8 Wednesday January 26 2022 | the times
News
Detectives from the Metropolitan
Police will try to seize material that may
have been withheld from Sue Gray’s
inquiry into Downing Street parties as
part of the force’s criminal investi-
gation, which is set to last weeks.
Investigators can deploy the full
force of their powers, including seizing
phone records and requiring any guests
to submit to interviews, to uncover the
truth behind the series of events in
Downing Street and Whitehall.
There have been claims that Down-
ing Street officials and aides have delib-
erately withheld information from the
Cabinet Office inquiry amid concerns
about being implicated.
Gray, the senior civil servant oversee-
ing an inquiry into the events, was said
to have been “completely blindsided”
by revelations of two “boozy” Downing
Street parties held on the eve of the
Duke of Edinburgh’s funeral last year.
She was particularly frustrated because
staff had failed to come forward with
details about the parties. Gray did not
have powers to compel officials, aides
and ministers to submit phone records.
Sources said that the Met, however,
would have no hesitation in deploying
such powers if there was any suggestion
of a cover-up. The force has significant
search powers, though they would be
used only as a last resort.
Dame Cressida Dick, the Met Police
commissioner, announced yesterday
that detectives had begun investigating
a “number of events” in Downing Street
and Whitehall. Eight of 17 events are
said to be under criminal inquiry.
The force had previously refused
to investigate alleged parties at No 10
because they were reported retrospec-
tively. Its stance had attracted criticism
from politicians and former officers.
The decision to investigate was made
on Sunday after detectives received
material from Gray’s team that showed
potential criminal breaches. Detectives
widened the inquiry yesterday after re-
ceiving more information from the
Cabinet Office.
Dick told the London Assembly that
the Met had been reluctant during the
pandemic to investigate breaches after
they had taken place, but added that the
force would occasionally retrospective-
ly examine the “most serious flagrant
type of breach”. She said there were four
Recent months have seen no shortage
of comparisons between Boris John-
son’s embattled administration and
that of the Conservative prime minister
whose reign is now synonymous with
sleaze: John Major. But the decision by
the Metropolitan Police to open a
formal investigation into lockdown
parties at Downing Street invites a
comparison with the prime minister
Johnson relished in criticising in his
time as a journalist: Tony Blair.
Blair was the first and hitherto last
inhabitant of No 10 to find himself sub-
ject to a police investigation while in
office. Then the alleged offences were
of altogether greater gravity, but the
political impact may well prove eerily
similar. What was to become known as
the cash for peerages scandal began in
April 2006, when Desmond Smith, a
little-known government education
adviser, was arrested for an offence
under the 1925 Abuse of Honours act.
He was recorded saying that wealthy
donors who ploughed millions into
Blair’s academies programme could
Quentin Letts
Sentry whips watched
for Tory party-poopers
N
ot since Marie
Antoinette had cake
created such a
sensation. The rolling
news channels were
discussing little but Boris Johnson’s
birthday sponge.
The head of the Met (police, not
the opera house) announced that
her sleuths would be investigating.
The Speaker granted an urgent
question. The Commons turned toLabour’s deputy leader, Angela
Rayner, for her aria. Let La Stupenda
soar. Aiee. A cat gargling tacks.
Rayner was appalled —
scandalised! — that the Commons
was again discussing trivia rather
than debating more serious affairs.
Conservative MPs quickly noted that
it was Rayner who submitted the
urgent question, so she presumably
wanted parliament to spend 45
minutes on the matter.
Opposite Rayner, again, sat that
big-boned Horatio, the paymaster-
general, Michael Ellis. Each time
Covid shindigs have been raised in
urgent questions, it has fallen to Ellis
to respond. Each time he shimmers
in with a white square in his topPolitical Sketch
Outcome is immaterial — look at Blair
expect knighthoods and peerages.
What was later accepted by police to
have been a cynical assessment of the
reality of political patronage rather
than an inducement to corruption
nonetheless led to a long criminal
investigation. At its heart was Lord
Levy, who was accused of — and alwaysdenied — brokering millions of pounds
in loans from the super-rich on the
understanding that they would then be
recommended for peerages.
Unlike Levy and others at the heart
of his administration, such as Ruth
Turner, No 10’s head of government
relations, Blair was never arrested.
