“Partygate”: Sue Gray’s long-awaited report submitted to Boris Johnson

Published on : 01/31/2022 – 13:47

The long-awaited administrative report on “Partygate”, the scandal of parties organized in Downing Street during confinement, was delivered to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, local media reported on Monday (January 31st).

The publication of this report, written by senior civil servant Sue Gray, on the farewell parties, garden parties and Christmas or birthday parties organized in 2020 and 2021 at the Prime Minister’s residence has been keeping the press and the British political class.

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But the document was slow to be published, according to the press because of questions about what may appear in it, while the police in turn seized the scandal.

“We can confirm that Sue Gray has provided an update on her investigation of the Prime Minister”, commented, in a terse press release, a spokesperson for the Cabinet Office, the inter-ministerial agency from which the work of the senior official came.

A watered down version?

According to British news agency PA, “a version” of his investigation was given to Boris Johnson, and Sky News says the document given on Monday does not constitute “the full and final report”, when the Tory leader is expected to do so. a statement in the House of Commons in the afternoon.

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British police, who have opened an investigation into several of these parties, potentially the most damaging to Boris Johnson, had provoked outrage by asking that this internal report be redacted of key elements so as not to harm their own investigations, raising fears of the publication of a watered down version.

These parties have plunged Boris Johnson into a serious crisis which threatens his retention in his post, the calls for the resignation having multiplied even in the conservative majority. Many members of his camp are waiting for the publication of the internal report to decide whether or not to try to oust him by means of a vote of no confidence.

With AFP and Reuters