Sunday Mirror (Northern Ireland)
COPS MUST TELL ALL ON PARTY FINES
KEIR Starmer yesterday launched a scathing attack on police for refusing to say how many fines they are giving out for Partygate.
The Met say they will continue issuing fixed penalty notices for up to 12 No10 parties – but they won’t give any updates until after the local elections on May 5.
The Labour leader – who was once the nation’s chief prosecutor – hit back: “The Met police should not have changed their practice.
“They should continue to take their
decisions and make those decisions public as they were before.
“Criminal charges are brought all the time, elections or no elections. It’s in the public interest to know who has received fines, particularly those high up in government.
“And the Prime Minister must disclose if he gets further fines.”
It is understood that penalties for a bash on May 20, 2020, began dropping into inboxes on Friday.
Boris Johnson stayed at that party – which he insists was a “work event” – for 25 minutes then went upstairs for a scheduled call with the Queen.
No10 say that so far he has received no fine beyond the one 13 days ago for his birthday party in the Cabinet Room on June 19 that year.
Favourite to succeed him among Tory MPs is former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt. Insiders reckon he would get the powerful backing of former PM Theresa May who has made no secret of her disdain for the chaotic, lawbreaking premiership of her successor.
A Whitehall source said: “Hunt is a One Nation Conservative like her.
“That’s the direction she feels the party should be going in, but she never got the chance and has had to watch as Boris Johnson wrecks everything.”
Mrs May is saying nothing about who she will go for in a leadership contest. And there was not a peep from Mr Hunt when the Sunday Mirror put the question to him.
Leading challengers are Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and Foreign Affairs Committee chair Tom Tugendhat.
A senior Tory said: “Liz is the darling of the grassroots. If she makes it to the final two then the membership will overwhelmingly vote her in.”
Also in the frame are Trade Minister Penny Mordaunt – already promising MPs ministerial jobs if they back her – and Defence Secretary Ben Wallace.
Mr Johnson thought he’d get away with it when the first £50 fine dropped for attending his own birthday party. Tory MPs had been expecting it, and put it about that the Ukraine crisis was no time to change leader.
Letters of no-confidence to backbench shop steward Sir Graham Brady – who needs 54 to trigger a vote – were withdrawn.
But the mood quickly changed as their inboxes began to fill up with emails from angry constituents.
Former Immigration minister Caroline Nokes received hundreds.
She wrote: “One surpassed all others. It was from a constituent who lost his three-year-old child to a terminal illness. The family abided by