Nor, unlike Jonathan Powell, his
chief of staff, was the prime minister
interviewed under caution. Instead,
police came three times to DowningStreet to question him as a witness. As
the months dragged on the focus shift-
ed from the alleged sale of honours to a
conspiracy to pervert the course of jus-
tice. In the end, 16 months after the first
arrest, no criminal charges were
brought. Neither Blair nor his inner cir-
cle had to endure the personal agony
and constitutional quagmire such a
decision would have surely meant. Yet
by then their time in power was over.
To say the police investigation that
menaced his administration in its dog
days was Blair’s ultimate undoing
would be reductive to the point of in-
accuracy, but for Gordon Brown, wide-
ly suspected of having forced the issue
into the public domain, the scandal was
a godsend.
With leadership contenders circling
and MPs losing patience with the
prime minister, the present inhabitants
of No 10 would do well to heed the
words of Bob Ainsworth, Blair’s deputy
chief whip. “What are we going to do
about him?” he said as he learnt of the
loans. “He’s becoming outrageous. Like
Louis XIV – l’etat, c’est moi. Sooner or
later, there will be a coup attempt.”Patrick Maguire Red Box Editor
Tony Blair was
embroiled in the
2006 cash for
peerages scandalNews Politics
Detectives have power to force
Fiona Hamilton Crime Editor
Steven Swinford Political Editor
reasons that this had been considered
appropriate in this case: there was hard
evidence; evidence that those involved
knew or ought to have known that what
they were doing was an offence; that
not investigating would “sufficiently
undermine” the legitimacy of the law;
and that there was “little ambiguity of
absence of any reasonable defence”.
Sources told The Times the inquiry
was likely to take weeks and could
extend further depending on the evi-
dence gathered. The Met plans to carry
it out as “expeditiously as possible”.
Detectives have asked the Cabinet
Office team to send its evidence to
them. Detectives have been in close
liaison with the team, which had gath-
ered documentary evidence including
emails that are being passed over for
assessment. The Met already has access
to security camera footage of outside
buildings, incident logs and other notes
by officers in the diplomatic protection
group deployed at No 10.
Anyone who organised an event
could be interviewed while guests are
expected to be asked to account for
their “reasonable excuse” to be there.
The investigation is being carried out
by the Met’s special inquiry team, over-
seen by Jane Connors, deputy assistant
commissioner.
Dick said she understood the “deep
public concern about the allegations in
the media the past several weeks” given
that the vast majority of the public had
acted responsibly during the lock-
downs and many had suffered con-
siderable loss and made huge sacrifices.
She added: “Throughout the pan-
demic the Met has sought to take a pro-
portionate approach. I should stress the
fact we are now investigating does not
mean that fixed penalty notices will
necessarily be issued in every instance
and to every person involved. We will
not be giving a running commentary on
current investigations.”
The Met has refused to say which
parties it is investigating but its
announcement came a day after No 10
admitted that Johnson attended a
birthday celebration organised by his
wife on June 19, 2020, when social gath-
erings indoors were banned.
No 10’s ‘culture’ problems all stem from
Johnson, Daniel Finkelstein, page 25
We feel like fools for following the
rules, Alice Thomson, page 27
Police investigation adds pressure
on the PM, leading article, page 29 Liz Truss arriving for the cabinet meeting yesterday at which Boris Johnson didQ&A
What has the Met announced?
Dame Cressida Dick, the
commissioner, told a committee of
the London assembly that her force
was investigating several events at
Downing Street and Whitehall over
the past two years that could have
involved “potential breaches of
Covid-19 regulations”. According to
some reports, eight events are
being looked at by detectives.Why is the force investigating now?
Dick said it made the decision after
information was provided by the
Cabinet Office — that is, by the
inquiry team led by Sue Gray. She
said her officers had applied a
three-part test for whether it should
investigate potential breaches that
took place so long ago: whether
there is evidence that those
involved knew, or ought to have
known, that their behaviour was
against the rules; whether a decision
not to investigate would undermine
the law; and whether there was little
ambiguity about the offence. She
said all three tests had been met.What happens now?
Dick declined to give a sense of how
long the Met’s investigation would
take. Contrary to briefings after the
Met’s announcement, it seems that
Gray’s report, or at least some of it,
will still be published this week.
Even if Gray’s report is not damning
and allows Boris Johnson to reset
relations with his parliamentary
party and appoint new staff in
Downing Street, he will be
hampered by the Met investigation
continuing in the background. The
key question is whether the police
will punish Johnson or others
around him if they are found to have
broken lockdown rules they wrote.What is the sanction?
Breaches of Covid-19 restrictions
result in a fixed penalty notice,
which is not a criminal conviction.
Matters have reached court only if
suspects refused to pay.