recommended a 24 working-day prorogation in 2019


  Johnson argued that the use of this prerogative power was limited only by non-legal conventions, and that the issue of whether he had used this power appropriately was a political question that could only be answered by elected MPs
• Johnson's opponents argued that the question was whether such an extensive prorogation power actually existed


  They argued that this was a legal question, that was best answered by independent, impartial judges
• The Supreme Court unanimously ruled in September 2019 that Johnson's advice was unlawful and void
• Johnson commissioned legal advice that argued that the Privileges Committee had adopted an "unfair procedure" that would have been found unlawful if tested in court