22 March 2023
The first thing to note about the appearance of Boris Johnson at the hearing today of the committee of privileges is that how little difference it will probably make to the committee’s report.
This is because the bulk of the report will be based on documentary evidence and the written evidence of other witnesses.
On certain points there is the possibility that the oral evidence of Johnson may make a difference – where it will rebut or even refute what the evidence would otherwise point to.
This is to be expected – and it can be compared with civil litigation where the respective merits of the parties’ cases can often become plain on disclosure of documentary evidence and the exchange of witness statements, long before any actual trial and cross-examination.
As such, today’s hearing was not an all-or-nothing gladiatorial bout.
For, as far as the committee’s report is concerned, what Johnson had to say may only have marginal importance, and on some points his evidence may make no difference at all.
Instead, and as this blog averred would be the case yesterday, Johnson gave the impression that he was playing to other audiences – that of his fellow parliamentarians (who would have to decide on any sanction) and to the media and the public (who would aid him in placing pressure on parliamentarians).
His combative and sometimes even confrontational performance makes no sense if you see it as an attempt to shape the committee’s report – but it made a lot of sense in his objectives to discredit the committee and any adverse report, and to frame himself as a victim.
Unfortunately for his strategy and tactics, he fell flat on at least a couple of occasions, including when he indicated that he would only accept the committee’s findings as fair if he was cleared.
No doubt if he is “cleared” he will hold the committee up as an exemplar of fairness and thoroughness.
And this will not be the first time he has wanted his cake and to eat it.
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Long term followers of this blog and this story may recall that it was observed last year that the “showing leadership” formulation was highly successful in heading off fixed penalty notices from the police.
At a stroke Johnson had a plausible explanation for being at almost all the gatherings – even thought those also attending got the penalties.
The only gathering for which that explanation could not work was for his own birthday, and so that is why he perhaps got a penalty for that and not any other gatherings.
I do not know if that theory is true, but it so far matches the facts better than any other explanation.
Today showed that Johnson is fully into his stride with the “showing leadership” explanation for his attendance at the gatherings.
The problem, however, is that a defence for his attendance which works with the police for breaking the criminal law does not necessarily work as an excuse for whether he knew the gatherings generally would be against the non-legal guidance.
It may well be that the price of heading off more than one fixed penalty notice is that Johnson now has no real answer to the hard questions of this committee about what he would have known at the time.
Johnson also had no real answer today to where some commentators think he is most exposed – his failure to correct the record as soon as he realised what he said was not correct.
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Nobody knows what the committee will decide – and, if they say Johnson is in contempt, what the House of Commons will determine as any sanction.
The committee may still find that Johnson made those statements in good faith and that he corrected the record in a timely manner – even though the other evidence points to a breach of privilege.
Perhaps.
But whether the “greased piglet” gets away (again) without serious sanction may be determined by the audiences to whom Johnson was playing today.
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I beg to differ. His performance will make a big difference in the court of public opinion and the penalty handed down by parliamentarians.
The ‘optics’ and his body language will be played out in clips if he gets away with it.
If he gets the full penalty and loses his seat Sunak could be on a winner without Johnson to worry about.
Differ? I hoped that is what my post was saying.
The first two paragraphs – to paraphrase – the performance would make little difference as the evidence was all in the written evidence that struck me.
The following paragraphs are worth reading too :-)
Indeed they are.
But reviewing the questioning from all Committee members, in particular the Tory members, confirms Johnson’s character which just reading the evidence would never achieve.
I never found the showing leadership excuse remotely convincing. What it shows is that the No10 culture involved drinking, often by partying but also while staff were working at their desks, as Johnson admitted today. I find it hard to imagine this happened while Theresa May was PM.
The true way of showing leadership would have been for Johnson to insist that all this came to an end after the coronavirus restrictions were introduced.
It is perfectly possibly for leaders to thank their staff without partying and alcohol, whether during the pandemic or in more normal times. Most workplaces now ban alcohol, though I suspect Johnson may be unaware of this.
There are of course some situations where alcohol is (or was) regarded as a necessary part of the job. Journalists ply those they meet with drink in order to get them to say things that they otherwise wouldn’t. When I was an ACAS conciliator in the 1980s we did it for the same reason.
