the times | Monday May 23 2022 2GM 7
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Jacks for the Platinum Jubilee, created a feel-good factor yesterday but demand for action to combat rising prices is growing. Seven in ten Conservative voters now support a windfall tax on energy companies
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JEFF MOOREBoris Johnson’s most senior civil ser-
vant is expected to come in for severe
criticism when Sue Gray’s report into
lockdown-breaking parties in Down-
ing Street is published this week.
The report is said to make “very grim
reading” for Simon Case, the cabinet
secretary, despite the fact he escaped a
fine from the Metropolitan Police for at-
tending gatherings in Downing Street.
No 10 has drawn up a plan to contain
the fallout from the report, which is ex-
pected to directly criticise Johnson and
a group of senior figures around him in
Downing Street.
Those named in the report had until
5pm last night to raise objections, as
Gray, a senior civil servant, finalised the
details before publication.
Following the release of the report,
Johnson will head to the Commons to
offer an explanation in public before
addressing backbench Conservative
MPs at a meeting of the 1922 Commit-
Where is our minister for the north, asks red wall MP
Geraldine Scott Political Reporter house minister in 2019-20, said that the
80-strong NRG had told him they
“want that minister for the north” after
his former responsibilities were taken
in by Grant Shapps, the transport sec-
retary. “Colleagues are really clear that
actually, to get that distinctive northern
Conservative voice out there, you need
someone to go toe to toe with Andy
Burnham, Steve Rotheram, other
northern mayors... and that’s really
missing at the moment,” he said, refer-
ring to the Labour metro mayors for
Greater Manchester and Liverpool.
He claimed that without a minister
for the north there was a risk that
Downing Street would come under
pressure to allow northern Tories to
split off and develop their own policies
and messaging. He expects the issue to
be discussed at the NRG’s first confer-
ence in Doncaster on June 17. Five days
later by-elections in Wakefield and
Tiverton & Honiton will show how well
the Tories are performing at opposite
ends of the country.
Berry, 43, said there were specific
needs in the north of England that
London could not understand. He
added: “When I went in [to parliament]
in 2010, we were effectively a southern
party that had a few northern members
of parliament. That has been turned on
its head by the 2019 results and actually,
we are now a party that has its feet firm-
ly planted in both the north and thesouth of England. The fact that we now
have a Conservative MP representing
them doesn’t give some God-given
right to continue for ever to have a
Conservative MP. Frankly, if we don’t
win seats in the north then Boris John-
son is not going to be prime minister.”
Berry, who did not deny that he
would like to return to cabinet, said:
“There’s quite a lot of messaging about
levelling up and delivery for the north,
which plays really badly [in the south].
“The point is that it’s a similar chal-
lenge that we face in Scotland and
Wales, because there is different mes-
saging for the Conservative Party in
Scotland and there’s different messag-
ing for the Conservative Party in Wales... there is actually a Conservative Party
in Northern Ireland, but it doesn’t do
very much. And I suppose one of the
things that we will talk about at this
conference is how can an all-England
Conservative Party appeal to voters in
Surrey Heath and Darlington? Is there
something about having the same phi-
losophy but different messaging
around it?”
Berry said a key example was the lack
of a minerals strategy. He also high-
lighted the cost-of-living crisis, saying
he supported increasing universal
credit and cutting VAT. “People aren’t
worried, they’re scared,” he said. “We
need the Treasury mindset to change.”
The political landscape, letters, page 30
Boris Johnson risks being thrown out of
office by red wall voters at the next
election, a leading Conservative MP
has warned, as he said that the govern-
ment had “gone backwards” in its pro-
mises for the north.
Jake Berry, head of the Northern
Research Group (NRG) of Tory MPs,
said that northern voters would be
“kingmakers” at the next election
because the Tory party had undergone
a “generational shift”. He said that the
government had to find a way to bal-
ance the competing demands from the
north and the south.
Berry, who was the northern power-
Gray expected to condemn top civil servant
George Grylls trast, were told by party lawyers to
provide the bare minimum detail and
dared the police to come after them,
which they generally did not.”
In total 83 people were issued with
126 fixed penalty notices, with 35 men
receiving fines compared with 48
women. Scotland Yard decided to ex-
clude four parties from its probe
because they did not meet “the thresh-
old for criminal investigation”.
However, one of the people at a
gathering in the Downing Street gar-
den on May 15, 2020, that was not
looked at by the Met told The Times that
the event was “definitely a party”.
The gathering was dismissed as a
work event even though a picture
emerged of Johnson drinking wine
with Dominic Cummings, his former
chief adviser, and his wife Carrie, on the
Downing Street terrace. They told The
Times that the event was just “people
getting pissed in the garden”.
A selection of photographs are
expected to form part of Gray’s report
to illustrate the culture of lockdown-
breaking.
Gray handed more than 300 images
to the Met to help with its investigation,
including some which are believed to
feature the prime minister holding a
can of beer, looking at the camera, at his
lockdown-breaking birthday party in
2020.
Further photographs were destroyed
when the first reports about parties
emerged at the end of last year.
On the night of one infamous party
on the eve of the Duke of Edinburgh’s
funeral last year, No 10 staff photo-
graphed each other using the swing and
the slide in the Downing Street garden,
according to witnesses.
One partygoer took pictures on their
instant camera while others updated
live stories on Instagram. All the photos
are believed to have been deleted many
months later when the first stories
emerged as those involved became
worried about potentially incriminat-
ing evidence.last senior one left so if Johnson is look-
ing for a human shield on the Gray
report he might be it,” a Whitehall
source said.
A senior government source said the
report makes “very grim reading” for
Case as further questions emerged
about the way the Met handled
the investigation.
There has been widespread
bemusement over the decision
to only fine the prime minister
for attending a birthday gather-
ing with cake, an event
that had been seen as
the most inconsequen-
tial of all the parties.
“Junior civil ser-
vants were told to be
totally honest and tell
everything they
know — and they’ve
been fined,” the
source said.
“Politicos and [spe-
cial advisers], in con-tee behind closed doors on Wednesday.
A No 10 source said: “We’re keen to
move on. The report deserves its mo-
ment in the spotlight to be scrutinised.
But at the end of the day, we want to be
getting on with the job.”
Case was originally asked by John-
son to lead the investigation into
lockdown parties but was forced to
step aside when The Times
revealed that a Christmas party
quiz was hosted in his office in
December 2020.
Amid speculation that
Johnson could make Case
a scapegoat, No 10 insist-
ed last night that the
prime minister retained
full confidence in his
cabinet secretary.
“He’s likely to be
criticised and is theSimon Case held a
Christmas party in
his office in 2020