Probe into Johnson’s £15k Mustique trip
He’s among 9 MPs facing sleaze claims
BORIS Johnson is under investigation by Westminster’s sleaze watchdog over the £15,000 holiday he and Carrie Symonds took to Mustique, it was confirmed yesterday.
The Prime Minister is one of nine MPs – all but one of them Conservatives – being looked into by Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards Kathryn Stone.
The list of MPs published yesterday showed that Mr Johnson is being investigated over a registration regarding ‘Visits outside the UK’.
It relates to who funded the luxury ten-day break he and his fiancee enjoyed to the private Caribbean island more than a year ago.
If he is found to have broken the rules, he could be forced to apologise and if the commissioner refers the case to the standards committee as a particularly serious breach, he could even be suspended from the Commons.
The investigation also comes as the PM faces three probes into the funding of his lavish redecoration of his Downing Street flat. Mr Johnson and Miss Symonds jetted off to Mustique – a hideaway for the rich and famous – on Boxing Day 2019, just weeks after his general election triumph.
They stayed in a three-bedroom hillside villa called Indigo, which boasts four-poster beds and an infinity pool. After the trip Mr Johnson declared the break in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
Among his ‘benefits received’, he registered ‘accommodation for a private holiday for my partner and me, value £15,000’ in St Vincent and the Grenadines, the archipelago of which Mustique is one island. He listed donor as Carphone Warehouse co-founder David Ross.
But Mr Ross then said he had only helped arrange the trip and had not funded it.
The investigation is looking into whether the PM potentially breached the part of the Code of Conduct that requires MPs to ‘fulfil conscientiously the requirements of the House in respect of the registration of interests in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests’.
Mr Ross’s spokesman told Sky News yesterday: ‘Mr Ross facilitated accommodation for Mr Johnson on Mustique valued at £15,000. Therefore this is a benefit in kind from Mr Ross to Mr Johnson, and Mr Johnson’s declaration to the House of Commons is correct.’
And Downing Street yesterday repeated its insistence that all the required transparency declarations were met regarding the trip. But Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner said: ‘Another day, another investigation into Boris Johnson for more sleaze and dodgy dealings.
‘The public have a right to know who paid for Boris Johnthe
‘Could even be suspended’
son’s luxury Caribbean holiday and the renovation of his flat.’
Former environment secretary Owen Paterson is among the eight Tories under investigation by the parliamentary commissioner. He is being investigated over alleged breaches of rules on ‘paid advocacy’, registration of interests and use of public facilities. He insists he correctly declared his financial interests.
The ninth MP is Claudia Webbe, currently suspended from Labour while she awaits trial for harassment.