I watched it all and found him wholly unconvincing. I would be surprised if those who could not attend funerals of family, those who worked in hospitals, nursing homes and delivered essentials, the “key workers” so valuable during lock down but not worth a pay rise now, did not share that opinion. The idea that he had to drink and thank a member of staff leaving, when a senior surgeon doing open heart surgery could not do the same for a scrub nurse, or care workers with inadequate PPS in an old people’s’ home not allowed to have a drink of tea together after work, I think most people would find offensive. The sense of entitlement was palpable.
My observation is that Johnson tried to convince the Committee, MPs and us that it was reasonable for him to think that the rules didn’t apply to No10, or at least not in the same way as they did to the rest of us. I think the ‘no rules for us’ mentality at No 10 explains everything: the parties, the booze ups, the leaving do’s, his birthday party, hell, even Barnard Castle, happened with his implicit or explicit approval. It also explains why there was a photographer, and why there were no warnings that events might have broken the rules. ‘No rules for us’ was a given. Accepted by everyone at Downing Street. It was this that needed to be hidden.
Johnson’s defence seems to rely on the “logic” that – because it was reasonable that the rules didn’t apply to us, they couldn’t have been broken, and therefore the rules were followed. That’s how birthday parties and leaving drinks suddenly become necessary for work. Why the social distancing rule is suddenly ‘where possible’. But of course ‘No rules for us’ is not the same as ‘the rules and guidance were followed at all times’. Quite the opposite. That’s why “No rules for us” was what needed to be denied and hidden. That’s why he lied. That’s why it was intentional.
And why it won’t wash with the public. But why the attempt to discredit the committee.
Absolutely agree. You have summed it up perfectly.
You refer to Johnson’s “failure to correct the record as soon as he realised what he said was not correct.”
Surely that instant in time was no later than when he uttered the words in question.
He started, rather bizarrely, that he still believes that his statements to parliament were true. So the question of correcting them doesn’t arise.
Yes, and later he acknowledged and “apologised” about “inadvertently” misleading parliament.
That’s the trouble with lying. It is the ultimate memory test!
Would it be within the scope of the committee to formally comment (even as a passing and carefully-caveated “concern”) in their final report if they were to feel that a contemptuous attitude to the committee itself may possibly have been displayed?
To insist, as Johnson does, that a staff get-together with drinks, thank-you speeches, etc., to mark a colleague’s departure is not just “reasonably necessary for work purposes” but important, even vital, is to take a very broad view of what constitutes work.
Perceptive analysis as ever, thank you.
One question… was the Lord Pannick acting for the member for Uxbridge on a no win, no fee basis?
Most certainly not.
I was fascinated by one small detail: when Johnson took the oath, he concluded with the words “so help me God”. Those words do not form part of the oath as used in courts in England and Wales, but they are used in the United States. There is nothing that I can find in the Oaths Act 1978 or the Parliamentary Witnesses Oaths Act 1871 to justify their use. And Erskine May (part 6, paragraph 38.37) does not specify the exact form of words to be used when Parliamentary Committees administer the oath to a witness. So was their use by Johnson an embellishment of his own making, or did the Committee Clerk add the words for some reason?
It did sound like the verbal equivalent of a gavel. Perhaps someone had advised him that the Magna Carta says that the oath doesn’t count if you change the words.
Is it so that Johnson retains the title, “Right Honourable”?
In vino veritas, in aqua sanitas.
This little taught legal principle is so very true.
“The first thing to note about the appearance of Boris Johnson at the hearing today of the committee of privileges is that how little difference it will probably make to the committee’s report.”
Yes, they seemed to have decided already. Like the King of Hearts, “Sentence first, verdict afterwards.”
No: evidence first, waffle afterwards.
But you had to read the rest of the post to understand this.
I suppose some poor souls will spend time dissecting the documentary evidence and what was said. We taxpayers will have to pay them to do this – to what useful end? We are most unlikely to see Johnson led away in chains – all we will see is some political fudge. Might as well put £500,000 in the poor box now and achieve something useful.
A rather expensive form of theatre treble billed with Rishi’s Windsor Knot show and the Naughty MET show. Not very amusing.
The ‘repeatedly assured by officials’ statements in the House could be his undoing. Indeed, he said, in the hearing, ”by Civil Servants’, but he only mentioned getting an assurance from his own political adviser(s). (He waffled somewhat.) The most obvious ‘officials’ have denied giving any such advice, and he cannot name a civil servant who did.